It’s hard to tell what exactly is happening in Saudi Arabia. The New York Times presents it as a genuine relaxation of Islamic strictures, which, as is clear from the Times article itself, is not the same thing as reform of Islam: Muslim clerics who know full well what the contents of Islamic law are regard the crackdown with extreme concern, precisely because they’re afraid that Muhammad bin Salman will transgress the bounds of Islam.
The arrest of Prince Alwaleed, in any case, is good news, but not for any reason that the establishment media will present. (The corruption charge in Saudi Arabia is as absurd as handing out speeding tickets at the Indianapolis 500.) Alwaleed is the chief financier of Georgetown’s Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, named for himself, one of the primary propaganda factories that perpetuate the “Islamophobia” myth in the United States. Within that Center is the Bridge Initiative, which purports to build bridges between Muslims and Christians but is actually devoted to smearing and defaming opponents of jihad terror and Sharia oppression.
If the Saudis are really committed to reform, let them close down their Georgetown “Islamophobia” propaganda mill. I won’t be holding my breath.
“Future Saudi king tightens grip on power with arrests including Prince Alwaleed,” by Stephen Kalin and Katie Paul, Reuters, November 5, 2017:
RIYADH (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia’s future king has tightened his grip on power through an anti-corruption purge by arresting royals, ministers and investors including billionaire Alwaleed bin Talal who is one of the kingdom’s most prominent businessmen.
Prince Alwaleed, a nephew of the king and owner of investment firm Kingdom Holding, invests in firms such as Citigroup and Twitter. He was among 11 princes, four ministers and tens of former ministers detained, three senior officials told Reuters on Sunday.
The purge against the kingdom’s political and business elite also targeted the head of the National Guard, Prince Miteb bin Abdullah, who was detained and replaced as minister of the powerful National Guard by Prince Khaled bin Ayyaf.
The allegations against Prince Alwaleed include money laundering, bribery and extorting officials, one official told Reuters, while Prince Miteb is accused of embezzlement, hiring ghost employees and awarding contracts to his own companies including a $10 billion deal for walkie talkies and bulletproof military gear worth billions of Saudi riyals.
The allegations could not be independently verified and members of the families of those detained could not be reached.
News of the purge came soon after King Salman decreed late on Saturday the creation of an anti-corruption committee chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, his 32-year-old favorite son who has amassed power since rising from obscurity three years ago….
“Saudi Prince, Asserting Power, Brings Clerics to Heel,” by Ben Hubbard, New York Times, November 5, 2017 (thanks to Mike):
BURAIDA, Saudi Arabia — For decades, Saudi Arabia’s religious establishment wielded tremendous power, with bearded enforcers policing public behavior, prominent sheikhs defining right and wrong, and religious associations using the kingdom’s oil wealth to promote their intolerant interpretation of Islam around the world.
Now, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is curbing their power as part of his drive to impose his control on the kingdom and press for a more open brand of Islam.
Before the arrests on Saturday of his fellow royals and former ministers on corruption allegations, Prince Mohammed had stripped the religious police of their arrest powers and expanded the space for women in public life, including promising them the right to drive.
Dozens of hard-line clerics have been detained, while others were designated to speak publicly about respect for other religions, a topic once anathema to the kingdom’s religious apparatus.
If the changes take hold, they could mean a historic reordering of the Saudi state by diminishing the role of hard-line clerics in shaping policy. That shift could reverberate abroad by moderating the exportation of the kingdom’s uncompromising version of Islam, Wahhabism, which has been accused of fueling intolerance and terrorism.
Bringing the religious establishment to heel is also a crucial part of the prince’s efforts to take the traditional levers of Saudi power under his control. The arrests on Saturday appeared to cripple potential rivals within the royal family and send a warning to the business community to toe the line.
Prince Mohammed has taken control of the country’s three main security forces, and now is corralling the powerful religious establishment.
As evidence of that, the kingdom’s chief religious body, the Council of Senior Scholars, endorsed the arrests over the weekend, saying that Islamic law “instructs us to fight corruption and our national interest requires it.”
The 32-year-old crown prince outlined his religious goals at a recent investment conference in Riyadh, saying the kingdom needed a “moderate, balanced Islam that is open to the world and to all religions and all traditions and peoples.”
But such top-down changes will face huge challenges in a deeply conservative society steeped in the idea that Saudi Arabia’s religious strictures set it apart from the rest of the world as a land of unadulterated Islam. Enforcing those changes will also require overhauling the state’s sprawling religious bureaucracy, many of whose employees fear that the kingdom is forsaking its principles.
“For sure, it does not make me comfortable,” a government cleric in Buraida, a conservative city north of Riyadh, said of the new acceptance of gender mixing and music at public events. “Anything that has sin in it, anything that angers the Almighty — it’s a problem.”
The government has tried to silence such sentiments by arresting clerics and warning members of the religious police not to speak publicly about the loss of their powers, according to their relatives.
All clerics interviewed for this article spoke on condition of anonymity for fear that they, too, would be arrested for breaking with the government line….
Public observance of any religion other than Islam is banned, and clerics run the justice system, which hands down harsh punishments like floggings and prison for crimes like disobeying one’s father and apostasy.
Human rights groups say the kingdom’s textbooks still promote intolerance, and conservatives in the education ministry pass their views along to students.
While the prohibition on the mixing of unrelated men and women is starting to change, gender segregation remains the norm.
Crown Prince Mohammed, who rose to prominence after his father became king in 2015, has shown little deference to the traditional religious establishment while spearheading an unprecedented social opening.
When the government took arrest powers away from the religious police last year, many Saudis were so shocked that they suspected it was not real. That change paved the way for new entertainment options, including concerts and dance performances.
In addition to promising women the right to drive next June, the government has named women to high-profile jobs and announced that it would allow them to enter soccer stadiums, another blow to the ban on mixing of the sexes.
In pushing such reforms, Crown Prince Mohammed is betting the kingdom’s large youth population cares more about entertainment and economic opportunities than religious dogma.
Many young Saudis have cheered the new direction, and would love to see the clerics banished from public life. But the changes have shocked conservatives.
“Society in general at this time is very scared,” said another cleric in Buraida. “They feel that the issue is negative. It will push women into society. That is what is in their minds, that it is not right and that it will bring more corruption than benefits.”
Like other clerics, he saw no religious reason to bar women from driving but said he was against changing the status of women in ways that he said violated Islamic law.
“They want her to dance. They want her to go to the cinema. They want her to uncover her face. They want her to show her legs and thighs. That is liberal thought,” he said. “It is a corrupting ideology.”…
Wellington says
Nothing more than cannibalization of one faction of barbarians of another faction of barbarians.
But poor, poor, Georgetown University, which has sold its soul to decrepits like Alwaleed. Guess Georgetown, which is Catholic in name only (anymore so is the papacy), will have to look elsewhere to sell what’s left of its soul. I’m sure they’ll find a Muslim “taker” out there sooner or later. No doubt.
And incidentally, Rudy Giuliani is looking even better now, now isn’t he? Unlike Georgetown, he would not sell his soul to a deceiver like Alwaleed.
Giuliani versus Georgetown. Who you takin’?
gravenimage says
Yes–Rudy refusing to take that repulsive, strings-attached check was one of his finest moments.
As for this, it is more of Muslims eating their own.
mgoldberg says
Alaweed’s money will continue to flow generously. Whether it’s his or another’s there… the money will continue to flow to Georgetown. I remember after seeing Giuliani make his forthright, principled stand, that it meant nothing to the saudi’s. They didn’t care. It was just one more thing for them to ignore, and pretend it was of no importance to them…. it wasn’t. They couldn’t care less. ‘They depise the judeo-christian west, and the US, and Israel, and all the rest. They simply have the oil moolah to buy off anyone and everyone for their civilizational jihad. That is extremely important to them. We love the sanity and reasonableness of Giuliani’s statement. To them, it was just something in their way, and they did buy their way around it. It always comes down to power with them, just as it did with Mohammed.
eduardo odraude says
I think Trump may have learned a thing or two from Rudy — Rudy was one of the kings of political incorrectness back in the day, and as with Trump, people tended to love Rudy or hate him. Like Trump, Rudy was vilified as a racist, but was nothing of the kind.
George says
Robert understated Alwaleeds influence. The prince has been at work doing the same thing in Scotland. Though I have not been following his efforts throughout the West, I have no doubt that Saudi Arabia intends to pollute universities through Europe with its propaganda, paving the way for the hegemony of Islam.
Infidel Lass says
Wait and see. Crown Prince Mohammed could be the best thing to happen to Saudi Arabia- or it could just be a way of taking complete control over the country for his own benefit. I’m curious though- where’s the King in all this? Is this what he named his successor for, and won’t he feel threatened enough by hard-liners to revert the progress?
gravenimage says
I think any “progress” made in the hideous Shari’ah state of Saudi Arabia will be minimal at best. After all, how many times have we seen a new king there declared a “moderate” and “reformer”–yet the beheadings in Chop-Chop square go on…
Wellington says
Agreed, gravenimage. Reminds me of the many times during the Cold War when it was announced that a moderate was now at the helm of some Communist country, for instance when Andropov became First (General) Secretary in 1982 after Brezhnev kicked the bucket and the Western press went on and on about how he liked Scotch, jazz, blah, blah, blah.
Infidel Lass says
Hmmm, I suspect as much. On the other hand, the prince is young- barely in his 30s- and shows some appreciation for western culture- see the mixed gender parties and allowing music. He won’t be able to completely change SA during his reign, but maybe it is a positive sign. Not that I’m hopeful or anything, but we might be surprised yet.
gravenimage says
Agreed, Wellington.
gravenimage says
Infidel Lass wrote:
Hmmm, I suspect as much. On the other hand, the prince is young- barely in his 30s- and shows some appreciation for western culture- see the mixed gender parties and allowing music. He won’t be able to completely change SA during his reign, but maybe it is a positive sign.
………………….
Infidel Lass, generations of Saudi princes have enjoyed mixed-gender parties (especially when the women are Western Infidels) and music–as well as lots of fine liquor.
This personal hedonism hasn’t lessened any of their zeal for imposing Shari’ah at home, nor for exporting it abroad.
There is a long tradition of Muslim rulers flouting the strictures of Islam personally–this does not change anything, nor is it a sign of actual liberalism.
Stan Lee says
Bin Salman is taking on a helluva opposition, and I wish him the best of fortune in his endeavor. I believe he’s setting up a transition for his son, Prince Mohammed, who will be the country’s eventual king.
Supposedly, there are more than 6,000 men with title of “Prince”in Saudi Arabia, so they must come in all degrees. Salman’s son, Mohammed must have the particularly highest “Prince” degree. Salman’s innovations could clean up the many loose ends of Saudi Arabia and Wahhabism. Salman has realized that while Saudi Arabia has rested upon its Wahhabi laurels of the Sunni religious Islam, the less populated, but more politically active Shia Islam centered by Iran has been very actively pursuing agreements (deals) with Russia, buying nuclear knowledge from Pakistan,(and “secretly from Russia) and dealing with No. Korea and a few South American/Central American countries, like Venezuela, Honduras, and probably Cuba. In other words, Iran has taken strides, especially to tweak U.S.A.’s “whiskers” and it has gained prestige as a result.
I hope Salman can bring his modernizations about, obviously he will have the support of the U.S.A. which will set up more intrigue between Russia and U.S.A.
gravenimage says
Stan–with all respect–I have to say I think you have far too rosy a view of what is going on.
God knows I wish you were right.
shortfattexan says
I suppose it is remotely possible that Crown Prince Mohammad is on the level and is genuinely trying to reform his country. I’m a nice guy, and I’m willing to give anyone the benefit of the doubt … up to a point. But when it comes to the Saudis, that “point” doesn’t extend very far at all.
One possible explanation is that the Saudis see trouble with Iran on the horizon, and they know that in a military confrontation, they have no chance against Iran (or anyone else) without US help. Unfortunately for the Saudis, they are also seriously unpopular in the West right now, and they believe the current US President is less likely to obsequiously do their bidding than the previous one. So maybe this whole scheme of bin Salman’s is really just a PR stunt intended to ensure the US will come to their rescue when/if the Iranians decide to get tough.
shortfattexan says
And a simpler explanation is that bin Salman just wants to make sure he doesn’t have to share power with anyone, including with the religious establishment.
M says
Salman wants to build a new modern mega city there from scratch. Neom I think they are calling it? Maybe he realises extremism cannot work for an international, mixed new city? I’m skeptical but hoping he really see the idiocy of wahabbism. Islam is a supremacist cult but at least they could stop exporting hate textbooks?
gravenimage says
The Saudis have yammered on about “reform” before, for the international press–nothing ever comes of it.
gravenimage says
M, the Saudis are flush with cash from unearned oil wealth. This has not only not tempered Islam in Saudi Arabia, it has allowed them to export Wahabbism through Mosque building, school text books, and trained Imams.
gravenimage says
Saudis arrest Prince Alwaleed, benefactor of Georgetown’s “Islamophobia” program
………………….
Most likely this is just a brutal consolidation of power in the Al Saud family.
But if Prince Alwaleed is not spewing Islam in the West, that is not a bad thing.
Jack Diamond says
He’s imprisoned in a 5-star hotel. We’ll see.
Jack Diamond says
Wonder if he gets to keep his secretaries, er, the flight crew, from his $400 m. Flying Palace Airbus? Or if this purge is gonna be like ones the Soviets and Maoists used to do, purged from planet Earth? I’d bet on the secretaries.
Here is the Prince in better days, and a picture is worth a thousand words:
https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-xd-yDD-0tJ8/WNI-lkezbzI/AAAAAAAABKI/jaruFKAIRRs-1cOrQ4T_2XPcPfKw7uDPwCLcB/s1600/panhgeran.jpg
Guntur Setiabudi says
Is that his cabinet or secretaries?
Jack Diamond says
Those are his prison guards.
Bill49 says
What, no Niqabs? Prince is already reformed.
Jack Diamond says
The government is anticipating confiscating $800 billion from those arrested. The low price of oil and dwindling coffers supporting all the royal parasites might have a tad to do with what is going on. $800 billion, were almost talking real money…
That and some real existential fears about the future.
Custos Custodum says
The interesting thing is that this mirrors what young fatso Kim Jong-Un did in North Korea – rely on a relative (uncle by marriage) to consolidate his rule, then brutally kill the same uncle and consolidate power primarily in his and his sister’s hands.
It would be interesting to find out more about MBS’s mother – for example, was she from a good Saudi family? Is she still married to the king? (Marital churn is high among senior Saudis.)
gravenimage says
Totalitarian thugs have a great deal in common.
mgoldberg says
It has nothing to do with stopping the civilizational jihad. It is but the next King getting rid of some of his competitors, and the enormous corruption when a few thousand princes and nephews are worth mega millions and billions and work to swindle and haul in more for their families and clans. As for the Bin Talwwee center, nothing will stop with their civilizational jihad. it will simply be maintained, but now… now we have entered the stage where the infidels will be fully cooperating and growing the movement for the muslims. And the new Saudi king will get a few more mega millions from the ousted people who will bribe him to save their lives.
jewdog says
Glad to see that there is some religious liberalization, but the arbitrary use of power to achieve it means that power could be used for the opposite effect. Just look at Turkey: arbitrary power enforced Kemalism and now it enforces Islamism.
Saudi Arabia should be taken over and forcibly secularized. It is nothing but a desert prison.
gravenimage says
Actually, there is no religious liberalization. Even if the Saudis do wind up allowing women to drive–hardly a sure thing yet–that does not change Islam one whit.
mgoldberg says
Driving in a Niqab, how liberating….
eduardo odraude says
Liberalization so far seems to be only words. But the Saudi ruler is apparently talking about opening Saudi Arabia to the world, including other religions.
Sarah says
The Clerics will kill him first before allowing other religions into that dump of a ‘kingdom’. Let alone allow this Prince or any other ‘royal’ to water down their precious Islam.
Remember – the so-called ‘House of Saud’ exists and rules thanks to those Clerics.
gravenimage says
We’ll see…
underbed cat says
When you examine how much Alaweed has invested Saudi huge amounts of cash into our companies which might be close to 40% of our which gave the Saudi too much influence, silenced the information about the doctrine of Islam and puts our economy at risk. I read that Prince Mohamed, in his early thirties ,also handles the defense, closed the airports, created a travel lock down which might impact foreigners who might desire to leave, really bad situation if violence and war begins. The amount of influence these investments created solves the riddle why our leaders are silenced on Islam, and the knowledge of the sura’s from the Quran which call for jihad and dawah, which is a condition of sharia law, aligning with the time of travels of our President is also concerning.
underbed cat says
error….has invested huge amounts of Saudi cash into our companies that comprise our stock market, estimated to be about 40% of our economy, if seized could be a big problem. These investment gave the Saudi’s too much influence over our policies and silenced the information about the doctrine of Islam, sharia law, goals and put our country at risk…..
David Stephenson says
It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. Me thinks President Trump has brokered a deal. What that deal actually is remains to be seen.
eduardo odraude says
That’s what I was thinking. That the Saudi ruler, worried about Iran, has some sort of deal with Trump, and the deal entailed liberalization of Saudi Arabia and discontinuing Wahabi propaganda around the world. Just a guess, and perhaps a bad one.
Infidel says
All power to this Saudi prince but at the same time, I have this sickening feeling that his days are numbered and he has set himself squarely in the sights of the mad and rabid Jehaadi jackals. Expect assassination attempts on him in the future for sure by these fiends…
Chand says
This is the 21st century and all monarchies should be toppled and democracies established. Monarchs should be made to do some hard labor for a while to clear their brains and let them joint rest of humankind. Saudis should begin by stopping spreading their Wahaabism worldwide to convince anyone of their motive to reform.
gravenimage says
I see that Chand is pretending that constitutional monarchies are no different from tyrannies like Saudi Arabia.
Kathy Brown, Esq. says
How in the world can any muslim, anywhere, indict anyone else for “corruption”?
This same “King” forcibly rapes a few helpless little boys before breakfast, segues into the same thing with one of his genitally-mutilated wives by lunch, then rounds it all off with torturing some helpless animal round about dinner time…
“Corruption”? Thy name is islam.
gravenimage says
Spot on, Kathy.
And so good to see you posting again! You have been missed here. Hope you are well.
Flavius Claudius Iulianus says
Sorry, off topic: MYANMAR
The Myanmar government and army know our MSM too well. They won’t let journalists into their country. Aung San Suu Kyi should meet with Bob Rae, silently hand over her honourary Canadian citizenship back to him, get up without a word and walk out of the room. The future of her country is more important to her than this empty honour. The championship virtue signaler in Canada would deserve the rebuff.
This CTV report is a real tearjerker but it is thin, as usual, on hard facts from inside Myanmar. Would CTV ever deign to tell the full story about the Mohammadin Bengali’s nasty, violent history?
Starts at 32 seconds.
http://www.ctvnews.ca/video?playlistId=1.3666447
mortimer says
The Saudi royal family rules the secular side and the descendants of Sheikh Muhammad Bin Wahhab rule the religious side of Soddy Barbaria.
Savages and barbarians are all they have. There’s no one there who is civilized. Those people have left.
Salah says
In a first, head of Maronite church to visit Saudi Arabia
https://en.annahar.com/article/694978-patriarch-beshara-rai-invited-to-saudi-arabia
gravenimage says
Hmmm…we’ll have to see if anything really comes of this. It might also be a threat.
John Forbes says
THIS ALLIANCE OF GREED HAS ALWAYS HAD THE POTENTIAL TO CORRUPT & CREATE CHAOS !
THE WEST WANTS CHEAP ENERGY & THE SAUDI’S WANT THE WEALTH !
THE WEST HAS SOLD BONDS FOR DECADES & THE SAUDI ‘S HAVE AMASSED MASSIVE WEALTH & USED MUCH AT OUR INSISTANCE TO INVEST IN THE WESTERN INDUSTRIES & BANKS & ARMS INDUSTRIES & HEDGE FUNDS GIVING THEM ENORMOUS INFLUENCE & POWER !
THE WEST – NOT BOTHERED TO DO THEIR HOMEWORK – THOUGHT THAT BOOZE , PROSTITUTES & DECADENCE WOULD ENTERTAIN THESE PRINCES FOREVER !
NOT SO – THE PRINCES ARE ALSO DEVOUT MUSLIMS WILL CONNECTED TO THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD & MANY POLITICAL GROUPS WORLD WIDE & THE SAUDI WAHABI SECT – BELIEVES THAT NOW IS THE TIME TO SPREAD THE FAITH IN THE WEST AS THE WEST LOST THEIR FAITH & LOST THEIR CONFIDENCE & ARE LED BY THE SELF SERVING & WEAK !
THIS IS WHY THEY FIRMLY BELIEVE THAT AT NOT TIME HAS THIS OPPORTUNITY BEEN BETTER & WITH THE WEST IN DISARRAY & WEAK & FRIGHTENED TO DEATH THEY MAY WELL BE RIGHT !
THEY WILL PUSH ISLAMIC EXPANSION RIGHT ACROSS THE GLOBE UNLESS WE DECIDE TO STAND UP FOR OURSELVES & AT THE MOMENT THERE IS LITTLE SIGN OF THAT !!!!
Ibrahim itace muhammed says
All Zionist/wahhabi family members are corrupt,stealing from public funds and go to the west to romance with naked filthy christian ladies. Now they want the same nudity be introduced inside Saudi soil,which they call reform. It is backwardness taking Saudi Arabs to jahiliyya period.
Salah says
Your exhibitionist “prophet”…
http://crossmuslims.blogspot.ca/2010/03/muhammad-and-nudity-mahomet-et-la.html
PissLam says
Your self-professed prophet was a filthy serial rapist and a pedo. Then he taught others to do the same.
gravenimage says
More ranting from the unhinged Ibrahim itace muhammed. Note that he considers any rights for women–no matter how minimal, such as being allowed to drive–as “nudity” and backwardness.
Also, has anyone noticed how utterly obsessed with sex this Mohammedan is? He is constantly going on about Infidel men’s foreskins, and has claimed that a busful of women in New York City tried to have sex with him in public.
Even more disturbing, he has claimed that female captives love to be have sex with their Muslim captors, so it cannot be considered rape. *Ugh*.
Sarah says
This new Crown Prince character is doing the mad panicked dash to try and keep the ‘kingdom’ together financially in the future.He sees the writing on the wall and their obscenely indulgent and extremely lazy reliance on all that sweet sweet oil money is a big problem. He sees the truth – the oil money is going to dry up eventually, the nation is packed with lazy bastard’s and has crippled itself with its reliance on all that cash – all reward no effort. He’s trying to invest and create future building programs.
Typical Saudi though, he’s going about it in the wrong ways. Throwing incredible sums at idiot ideas. The myriad of multi billion dollar programs he’s had announced are largely to a one, downright ridiculous.The Saudi’s can’t grow, produce, manufacture or develop ANYTHING themselves. So why they think complex engineering, scientific and technological future building programs will be a win for them, is just crazy talk. And classic Saudi nonsense.
Now he’s hunting down all the dissent in the ranks. The problem with having a ‘royal’ family in the Islamic world is that they breed like damn rabbits. I’ve read that there’s somewhere in excess of a 1000 Princesses alone. And we all know how useless and pointless a Saudi ‘Princess’ is. She exists to spend money, bash her staff and breed more little feral ‘royals’ for the family. God knows how many there are, altogether, in this family of theirs. And they’re all greedy, self-serving and corrupt.
Greed, selfishness and corruption are all by words of the Saudis. This ‘royal’ family just elevate it all to some kind of sickening art form. The big issue for this family is that Saudi Arabia is bleeding money in so many areas – far more than they’re openly admitting to. And with oil prices having been depressed for so long now, their insistence on continuing their excessive spending and ‘future building’ is already causing them severe problems.
They’re going to spend themselves out of all that money. No more gold plated mansions then. No more private jets for every man and his dog. No more titanium covered Mercedes Benz’s that they fly in and out of London to show off to each other, every year. And no skills, no work ethic, no concept whatsoever of how to actually roll up their sleeves and WORK. They are decadent, obscenely so – and their chickens are going to be coming home to roost very soon.
Pass the popcorn, please. I’m going to enjoy every single moment.
Makenomistake says
Mere “corruption”!!!!
Islam is “crime”,pure and unbridled, if anything, that has engendered a criminal ideology .All criminals gathered around it out of their own criminal instinct. We have all been suffering it for the last fourteen centuries.
It will of course meet a violent death by its own votaries ensuring a mutual destruction.
Vann Boseman says
It is easy to agree with Robert Spencer that it is hard to know exactly what is happening but that corruption has nothing at all to do with it. The best guess I’ve heard, to me, is that there is an attempt by the favored prince to insure that he is the next recognized king when the time comes for there to be a new ruler. Certainly a part of this guess is that the attempt to seize power by someone for some reason is likely the most important motivator. I am told that assassination by “helicopter accident” is ordinary and may have already occurred once associated with this event.
PissLam says
I am quite certain more than a few of those arrested had terror connections vis a vis financing Islamic terrorist groups. With Trump at the helm it was a matter of time before the Saudis were given an ultimatum to do something against those in KSA who were funding Islamic terrorist groups.
gravenimage says
Somehow I doubt it. I imagine this has more to do with palace intrigue and consolidating power.