By Martin Indyk
I am posting this article even though I don't agree with its central idea that king Abdullah is standing up for Palestinian and Arab rights. He is trying to cover his royal behind and at the end of the day Saudi Arabia is U.S.-occupied territory.
"What has happened to the love affair between Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah and President Bush? Two years ago, down on the Texas ranch, they were photographed walking hand in hand. It was the beginning of a beautiful relationship: Bush dropped his demand for democratization in the puritanical kingdom, and Abdullah did his best to moderate oil prices. The dowry was a new U.S. arms deal for the Saudis. A second honeymoon was scheduled for this month, when Bush planned to host Abdullah for his first state visit.
So the White House was mightily perplexed when it was informed that the king's schedule didn't allow for a spring visit to Washington. Then, at an Arab League summit in Riyadh last month, Abdullah denounced the U.S. war in Iraq as an "illegitimate occupation." He also used the occasion to make up with Bush's bete noire, Bashar al-Assad, the brash Syrian president who had previously denounced the Saudi leader as "a dwarf."
What was going on? Simply put, the Bush administration had been listening to the wrong Saudi. Keen for any signs of hope in the region as Iraq spiraled downward, Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other senior U.S. officials had grasped at a grandiose regional game plan being pushed by Prince Bandar bin Sultan, formerly the Saudi ambassador in Washington and now Abdullah's national security adviser. But Bandar wasn't calling the shots; Abdullah was, and he has a very different way of doing business......"
No comments:
Post a Comment