Well, of course this is no surprise. But there is no real reason why Saudi officials couldn’t or wouldn’t have helped out with this. After all, the ideology of Al-Qaeda was nurtured and supported by high-level Saudis for years. Must we assume that all this support abruptly vanished? From AP, :
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — The Al Qaeda group responsible for abducting and killing an American engineer says it was aided by sympathizers in the Saudi security forces, a claim that was denied by Saudi authorities. …
Sunday’s Al Qaeda article said the militants decided to behead Johnson when Adel al-Jubeir, foreign affairs adviser to Crown Prince Abdullah in Washington, declared that Saudi Arabia would not negotiate with the kidnappers.
The group said it beheaded Johnson, 49, of Eagleswood Township, N.J., when its deadline expired Friday.
Asked about the Al Qaeda statement in a televised interview, al-Jubeir said, “We have never negotiated with terrorists. We don’t intend to do so.
“I believe what the Al Qaeda people were trying to do is trying to justify a murder that is unjustifiable under any faith or under any principle of humanity.”
Mm-hmm. If these high-sounding words had actually been Saudi policy for the last twenty years or so, we might not be in this fix.