ARTICLES

“HOW CAN THE SON OF A KING BE AN OUTSIDER?”

Trump Goes to Saudi Arabia
Given the badly frayed relations between the U.S. and Riyadh, the president is guaranteed a win.
By Karen Elliott House
Wall Street Journal
May 19, 2017

President Trump will receive an effusive welcome here from his royal hosts determined to underscore that once again Saudi Arabia and the U.S. are close allies. Barack Obama favored Iran, but that’s over. King Salman, 81, is gathering 50 Islamic leaders to meet Mr. Trump. This unprecedented assembly is intended to show not only that Saudi Arabia is the leader of the Islamic world but that Muslim leaders support the U.S. against Islamic State terrorists.

While the elderly monarch is host, the indisputable power behind the throne is his young son, Deputy Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, 31. He is orchestrating a two-day summit spectacular that will star Donald Trump and the new face of Saudi Arabia – a country now enjoying once-forbidden entertainment and a much larger role for women, who may be allowed to drive as early as this summer. Conservatives seethe but can’t block change.

The young prince and the president have much in common. Both are outsiders, brash, unorthodox and new to politics. Each faces strong opposition at home. Both seek to spur economic growth by reducing the role of government. And each is fighting orthodoxy: MBS, as the prince is known, wants to curb the role of religion and tradition, which inhibit modernization, while Mr. Trump battles leftist orthodoxy and political correctness. Both are smart marketers.

Mr. Trump’s presence is an opportunity for the prince to show off his modernization effort. An extravaganza featuring something for everyone – the Harlem Globetrotters taking on a Saudi basketball team, car races, country singer Toby Keith – is intended to convince Americans there is a new, open Saudi Arabia and Saudis that mixing cultures and sexes isn’t evil.

How can the son of a king be an outsider? In a culture that reveres age, especially among the royal family’s thousands of princes, the appointment last year of a young man who isn’t a senior prince, nor even his father’s eldest son, came as a shock. Like Mr. Trump, Mohammed bin Salman faces a “resistance” in the form of determined opponents among his royal relatives. Social media has created a “virtual opposition” by enabling disgruntled citizens to express their views.

So both the prince and the president seek success to bolster their leadership, easier to achieve in diplomacy than domestic affairs. Given the badly frayed state of U.S.-Saudi relations, Mr. Trump is guaranteed a win, at least with Saudis, because he isn’t Barack Obama. The president has further pleased Riyadh by making this his first stop on his first foreign trip. No president has ever put Saudi Arabia first so visibly.

But the Saudis want concrete support once Air Force One lifts off for Israel, Rome and then a NATO summit in Brussels. Both countries see Iran as a threat, but the U.S. president demands more burden-sharing from allies. So the prince, who also is defense minister, is said to be ready to invite the U.S. military back to Saudi bases vacated in 2003 in the face of opposition to foreign troops in the land of the two holy mosques. Riyadh is fighting a costly war against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen, and the prince wants more U.S. support.

If the leaders agree to return the U.S. military here, it would mark a significant new commitment to Saudi Arabia’s defense – and surely be seen by Iran as a provocation. It would be a clear triumph for both leaders – and a repudiation of Mr. Obama’s exhortation that Saudi Arabia “share the neighborhood” with Iran.

The U.S. wants to curb Iranian expansion but may be cautious about new entanglements as Saudi-Iranian tensions are rising. Prince Mohammad recently slammed the door on any dialogue with Iran, insisting that Tehran seeks domination of the Muslim world. “We know we are a major target,” he said. “We will not wait until the battle is in Saudi Arabia, but we will work so the battle is there.” Iran immediately warned that if Riyadh persisted with “such stupidity,” nothing will be “left in Saudi Arabia except Mecca and Medina.”

Beyond bases and Islamic nation support in the fight against ISIS terrorists, King Salman seeks to tie the House of Saud to the Trump family. The king has just named another of his sons, Khalid, 29, a former fighter pilot, as ambassador to the U.S. Sending his son to Washington is a very personal gesture to a president with family working in the White House.

Prince Mohammad faces much tougher domestic challenges than President Trump does. The prince has to transform an economy and society long addicted to oil revenues, which have collapsed, and persuade coddled Saudis they must work. Mr. Trump is trying to raise U.S. GDP growth to 3% from 1%; Saudi Arabia has no growth. Mr. Trump seeks to spur U.S. energy production, while the prince is suppressing Saudi production to stabilize prices, in part weakened by growth in U.S. oil production. The U.S. got good news that unemployment is down to 4.4%. Saudi unemployment officially is 11%, but among the 70% of Saudis under 30 the true figure is triple that.

Mr. Trump, for all the angry opposition at home, is more secure than the deputy crown prince. Should his father die, a new king may remove Mohammad bin Salman. Some Saudis believe King Salman will promote MBS to crown prince and thus next in line to be king – but he hasn’t yet done so.

Regardless of these uncertainties, Mohammed bin Salman is confidently pushing ahead with ambitious plans to transform Saudi Arabia. Like Mr. Trump, the prince needs some clear wins over the next several years – an end to the costly Yemen war; successful privatization of Aramco, the national oil company, and other government companies set for public sale. He must persuade skeptical citizens that his plans will in coming years provide Saudis a prosperous life without dependence on oil.

(Ms. House, a former publisher of The Wall Street Journal, is the author of “On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines – and Future”)

 

AN UNPRECEDENTED ROYAL WELCOME

Saudi Arabia, Ignoring Trump’s Slights, to Give Him a Royal Welcome
By Ben Hubbard
New York Times
May 18, 2017

BEIRUT, Lebanon – When President Trump heads to Saudi Arabia on Friday for his first trip overseas since taking office, it will be for much more than a run-of-the-mill state visit.

The Saudis have internationalized the event, organizing a sprawling “Arab Islamic American Summit” with leaders from dozens of Muslim countries, as well as talks with the king, the inauguration of a counterterrorism center, public forums for business executives and young people and a country music concert.

Saudi Arabia, home to some of Islam’s holiest sites, will be pulling out all the stops for a man who has declared “Islam hates us” and said the United States is “losing a tremendous amount of money” defending the kingdom.

But Saudi Arabia and its Persian Gulf allies were so angry over former President Barack Obama’s policies toward the Middle East that they appeared prepared to dismiss Mr. Trump’s remarks as campaign rhetoric, and to see in him a possibility of resetting relations.

The grandiose reception seeks to convince Mr. Trump that his priorities are theirs, too, and that they are indispensable partners in fighting terrorism, in confronting Iran, in bolstering American businesses and perhaps even in pursuing peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

“This administration has vision that matches the view of the kingdom with regards to the role of America in the world, with regards to getting rid of terrorism, with regards to confronting Iran, with regards to rebuilding relations with traditional allies, with regards to trade and investment,” Adel al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, told reporters on Thursday.

The number of events scheduled throughout the Saudi capital, Riyadh, on Saturday and Sunday is staggering, as the Saudis seek to project their country as a dynamic place, a leader in the Arab and Islamic worlds and a close ally of the United States.

The Stars and Stripes is flying in Riyadh’s streets, intermixed with Saudi flags.

There are three summit meetings planned: between Mr. Trump and King Salman, the Saudi monarch; between Mr. Trump and the leaders of a Gulf coalition, including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates; and between Mr. Trump and more than 50 leaders and representatives from across the Muslim world.

Expected to attend are 37 heads of state and at least six prime ministers, said Osama Nugali, a spokesman for the Saudi Foreign Ministry.

Among the invitees is President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for crimes including genocide, although it remains unclear whether he will attend or, if he does, whether he will meet Mr. Trump.

“He is invited definitely because it is an Arab and Muslim country,” Mr. Nugali said.

Also reported by local news organizations to be attending are President Fuad Masum of Iraq, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan.

Not on the guest list are Iran, the Saudis’ regional nemesis, and Syria, whose president, Bashar al-Assad, is at war with rebels who have received support from the United States, Saudi Arabia and other countries that will be in Riyadh.

Mr. Trump and King Salman will also inaugurate the Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology, where Mr. Trump is to give a speech about Islam. The American president, a prolific – and often contentious – user of Twitter, will also deliver the keynote address at a conference about social media, under the auspices of Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the king’s powerful son. Also scheduled to speak is the Fox News host Bret Baier.

Elsewhere in the city, there is to be an international counterterrorism conference, a forum for chief executives, an art exhibition inside the Royal Court and a concert featuring the American country musician Toby Keith. In a kingdom where alcohol is banned, he is not likely to entertain the all-male crowd with his hit song, “Beer for My Horses.”

“Historic Summit. Brighter Future,” declares an official website for Mr. Trump’s visit, counting down the seconds until it all starts.

The exuberant reception for Mr. Trump reflects how differently Persian Gulf leaders see him compared with how they saw Mr. Obama.

Many of Mr. Obama’s Middle East policies angered the Saudis, including what they saw as his giving up on President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, a longtime American ally, during the Arab Spring protests; his hesitation to intervene directly in the Syria conflict; and his pursuit of a nuclear deal with Iran.

The distaste for Mr. Obama grew so strong that when he visited the kingdom last year, only a small delegation met him at the airport and state television did not broadcast his arrival.

“Any new president has to be better than President Obama, because no one was worse for us than Obama,” said Salman al-Dossary, a writer for the Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq al-Awsat.

In Mr. Trump, however, many Saudis see a decisive, business-focused leader, who they say shares their goals in the region.

They applauded his military strike on a Syrian air base after Mr. Assad’s forces used chemical weapons, and they have noted his tough talk on Iran. They hope he will increase support for the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen against rebels – aligned with Iran – who have seized the capital, Sana. And they see a role for American investment in efforts to shift the Saudi economy from its dependence on oil.

“This administration is very clear, not just with Saudi Arabia but also with Turkey and other traditional allies, that the idea is to double down on existing relationships and to put allies first,” said Mohammed Khalid Alyahya, a Saudi political analyst and nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council, a policy research organization.

Saudi Arabia has also pitched itself as a Muslim ally against Islamic State militants, and Mr. Trump’s desire to moderate his stance on Islam was among the reasons he chose Riyadh as his first stop overseas as president, according to administration officials.

The Saudis have spent a fortune on American weapons over the years, and a series of new deals that could be worth more than $300 billion over the next decade are close to completion, Reuters reported this month.

Mr. Trump also hopes Arab states like Saudi Arabia can play a role in brokering a deal between Israel and the Palestinians – an idea some Persian Gulf leaders have privately entertained, if Israel were to offer certain concessions.

Some aspects of Mr. Trump’s tenure that have caused criticism in the United States do not seem to bother the Saudis.

His reliance on his daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner – both of whom will join him in Riyadh – for policy advice is business as usual in a monarchy where princes run the government and the king has appointed one son as defense minister and another as ambassador to Washington.

And worries that Mr. Trump could use his presidency to benefit Trump hotels and golf courses get little traction in a country that is named after its royal family, and where the line between public and private wealth is vague.

Mr. Trump’s apparent lack of interest in human rights also suggests that he is unlikely to complain about the Saudi justice system or the limited rights of Saudi women.

Because of their decades-old alliance, Saudi Arabia relies heavily on the United States for security and other issues. To maintain that alliance under Mr. Trump, Saudi leaders have studiously ignored his negative statements about Islam while emphasizing what their kingdom provides, including intelligence cooperation and billions of dollars in arms purchases.

Mr. Trump has not always returned the love.

“I think Islam hates us,” he said in an interview with Anderson Cooper of CNN last year. “There’s a tremendous hatred there.”

Last month, he told Reuters that protecting Saudi Arabia cost too much.

“Frankly, Saudi Arabia has not treated us fairly, because we are losing a tremendous amount of money in defending Saudi Arabia,” he said.

While such comments made some Saudis uncomfortable, they took heart from his ordering of a military strike in Syria – a step that Mr. Obama had declined to take – and they hope his tough talk on Iran will lead to action.

“When it comes to United States foreign policy, we have learned in this region that actions speak louder than words,” said Faisal J. Abbas, editor in chief of the Saudi newspaper Arab News.

It remains unclear whether Mr. Trump’s visit will result in any concrete initiatives or will remain symbolic. But some caution that what Mr. Trump will ultimately give Persian Gulf states may fall short of great expectations.

“You have a Trump administration that has a banner of ‘America First’ and is preparing a counterterrorism strategy that seeks to place the burden more so on the shoulders of our partners,” said Brian Katulis, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a Washington-based research organization, who has recently met with senior Persian Gulf officials. “Therein lies a potential for a mismatch of expectations.”

 

ISRAEL PLAYS DOWN PRESIDENT’S INTELLIGENCE DISCLOSURE

With Trump Visit Imminent, Israel Plays Down President’s Intelligence Disclosure
By Rory Jones
Wall Street Journal
May 17, 2017

TEL AVIV – Israel on Wednesday played down the impact of sensitive Israeli intelligence information that Donald Trump shared with Russian officials, as it prepared to host the U.S. president for a much anticipated visit next week.

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman and the country’s intelligence and transport minister, Yisrael Katz, reaffirmed the U.S.-Israel alliance, with Mr. Katz saying he had “complete confidence” in the U.S. intelligence community.

U.S. officials said Tuesday that Israel was the source of information that Mr. Trump had disclosed to Russia’s foreign minister and its ambassador to the U.S. during a meeting in the Oval Office last week.

Under the terms of a longstanding intelligence-sharing agreement between Israel and the U.S., the intelligence was meant only for U.S. officials. The information, which concerned a threat by the extremist group Islamic State to airliners, was shared in such a way that could compromise the original source, according to officials.

After U.S. officials acknowledged Israel’s role in the incident, Mr. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on phone but didn’t discuss the issue, focusing instead on the president’s upcoming two-day visit to Israel and the West Bank, the premier’s office said Wednesday.

The visit, which starts Monday, will be the second stop on Mr. Trump’s first overseas trip as U.S. president. He will first visit Saudi Arabia and later stop at the Vatican and in Brussels.

As Israel readied for Mr. Trump’s arrival, its reassurances over the president’s use of its intelligence overshadowed a rare public disagreement over moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

During last fall’s U.S. presidential campaign, Mr. Trump pledged to make the move, but since the early days of his administration, he has grown more cautious about ordering the move.

On Sunday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson suggested the president might not shift the location of the embassy if it threatened to undermine efforts to revive the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

In response, Mr. Netanyahu reiterated calls for the U.S. to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

With Mr. Trump’s visit coinciding with the 50th anniversary of Israel’s capture of Jerusalem from Jordan in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, emotions in both Israel and the Palestinian territories are running high.

Israelis complained Tuesday after Mr. Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, refused to say in a press conference that the Western Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City was part of Israel.

Israelis say the site, one of the holiest in Judaism, falls inside Israeli territory. Palestinians and other Arabs say the site is in East Jerusalem, on land Israel captured from Jordan in the 1967 war and considered occupied by much of the international community.

Mr. McMaster was asked about the issue by reporters after Mr. Netanyahu’s office confirmed an Israeli media report that Israeli and U.S. diplomats had argued over the geographical and political status of the wall.

Mr. Netanyahu’s office had asked the U.S. whether the prime minister could join the president on his scheduled visit to the wall next week. U.S. diplomats indicated it wouldn’t be appropriate, as the site wasn’t in Israeli territory, Israeli media reported.

 

JORDANIAN GOVERNMENT CONDEMNS ATTACK IN SAUDI ARABIA WHILE SAYING THE DEATH OF A JORDANIAN TERRORIST IN ISRAEL IS A “TERRIBLE CRIME”

Jordan holds Israel responsible for killing Jordanian citizen [who was killed after he stabbed an Israeli in Jerusalem and was in the midst of trying to kill others]

http://www.petra.gov.jo/Public_News/Nws_NewsDetails.aspx?lang=2&site_id=1&NewsID=301709&CatID=13

Amman, May.13 (Petra) -- The Israeli government, as the occupying power, bears responsibility for the shooting and killing of a Jordanian citizen in the occupied East Jerusalem on Saturday, the government said.

In a statement issued today, State Minister for Media Affairs, the government’s spokesman, Mohammad Al-Momani, said the Ministry of Foreign and Expatriates Affairs is following-up, through the Jordanian Embassy in Tel Aviv, on the killing of Jordanian citizen, Mohammad Abdullah Salim Al-Kasji, to find out the details and circumstances of the incident.

The government condemned as “terrible” the crime committed against the Jordanian citizen and demanded Israel to reveal the full details of the crime.

Al-Kasji has recently left the Kingdom through the Sheikh Hussein crossing, northern Jordan, via Israeli tourist visa and didn’t return with the tourist group that he traveled with.

//Petra// AF

13/5/2017 - 07:37:10 PM

 

Jordan condemns terror attack in Saudi Arabia

http://www.petra.gov.jo/Public_News/Nws_NewsDetails.aspx?lang=2&site_id=1&NewsID=301624&CatID=13

Amman, May 13 (Petra)-- Jordan condemned the terrorist attack that occurred in Qatif, Saudi Arabia, where a number of terrorists attacked a development project, killing a toddler and a Pakistani expat and injuring 10 people, including six Saudis and four residents.

Minister of State for Media Affairs, Mohammad Momani, expressed Jordan’s support and solidarity with Saudi Arabia in facing terrorism.

Momani highlighted the need for collective efforts in the Middle East region and the whole world to confront terrorism wherever it existed.

The minister offered the Jordanian government’s condolences to Saudi Arabia and wished the injured a speedy recovery.

//Petra//

13/5/2017 - 10:17:21 AM