The self-righteous moralising of Saud al-Faisal
Saud al-Faisal, the foreign minister of the Saudi monarchy, cited a moral imperative to denounce the Syrian regime for its repression and outrageous violence. Yet, the Saudi monarchy, in coordination with the Obama regime, brokered a deal to provide immunity from prosecution for Ali Abdullah Saleh, despite utilising similar tactics, though in different magnitude, as Bashar al-Assad. The current president of Yemen, was brought in with a sham elections, being the only candidate. Voting papers even declared a vote for Abed-Rabo Mansour Hadi (Ali Abdullah Saleh’s long time second hand man and vice-president) as a patriotic duty! Predictably Ali Abdullah Saleh’s second-hand man gained victory with 99.8% of the vote and with the security apparatus and military mainly intact, despite orchestrating a violent repression that has led to the death of thousands. The Obama regime welcomed this as a ‘democratic transition’ and Abed-Rabo Mansour Hadi likewise signalled to his benefactors, in his inauguration speech, that he will carry out their agendas by promising a security clamp-down on ‘Al-Qaeda’ and thus the continuity of both military and security partnerships with the US and the Saudi monarchy.
In Egypt, the Obama regime were less forthright in their support of Hosni Mubarak, fearing the crumbling of US leverages in the security and military apparatus, engineered since the Camp David accords. Both Benjamin Netanyahu and the Saudi monarchy, at the time, signalled their outrage that the Obama regime should ‘interfere’ and make demands of their decades old ally, instead of sending a message of full support. Then King Abdullah hastily requested the Obama regime to continue in their backing of Hosni Mubarak, even if it necessitated the use of force against demonstrators:
The most difficult calls, officials said, were with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and Mr. Netanyahu, who feared regional instability and urged the United States to stick with Mr. Mubarak. According to American officials, senior members of the government in Saudi Arabia argued that the United States should back Mr. Mubarak even if he used force against the demonstrators. By Feb. 1, when Mr. Mubarak broadcast a speech pledging that he would not run again and that elections would be held in September, Mr. Obama concluded that the Egyptian president still had not gotten the message.
These are merely examples to place the motives of the Saudi monarchy in place, considering the self-righteous moralising for the oppressed ‘people of Syria’ that is broadcast across the multiple outlets of the Saudi monarchy. The official withdrawal of the Saudi monarchy from the recent conference in Tunisia, was due to their crude diplomatic efforts to impose their own agenda of forcing the full recognition of the Syrian National Council (SNC), the arming of the Free Syrian Army and the use, if necessary, of force to implement a policy of regime change. The duplicity of Saud al-Faisal, as it is with the Obama regime, has little to do with concerns to end violence but everything to do with a proxy-war.
