07-Oct-17: A quiet evening

London's museum precinct this afternoon: The driver
is pinned down by police [Image Source]

It's an ordinary Saturday night here in  Jerusalem.

Alright, not so ordinary since the whole country is in the midst of the Jewish religious festival of Sukkot which runs for a week and whose central motif is the temporary and generally-flimsy dwellings that are built by hundreds of thousands of families all over the country, and wherever in the world Jews live. It's the tail end of summer, the days are still sunny and warm and the evenings - Jerusalem's summer evenings are like this - are breezy and pleasant. A relaxing time.

All of which has gotten us thinking about the range and volume of news reports about terror in tonight's bulletins. A selection:

• Authorities in New York City revealed last night (Friday) that they have arrested three ISIS sympathizers who planned terror attacks on various New York locations including the MTA subway, music concerts and targets in the Times Square area. NBC News says the FBI arrested Abdulrahman El Bahnasawy, 19, a Canadian citizen, who [source] has been in US custody since May 2016 when he was arrested in New Jersey and who pleaded guilty to terrorism charges in October 2016; Talha Haroon, 19, an American citizen living in Pakistan and arrested there; and Russell Salic, 37, a Filipino who is being sent to the US for trial. It quotes Federal prosecutors saying the three men’s goal "was to kill and injure as many people as possible"  and that El Bahnasawy had already acquired bomb-making materials and secured a cabin to build them. They also planned - shades of last week's Las Vegas massacre - to shoot civilians "at specific concert venues". Reuters says "documents unsealed in federal court in Manhattan on Friday [showed] El Bahnasawy and Mr Haroon planned to carry out attacks during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ran from early June to early July."
• In Switzerland, a man wielding two knives rushed at police and two refugees inside a refugee center in the southern Italian-speaking region of Ticino at 2:00 am, local time, today. Police fired at the attacker as a result of which he is now dead. The French news agency AFP says the assailant was a 38 year old Sri Lankan "asylum seeker". Police were called to break up a fight in Brissago, on the shores of Lake Maggiore and were in the building when the man with the knives attacked the other people. 
• French police yesterday (Friday) charged three men in Paris with launching an explosive attack on a residential building in the city's upscale 16th Arrondissment. The plot failed when the gas canisters they rigged up failed to ignite. According to Times of Israel, two of the suspects were already on a police terror-watch list. The three, identified as Amine A, his cousin Sami B, and Aymen B., are now charged with multiple crimes and in detention. Police found four gas cylinders after being called to the scene: two in the hallway attached to a mobile phone which evidently served as a detonator and two more on the sidewalk outside the building. Associated Press says the charges against the three are attempted murder linked to a terrorist enterprise, transporting explosives and participating in a terrorist association aimed at preparing attacks. All three have prior French criminal convictions; we are not yet able to learn the details.
• In Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a little-reported shootout today between police and terrorists, according to an RT news story, resulted in the deaths of a "gunman and two guards... as the Saudi Arabian security forces prevented a terrorist attack near the royal Al Salam Palace... There has so far been no confirmation of the attack from Saudi authorities. The US Embassy in Saudi Arabia has issued a security warning to American citizens in Jeddah over the reported attack." This is bound to get more coverage but there's almost none tonight. 
• Another little-reported terror attack though on a much larger scale in the huge (but almost invisible to Western eyes) West African state of Niger. CNN says "three US Green Berets were killed and two others were wounded... near the Mali-Niger border when a joint US-Nigerien patrol was attacked Wednesday... Initial indications are the Green Berets were ambushed by up to 50 fighters who are thought to be affiliated with ISIS... The Green Berets were part of a team advising and assisting local forces when they were attacked." A sizable French and US military presence is seeking to stem the incursion of ISIS forces into Niger: some 800 US troops are currently based there; some are called advisers but that's likely to be mere foreign policy camouflage. CNN: "The US military has maintained a presence in the northwest African country for five years, with small groups of US Special Operations Forces advising local troops as they battle two terrorist groups, ISIS-affiliated Boko Haram and al Qaeda's North African branch, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb." 
• In Malaysia, where the authorities have been on high alert for human bombs and shooters since "Islamic State launched multiple attacks in Jakarta, the capital of neighboring Indonesia, in January 2016", Reuters says 8 people, four foreigners and four Malaysians, were taken into custody today "for suspected involvement in terrorist activities linked to Abu Sayyaf, the Islamic State and Jemaah Islamiah". Those arrested are said to include three Filipinos, one Albanian (a law lecturer at a local university) and two people convicted in 2016 of participating in terrorist activities (so people might be asking why are they free now).
• And here in Israel, the death of Reuven Shmerling, a Jewish Israeli in his 70s who lived with his family in Elkana and whose body was found on Wednesday at a location on the outskirts of Kafr Qassem, an Israeli town whose residents are overwhelmingly Arab, now appears (after the police expressed initial doubt) to have been the result of terrorism. Haaretz says "Shmerling left his home on Wednesday morning and went to a warehouse in Kafr Qasem, which belonged to his son. When his wife Hanna noticed he did not return home and is not answering his phone, his son was called to the warehouse, where he discovered his father's body. Paramedics pronounced Shmerling dead. In a statement, Shmerling's family stressed they have no doubt he was killed in a terror attack."

Two additional alarming reports turn out (so far at least) to be unrelated to terror:

• An incoming-missile alert was sounded in the Israeli communities closest to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip around the time we started writing this report. As of now (10:30 pm Saturday), the alert appears to be without basis and there were no actual rockets. This happens.
• In London, a car drove onto the sidewalk outside a popular museum at 2:20 pm London time today. According to Financial Times, this happened "at the junction of Exhibition Road and Cromwell Road, between the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Natural History Museum — is part of a shared space experiment and the pavement is at the same level as the road." The response from security services was rapid and large: "dozens of armed officers flooded the area and a 200 metre cordon was created around the scene. Witnesses fled in panic as police told them to "keep running" and put businesses around the area in lockdown." [Telegraph UK]
  The BBC quotes the Metropolitan Police saying one person was arrested. But earlier concerns that this was a terror attack were now being set aside, and "the incident was being treated as "a road traffic collision". London Ambulance said the people it treated - including the detained man - had mostly sustained head and leg injuries. Nine were taken to hospital." Meanwhile the driver "is being held in custody at a north London police station." The British are uncommonly tense over the prospects of more terror in their lives; as BBC notes tonight: "The current terror threat in the UK is at "severe" - the second highest level - meaning an attack is highly likely."

Life is so much more relaxed when you ignore what terrorists are planning and doing. But the difficult reality is that ignoring them doesn't make them go away.

04-Aug-17: The complex terror bombing plot in Sydney has roots in ISIS, maybe Saudi Arabia and most worryingly Turkey

Etihad flight over Sydney [Image Source]

An Associated Press analysis of an elaborate and potentially devastating terror plot to bring down an aircraft and its passengers in Australia raises some disturbing concerns - mainly by not focusing on them.

The syndicated report ["Australia police: Men tried to get bomb on Sydney plane", Kristen Gelineau | Associated Press | August 3, 2017] describes a scheme to hide an explosive device on an Etihad Airways flight (the airline is based in Abu Dhabi) out of Sydney in July. The Australian authorities got their first inkling about the plot and the plotters through a tip from unspecified foreign intelligence agencies on July 26, 2017. The suspects were arrested in Sydney on July 29.

The Australian Federal Police said in a media conference today (Friday) that Islamic State played a central role. They described how four men were arrested in a series of raids in Sydney last weekend. The relationships that tie them together have been described vaguely in numerous media reports over the past week:

Four men are being held at the Sydney police station under special terrorism powers after being arrested during counter-terror raids on Saturday night. The ABC has been told the group allegedly planned to conceal the bomb in a kitchen meat grinder before smuggling it onto a plane. A senior police source told the ABC that Khaled and Mahmoud Khayat were among those being held. The two other men, Khaled and Abdul Merhi, are believed to be related, but it is unclear how. ["Sydney terror raids: Police scour raided homes for third day over alleged plane terror plot", ABC Australia, August 1, 2017]

And

The government has so far declined to reveal any further details of the plane threat... All it will say is that the four - believed to be two fathers and their sons - planned to use a "non-traditional" device and had "an Islamist, extremist terrorist motivation." ["Four arrested over alleged plot to bring down aircraft", SBS News Australia, July 31, 2017]

In today's account:

Khaled Khayat, 49, and Mahmoud Khayat, 32, have been charged with two counts of planning a terrorist act. A third man remains in custody, while a fourth was released without charge. Khaled Khayat's brother has not been charged in connection with the plot, because police believe he had no idea the bag contained explosives... They were refused bail and the case was adjourned until Nov. 14. Police have not detailed the men's relationship... One of the men, a 49-year-old from Sydney, brought the device to Sydney airport on July 15 in a piece of luggage that he had asked his brother to take with him on the flight — without telling the brother that the bag contained explosives, Australian Federal Police Deputy Commissioner Michael Phelan told reporters. But for reasons still unclear, the bag never got past the check-in counter. Instead, Phelan said, the man left the airport with the bag, and his brother continued onto the flight without it... [Associated Press | August 3, 2017] 

A little more detail:

Phelan said police still don't know precisely why the bag containing the explosives never made it past the check-in counter. Some theories are that it was too heavy, or that Khaled Khayat simply chickened out... [Associated Press | August 3, 2017]

Reuters today focuses on that grotesque twist - that one brother attempted to send his allegedly-unwitting brother to his death:

Police allege that one of the two men charged late on Thursday had been introduced to Islamic State by his brother, who they said was a senior member of the group in Syria.
Communication between the accused man and Islamic State began around April, police said. Under the instruction of the unidentified Islamic State commander, the men built a "fully functioning IED" (improvised explosive device). One of the brothers was unaware that he was carrying a bomb, disguised as a commercial meat mincer, in his luggage, and tried to check it in at the airport, police said. ["Islamic State behind Australians' foiled Etihad meat-mincer bomb plot: police", Reuters, August 4, 2017]

Now the bombshell:

The components for the device, including what Phelan described as a "military-grade explosive," were sent by a senior Islamic State member to the men in Sydney via air cargo from Turkey. An Islamic State commander then instructed the two men who have been charged on how to assemble the device, which police have since recovered, Phelan said. [Associated Press | August 3, 2017] 

No one knows at this stage how the military-grade explosives got from
Turkey to Australia [Image Source] 

Which airline out of Turkey? Which airport? How, if at all, was the incoming consignment checked when it reached Sydney? What do the Turkish authorities say about it?

Turkish Airlines, for the record, carried more passengers to and from Tel Aviv than any other foreign airline serving Tel Aviv back in 2015 when relations between the two countries were frigid. It's a two-way street. At the time, one of Turkish Airlines senior managers said: "The number of flights to Tel Aviv is the greatest on Turkish Airlines network of global routes. It's a profitable route, and it's very important for us to continue promoting it...." Relations are (a little) warmer now between Israel and Turkey since diplomatic relations were restored last summer; we flew with them last year to and from Istanbul and enjoyed the experience.

But as the Australians will now be realizing, it hardly matters whether bilateral relations are warm or cool when you're at risk of terrorists from outside your own country.

The allegation that the Islamic State was able to ship explosives to Australia undetected was troubling, Phelan acknowledged. "All the security agencies and those responsible for security of cargo and so on have put in place extra measures since that time," Phelan said. "It is a concern that it got through, yes, it's hard to deny that."
Justice Minister Michael Keenan said the immigration minister had ordered extra security of air cargo. "You would appreciate it is a very big job to screen, and Australia is a very open economy — there is an enormous number of packages moving both inward and outward on any given day," Keenan told reporters. "But we've taken measures to improve screening." [Associated Press | August 3, 2017] 

The plot then morphed:

After the July 15 bid failed, the men changed tactics and were in the early stages of devising a chemical dispersion device, which they hoped could release highly toxic hydrogen sulfide, Phelan said. No specific targets had been chosen, though an Islamic State member overseas had given the men suggestions about where such devices could be placed, such as crowded areas or on public transport.

Public transport? An Uber car? A train? A jumbo jet? The Manly to Sydney ferry?

In cool, calm Australia, the island continent where air travel is an economic essential, there's genuine and well-founded concern that this deeply disturbing plot

signifies a change in tactics for the Islamic State — from the uncomplicated and bloody attacks we've seen recently to complex, mass casualty attacks against hardened targets... While Australian authorities haven't confirmed the type of explosive police allege Khaled Khayat and his conspirators tried to smuggle onboard the Etihad flight, it is likely it was the same explosive repeatedly used by Al Qaeda in a series of bomb plots targeting the US —PETN (pentaerythritol tetranitrate). PETN is valued by terrorists because it is hard to detect and has a relatively high yield for its size: about 100 grams can reportedly destroy a car. It's also the explosive of choice for Al Qaeda's most prolific and effective bombmaker, Saudi Arabian citizen Ibrahim al-Asiri. Al-Asiri is a member of Al Qaeda's Yemen-based cell, known as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and remains one of the most dangerous men in the world. He is responsible for creating the bombs used in most of Al Qaeda's post-9/11 plots against the US, including 'shoe bomber' Richard Reid in 2001, 'underpants bomber' Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in 2009, and a plot involving two bombs smuggled on separate cargo planes bound for the US in 2010. Al-Asiri remains free despite a decade-long manhunt. ["Sydney terror plot: Why police and government concern shouldn't be dismissed as hyperbole", ABC Australia News, August 4, 2017]

If there ever were, it's clear today that there are no safe corners.

04-May-16: Begging for spare Arab change at UNRWA

Everyone and his personal struggle: Addressing transport
issues in the UAE [Image Source: Reuters]

In the Middle East, there are two fundamental, but different, realities that influence strongly the shape of the Arab/Israel conflict. One is the passion with which Arab states, especially the richest among them, pledge undying support for the "resistance" "struggle" of the Palestinian Arabs. The other is the financial resources they put behind that "support".

UN Palestinian agency turns to Gulf countries to avoid funding crisis | Established in 1950, UNRWA helps some five million Palestinians living in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and in the Palestinian territories (File photo: AP) | AFP | United Nations (United States) Tuesday, 3 May 2016 | The head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency on Tuesday urged Gulf countries to donate millions to help UNRWA avoid a funding crisis. Last year, the agency was hit by a major funding crisis that threatened to affect the opening of schools. An appeal by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to donors helped resolve the crisis, but the agency still has a funding gap of some $80 million. “We’d be very appreciative to have countries that have come forward last summer to help, and in particular three Gulf states –- Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait -– renew their generosity this year,” said Pierre Krahenbul, UNRWA’s commissioner-general. “If we could have that, we’d be able to avoid another crisis this summer,” he said.

Image Source

To give this a frame of reference, the Gross Domestic Product in 2014 (US dollars), the latest numbers we could find, for the three Arab countries to which UNRWA is turning its beseeching eyes:

• United Arab Emirates $399.5 Billion
• Kuwait $172.6 Billion
• Saudi Arabia $746.3 Billion

To help readers put this pathetic charade into perspective, and understand the decades of deep Arab cynicism about their beloved Palestinian brothers, see "19-Jun-13: We actually do understand why Arab states put almost no money in the Palestinian Arab "refugee" fund pot. We just don't get why the US does."

Based on some numbers we published here four years ago, pretty much the same question should be asked of the European Union, Australia, Sweden, UK, Norway and a list of other Western countries.

20-Apr-16: Actions, words and honor in the dangerously complicated Middle East

The Getty Images photo from this morning in Riyadh shows the US president
shaking hands with Prince Faisal bin Bandar bin Abdelaziz al-Saud,
Governor of Riyadh, as he arrives at King Khalid International Airport
in the Saudi capital

The president of the United States flew into Saudi Arabia today (Wednesday) for a brief visit. Mostly, it's about a one-on-one meeting with Saudi's absolute ruler, King Salman. But there's something else at work here for those sufficiently astute to notice it.

The background, rather well known in this part of the world, is the matter of stresses, strains and surprising changes in the relations that prevail between the US and the Saudis.

The triggers for the tensions are (a) Obama's stunning redesign on how Washington sees Iran, with massively negative reverberations for Israel and (b) the zig-zagging US policy in relation to the country formerly known as Syria -but today who knows?

Here's the description of today's Salman/Obama encounter as reported by an American network, ABC News:

Under crystal chandeliers, the Saudi monarch greeted Obama in a grand foyer at Erga Palace, where the two walked slowly to a reception room as the small of incense wafted. The two offered polite smiles as they sat down side by side for pictures at the start of their two-hour private meeting. "The American people send their greetings and we are very grateful for your hospitality, not just for this meeting but for hosting the GCC-U.S. summit that's taking place tomorrow," Obama said, referring to the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council summit. King Salman offered similarly gracious words for the president, who is paying his fourth trip here for face-to-face meetings and photos with royal rulers since becoming president. "The feeling is mutual between us and the American people," the king said through a translator.
The president was slated to spend little more than 24 hours in the Saudi capital before heading on to visits to London and Hannover, Germany.

Notice anything unusual there? No, neither did we until we saw a memo from Dr Harold Rhode a few hours ago.

We first quoted Dr Rhode in this blog two years ago ["06-Oct-14: Oh Jerusalem"] when he noticed what most others didn't about the backsides of Muslim worshipers praying outdoors on Jerusalem's Temple Mount. We won't quote his observation here but please click to see what he wrote. His insightful comments may add to your day. They did to ours.

Dr Rhode is an astute and uncommonly well-informed observer of life in the Islamic world, Serving as a professor of Islamic history at the University of Delaware in the early eighties, his career evolved into being an expert on the Islamic world for the US government. Between 1994 and 2010, he advised on Islamic Affairs in the Office of Net Assessment, the Pentagon's think-tank.

Dr Rhode evidently saw reports of the Obama visit to the Saudis earlier today, including these unobtrusive lines:

Dressed in a grey suit, Obama emerged at 1:14 pm (10:14 GMT) and descended the steps of Air Force One onto a red carpet at the Saudi capital’s King Khalid International Airport. Prince Faisal bin Abdulaziz, the governor of Riyadh, greeted him. Unusually, Saudi state news channel Al-Ekhbaria did not broadcast Obama’s arrival, as it had done during his last visit – more than a year ago – to pay respects after the death of King Salman’s predecessor King Abdullah... [Agence-France Press, today]

Dr Rhode's observations (unpublished, as far as we know) are:

In the Middle East, actions speak louder than words. Direct verbal confrontation is frowned upon, so we must look to actions to understand what message people wish to convey. It is in this context that we must understand how deeply the Saudis humiliated Obama today by sending a lower-ranking official. Protocol would demand that the King to greet Obama, because Obama is a fellow Head of State. Thus, the Saudis signaled that they are humiliating Obama, both to the Middle East and the Muslim world in general. No words are necessary. Everyone there got the message.

Everyone got the message? Dr Rhode again:

I wonder whether the American officials responsible for Saudi Affairs understood this as a insult.  After all so much seems to go over their heads.

Later today, the Obama/Salman
get-together [Image Source]

AFP's reporting today focuses on the fence-mending character of today's tete-a-tete. They remind readers that the White House is emphasising "the strength of an alliance that has endured more than 70 years... [and] seeking to minimise the frictions."

But there's another side to this as Dr Rhode noted. AFP chooses to explain that via Mustafa Alani, a senior adviser to the Gulf Research Center. whom they quote today saying the Obama presidency has been “100 percent negative” for the region, a legacy of “keeping his distance.”

Obama met with Salman in Saudi Arabia  ["Obama Seeks to Bolster Ties With Saudi Arabia", Voice of America, January 27, 2015] at the state funeral of the previous ruler, the present king's half-brother, 15 months ago. At that distant time, King Salman

led an honor guard of senior Saudi princes and officials to greet the Obamas as they disembarked, including the crown prince and deputy crown prince and the kingdom's veteran oil minister Ali al-Naimi... 

Today's meeting of the two is likely to be the last formal meeting of the two heads of state during the Obama presidency. Given the difficulties the American side seem to be having with reading the map, this might not be so bad.

22-Mar-16: Speaking human rights truth to power at UNHRC

The Human Rights Council in Geneva
[Image Source: UN/Jean-Marc Ferré]

Kay Wilson had two minutes to speak to an assembly of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva yesterday (Monday). Here's the text, slightly modified from an article on the Israel National News website today, and a video below it.

I’m Kay Wilson, an Israeli Jewish tour guide and educator for StandWithUs. In December 2010, I was gagged, bound and held at knife-point for half an hour by two Palestinian terrorists, then butchered 13 times with a machete while watching my American Christian friend, Kristine Luken, hacked to death before my eyes because her executioners thought she was Jewish. The United Nations Human Rights Council immorally whitewashes terrorism as helplessness and frustration. As a survivor, I know that to be shackled in perpetual victimhood is not kind, helpful, moral or true. Personally, I’ve not also taken out my frustrations by holding Arabs hostage, tying them up and hacking them to death. Through the likes of their social media and educational institutions, the Palestinian Authority incites people to believe that Jews are unworthy of life. The incentive: American and European taxpayers’ money given to the Palestinian Authority, who rewards incarcerated murderers with monthly execution stipends.
Avoiding duty, and with pathological bias, you blame Israel, a Jewish democratic state of thriving coexistence, in which an Israeli Arab Muslim surgeon saved my life. Gagged with prejudice, bound with bigotry or held hostage by hate, and ineffective to do the goodness that will enhance people’s lives, may this council be set free, liberated to embrace both the integrity and impartiality needed to make our region a better place.

Here's the two minute video:

We have had reason to comment in the past on how Kay "passionately and articulately walks her audience through the before, the during and the after of being murdered - and surviving." See our post: "16-Jun-15: Kay Wilson's revenge". Also this: "30-Dec-13: Pretend walls, twisted messages: praising evil, condemning the innocents". 

The UNHCR defines its role as being

responsible for strengthening the promotion and protection of human rights around the globe and for addressing situations of human rights violations and make recommendations on them [UNHCR website]

Around the globe might be an extravagant way of describing its actual focus. Since UNHCR's creation in 2006, it had managed to condemn one country, Israel, 62 times; that's more resolutions condemning Israel than the rest of the world combined [source]. The council's monthly agenda includes one specific item - what it terms the “human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied territories” - every single month. That makes it the only region in the world getting that kind of attention. How well this safeguards "human rights around the globe" is a mystery.

Its membership is currently Albania, Algeria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bolivia, Botswana, Burundi, China, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, France, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Maldives, Mexico, Mongolia, Morocco, Namibia, Netherlands, Nigeria, Panama, Paraguay, Philippines, Portugal, Qatar, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, South Africa, Switzerland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Togo, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Venezuela, Viet Nam.

Ponder the list as you note that, in the UNHCR's own words, the members

are elected by the majority of members of the General Assembly of the United Nations through direct and secret ballot. The General Assembly takes into account the candidate States’ contribution to the promotion and protection of human rights, as well as their voluntary pledges and commitments in this regard.

Note also that Saudi Arabia, a chronic abuser of human rights, a place where 47 people were judicially beheaded in a single day some weeks ago, a seat-holder at the UNHCR because of a secret vote-fixing deal with the United Kingdom, and (absurdly) the elected head of UNHRC's Consultative Group, sees itself as the UNHCR's next president and no one within the organization seems to see that as a bitter joke.

And a reminder to all of us that the very most basic of human rights is the right to stay alive.

02-Mar-16: Saudi and Gulf states announce they now view Hezbollah as terrorists

The Gulf Cooperation Council members [Source]

Saudi Arabia, along with several of the Gulf oil states, today announced [via AP] that they are formally declaring Hezbollah a terrorist organization.

A statement from the Gulf Cooperation Council said Wednesday that it was taking the step because of hostile acts by the militant group within its member states. The group accused Hezbollah of charges including seeking to recruit members within the GCC and smuggling of weapons and explosives...

(The Gulf Cooperation Council members are the Kingdom of Bahrain, the State of Kuwait, the Sultanate of Oman, the State of Qatar, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.)

Should that be news? Yes, bearing in mind the background. Wikipedia, whose entry on Hezbollah is likely to change in the next 24 hours, currently says

Hezbollah's status as a legitimate political party, a terrorist group, a resistance movement, or some combination thereof is a contentious issue. There is a "wide difference" between American and Arab perception of Hezbollah. Since Hezbollah is a non-state actor that uses violence as a means of resistance to Israel, it is often associated with "terrorism" in West: several Western countries officially classify Hezbollah or its external security wing as a terrorist organization, and some of their violent acts have been described as terrorist attacks. However, throughout most of the Arab and Muslim worlds, Hezbollah is referred to as a resistance movement, engaged in national defense.

That entry lists these countries and organizations as having listed Hezbollah "in at least some part" as a terrorist organization. Australia, Bahrain, Gulf Cooperation Council, Canada, France, European Union ("Hezbollah's military wing"), Israel, Netherlands", New Zealand, United Kingdom ("Hezbollah's military wing"), and the United States.

In reporting this terrorism-related development, Gulf Today says today

Gulf nations have taken a series of measures against Hizbollah since Saudi Arabia last month halted a $3 billion programme funding French military supplies to Beirut.

Some additional small insight into the evolving view taken by the Saudis comes in an article by an influential columnist: "A company called Hezbollah", written by Abdulrahman al-Rashed, a former General Manager of Al Arabiya News. A brief extract:

How much is Nasrallah, who heads Hezbollah, bothered? 

 

To understand why Hezbollah has expanded beyond Lebanon into Syria and Yemen, we have to look at it as a limited-liability company that provides services to its owner, the Iranian regime... Iran has desires that it wants to impose on the West and Israel, such as allowing its nuclear program and extending its influence in the Arab Gulf countries and Iraq. This is what Tehran has achieved in part due to Hezbollah and other forces such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad... As a result of the Iran nuclear deal, Hezbollah’s main function - facing Israel - may expire. This is why the party is trying to reinvent itself as a company that offers other services."

Reuters noted just yesterday that

Relations between Lebanon and Saudi Arabia have been plunged into crisis since Riyadh halted $3 billion in aid to the Lebanese army - a response to the Beirut government's failure to condemn attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran.

We have more to say, but meanwhile urge readers to see "Iran funding Palestinian terrorism", published yesterday, and authored by Dr Ely Karmon of Israel's International Institute for Counter-Terrorism.

29-Dec-15: Gaza and what manipulative, highly-politicized foreign aid can buy

The red carpet is constantly out for visitors to Shujaiyeh
neighborhood, Gaza City. This non-Photoshopped photo is from nearly
a year after the destruction [Photo Credit: Dan Cohenvia 972Blog]

Gazan suffering. It's a vastly potent issue that drives much of the passion on the Palestinian Arab side.

With bitter wintery weather setting in fast, why are so many Gazan Palestinian Arabs still waiting for homes destroyed in 2014's summer battle with Israel to be reinstated and/or replaced?

Some digging around by reporters for the Wall Street Journal today offers surprising insights: "Politics Slows Rebuilding in War-Ravaged Gaza Strip | Political differences among Gulf Arab states play large role in who gets aid" [Rory Jones and Abubakr Bashir | Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015]

It frames the question in terms of the very different fates experienced by a pair of Gazan brothers and their two adjoining residences. They are Abdelraziq Harara, 53, and and Jihad Harara, 65, two Palestinian Arab everyman-like unknowns who happen to have lost their neighboring Gaza homes in the storm of war that swept over them in July 2014. That's when the densely-populated Shujaiyeh neighborhood of Gaza City became the center of fierce fighting involving the terrorists of the rocket-rich Hamas regime and the IDF. More than 140 Hamas rockets had been fired in the general direction of Israel from the Harara brothers' neighborhood in the 12 days commencing July 8, some of them reaching well into Israel's centers of population in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and .

Open-air prison? [Source]

Israel's patience got stretched thinner and thinner. Then it ended. At that point, Israel took some extraordinary preliminary measures before commencing a much-needed counter-offensive. Starting on July 16, 2014, and with the intention of minimizing the loss of civilian lives, the IDF

by means of leaflets, loudspeaker announcements, telephone calls, text messages and radio messages, told the residents to leave and relocate in central Gaza City until further notice... By 19 July, OCHA reported that while the majority had not left their homes,and ignored the warnings, up to half had gone as bombardments intensified. Israel condemned Hamas for using "human shields". According to Amnesty International, the UNRWA shelter facilities were overflowing and many of the residents had nowhere to go. Residents interviewed later also cited confusion due of lack of electricity and communications. The official Israeli view was that Hamas had compelled residents of Shujai'iya to stay behind in the face of IDF warnings to evacuate prior to the IDF assault, holding civilians as "hostages".Jordanian-Palestinian politician Mudar Zahran wrote that a Gaza medical worker had told him "Hamas militants blocked exits, shot people as they were running and forced the rest to return to their homes and get bombed". [Wikipedia]

Serious air, tank and mortar fire began on the night of July 19, 2014. Then shortly afterwards, Israeli ground forces entered the neighbourhood. Much destruction ensued.

Concentration camp? [Source]

Fast forward to today's WSJ analysis.

While Abdelraziq Harara's house is almost completely rebuilt, the immediately-adjacent lot, where his brother Jihad Harara's house once was, remains desolate. Same street, same family, completely different outcome. Why? As the WSJ article makes clear, the answer is: very poorly managed money, and the cynical manipulation this makes possible.

Soon after the end of the 2014 fighting, foreign donors were convened in Cairo for a one-day hand-over-the-money conference aimed at raising enough money to reverse the damage suffered by the Gazans. We noted here ["27-May-15: The cheque for Gaza is in the mail, or whatever"] that

the fund-raiser was an incredible success. The organizers had hoped to raise $4 billion, but ended with pledges to Gaza of an incredible $5.4 billion,.. And you have to take your hat off in recognition of the donors' selfless generosity. Some of them may be astronomically wealthy but let's give credit where it's due: they really wanted to help. Their fraternal ties to the Arabs of the Gaza Strip provided a powerful incentive to do the right thing. As we noted, major pledges of funding came from Qatar ($1bn). Saudi Arabia ($500m), Turkey ($200m), United Arab Emirates ($200m), the European Union ($568m), the United States ($212m) and the United Kingdom ($32m).

Successful as it all seemed to be, seriously negative signs were not hard to find even then. We suggested what this meant for Gaza's teeming masses and the desperately-needed cash that seemed to have been raised:

[T]he United States which pledged $277 million has handed over 84% of that. The European Union promised $348 million, and 40% has shown up so far which, compared with the Arabs, is not too shabby... [On the other hand] Qatar is spending tens of billions of dollars on getting ready to host the 2022 FIFA soccer World Cup. Of the $1 billion it pledged to its Gazan brothers, it has delivered 10 percent. The Saudi Arabians have produced just one-tenth of the $500 million they promised. Turkey pledged $200 million and has sent $520,000. Kuwait, not to be outdone, also pledged $200 million - and has not sent a penny. The unimaginably rich United Arab Emirates said it was giving $200 million; the World Bank says it has no data for how much arrived... ["27-May-15: The cheque for Gaza is in the mail, or whatever"]

With due modesty, it turns out we were right. As today's WSJ piece, written 14 months after ours. demonstrates, a mere

$1.2 billion of the $3.5 billion has been delivered, with Gulf states dispensing only about $170 million. Like other donors, Gulf governments have attached conditions on how their aid money is spent, according to Palestinian, United Nations and World Bank officials. “Donors have different requirements and priorities,” said Bashir Rayyes, who coordinates the Gaza aid effort for the United Nations and reports to the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank. Chief among these differences is their views about Gaza’s rulers. While Qatar supports Hamas, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have grown more aggressive in recent years in their opposition to Hamas... [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Gas chamber? [Source]

There's a self-serving quote in the article from a Hamas politburo member, an Islamist regime insider by the name of Ziad al Zaza:

"Each one of these countries wants a say in Gaza... We will never allow anyone to have a say in Gaza except the Palestinians."

Zaza, who knows how these things work, is a former Hamas deputy prime minister and finance minister. Other than his last three words, we think he ought to be believed... and the homeless of Gaza ought to be pushing him out of power as fast as they can.

Here, paraphrasing the WSJ team's findings, is what's known now about how certain super-wealthy Arab countries are playing their Gaza "relief aid" hand:

• Qatar, encouraged by Hamas to do this, has set up its own foreign-aid office in Gaza. In this way, it hires contractors and laborers directly to carry out road, school and home reconstruction. Still, it has managed to spend only a fraction of the $1 billion it pledged in Cairo.
• Saudi Arabia, for its own reasons, has no interest in seeing Hamas benefit from aid. So its funds are channeled via UNRWA. And, if you're wondering, it too has delivered just a tiny part of what it promised in Cairo last year.
• United Arab Emirates is sending some of its aid money to Gaza via Mohammed Dahlan, who was a powerful (and phenomenally wealthy) figure under Yasser Arafat. It's calculated to cause problems. Hamas see Dahlan as a rival. Fatah insiders say he has been trying to overthrow the Palestinian Authority's president Mahmoud Abbas. Just the right guy.
• Kuwait is also bypassing Hamas, and said to be sending its contribution via the Palestinian Authority. So how much have they already sent? According to the WSJ, oh, about exactly zero.

Qatar's man in Gaza gives the whole messy affair some revealing context:

Ahmad Abu Rass, who heads the [Qatari government] office, said Doha [the Qatari capital] won’t shell out more cash in Gaza until other donors step up efforts to fulfill their pledges. A half-hearted aid effort only sows more despair among Gazans and sets the stage for another round of fighting, making any aid a wasted investment, he said. [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Let's say that differently: no foreign aid serves Hamas better than foreign aid that never arrives. That's because Hamas has no interest at all in aiding its people - only in leveraging their plight for malevolent Islamist purposes. 

As poorly understood as this is by large parts of the mainstream media and by foreign governments (which it certainly is), ordinary Gazans comprehend it in practical and down-to-earth ways:

Abdelraziq said he and other displaced Gazans would take cash from Israel if it meant living in their own homes again soon. They don’t care about politics, he said... As Qatar’s maroon-and-white flag flew above a completed house nearby, [his still-homeless brother] Jihad said he had no control over what country aided him or why. He just hoped the money would come soon. “If the Israelis built the house, I’d fly the Israeli flag.” [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Not exactly what Hamas wants people to hear.

But then the messaging of its dominant fat-cats ["23-Nov-14: Gaza's wealth and where it is - and is not - going"] has always been strong on blunt threats and on real and threatened terror/fear - and considerably lighter on the basic business of taking care of the people they rule.

By the numbers. Source: WSJ

(The revealing WSJ graphic - note that we we removed a small part of it to simplify the message - sums up the Arab "largesse", contrasting it sharply with aid from Western sources.)

Describing accurately and fully how this works is a rare and tricky thing. Complex, often interwoven interests affect and are affected by it. That trickiness contributes to spiraling hyperbole - the need to reach for ever more evocative ways of depicting it, and never mind how outlandish or fact-free. The headlines we included in the screen shots above hint at the creative spirit behind much of the failed reporting and the supremely irresponsible rhetoric.

Understanding why so much misery goes on for so long in Gaza despite the phenomenal sums of money that have been channeled into countless relief efforts, special funds and emergency humanitarian appeals, remains Mission Almost-Impossible. Chronic distortion of facts is an essential part of the whole sad and endless process.

21-Jun-15: Some rare insights into what the Saudis have been up to

All over the global media today - the Saudi
Cables [Image Source]

What the Saudis say about themselves tends to be filled with platitudes and self-praise, as we pointed out just a couple of days ago ["18-Jun-15: Saudi advice on showing love and compassion and dealing with others nicely"]. Its current ruler, His Highness Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, provided an illuminating instance of how that works just this past Wednesday when he extolled what he called Saudi "humanitarian activities":

We are happy to serve Muslims all over the world... Islam works for goodness and reform and promotes constructive activities. It follows moderation, backs dialogue and brings people together... Muslims should do their duties in the best form and deal with others nicely.

Thousands of documents released via Wikileaks this weekend (61,195 of them now freshly uploaded as of tonight, and a Wikileaks promise of half a million more to appear in the coming weeks) give a starkly different view of Saudi activities. The fugitive WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange (who on Friday 'celebrated' the third anniversary of taking up residence inside the Ecuadorean embassy in London) introduces them this way:

"The Saudi Cables lift the lid on an increasingly erratic and secretive dictatorship that has not only celebrated its 100th beheading this year, but which has also become a menace to its neighbours and itself," 

We have not reviewed any of them ourselves. But the Wikileaks page asserts that they are made up of "extensive correspondence" between Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and its embassy in Canberra, Australia revealing

sustained Saudi efforts to influence political and religious opinion within Australia's Arabic and Islamic communities [and] bribing and co-opting key individuals and institutions...

Website of Australian Federation of Islamic Councils

Some highlights from a report published today in Australia's Sydney Morning Herald suggests deep Saudi penetration of Australia's Arab communities, as well as the buying of influence and tracking of dissenting Saudi voices:

• WikiLeaks has revealed secret Saudi Arabian influence in Arabic media and Islamic religious groups in Australia... 
• The documents include instructions from the Saudi government to its embassy relating to the payment of large subsidies from the Saudi Ministry of Culture and Information to prominent Arabic newspapers and media organisations in Australia...
• The Saudi embassy is also revealed to pay close attention to the political and religious beliefs of Saudi university students studying in Australia with reports sent to the Mabahith, the General Investigation Directorate of the Saudi Ministry of Interior, the Kingdom's brutal secret police that deals with domestic security and counter-intelligence. 
• [And] Saudi government funding for building mosques and supporting Islamic community activities in Australia.
• [Also evidence of Saudi pre-occupation with Iranian] Shiite Islamic leaders to engage with the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils 
• [T]he kingdom's funding of visits to Australia by Sunni Islamic clerics to counter Shiite influence.
• [E]xtensive Saudi efforts to influence and neutralise critical opinion in foreign media, including widespread use of monetary contributions and subsidies.

Saudi Arabia's own media have so far been careful to ignore what the rest of the world is seeing today. Although these can be accessed from wherever people can get connected to the Internet, that's not what the Saudi government is recommending its subjects do - quite the opposite.

Saudi Arabia on Saturday urged its citizens not to distribute "documents that might be faked" in an apparent response to WikiLeaks' publication on Friday of more than 60,000 documents it says are secret Saudi diplomatic communications. The statement, made by the Foreign Ministry on its Twitter account, did not directly deny the documents' authenticity... The world's top oil exporter, an absolute monarchy, is highly sensitive to public criticism and has imprisoned activists for publishing attacks on the ruling Al Saud dynasty and senior clerics. It maintains tight control over local media... [Reuters, June 20, 2015]

Saudis, and anyone else interested in a rare glimpse into what the Saudi power elite get up to when they think people are not watching, have plenty of material to sort through. For instance, an incident from Geneva, 2009, given global prominence via an AP report of the leaked papers, concerns the well-connected wife of a Saudi insider who used to serve as deputy minister of defense and aviation:

"Princess Maha Al Ibrahim... the wife of senior Saudi royal Abdul-Rahman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud... skipped town after failing to pay a first installment of 1.5 million Swiss francs owed to [a limousine] company and her hotel. When the bill was brought to her attention, "she declared that the amount was too high" and asked diplomats to handle the negotiations over its payment..." "When reached by phone on Saturday, Louis Roulet, the administrator of the limousine service, confirmed the document's authenticity and said he remembered the incident well. The total bill was "far more" than 1.5 million Swiss francs, he said, adding that it was eventually paid in full. "We don't work with this family anymore, for the obvious reasons," Roulet said. Still, the Algerian-born Roulet was unfazed, saying these kinds of disputes were typical of the Arab customers he dealt with. "I find this totally normal," he said. [Associated Press, June 20, 2015]

How normal? A glossy report that appeared in Vanity Fair two months ago fleshes it out somewhat. See "The Saudi Princess and the Multi-Million Dollar Shopping Spree" [Vanity Fair, April 2015]. But the anxieties stemming from the covert workings of Saudi influence extend far beyond a propensity for skipping town ahead of unpaid suppliers.

18-Jun-15: Saudi advice on showing love and compassion and dealing with others nicely

The political figure bending forward from the waist
(the White House is very definite that he was not bowing) before
the Saudi Arabian king in 2009 is President Barack Obama [Image Source]

What you think of Saudi Arabia – an entity that resembles a family business as much as it does a sovereign state - seems to depend, as with many things in life, on who you are and what you do in life.

How its owners think of their property and the people living in it can be gauged from a somewhat bizarre article that appears in a news report published a few hours ago by Arab News [“Saudi Arabia's first English-language newspaper... the daily's website gets hundreds of thousands of hits every day from Web surfers worldwide…”]. It’s headed “Shun violence, terror! King reiterates rejection of sectarianism”:

JEDDAH: Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman on Wednesday urged Saudis and other Muslims to uphold the values of tolerance, love, unity and mercifulness, and reject violence and terrorism. In a message on the occasion of Ramadan, he reiterated Saudi Arabia’s total rejection of sectarianism based on different schools of religious thought, saying sectarianism would weaken the country’s unity and solidarity. “We have unlimited confidence in Saudi citizens and we’ll not show any leniency toward those who try to weaken the unity of Saudis and undermine the Kingdom’s security,” he said. The message, which was read out on Saudi Television by Culture and Information Minister Adel Al-Toraifi, the king described Ramadan as a month of goodness and blessings when God forgives sins of believers and saves them from Hell. “Islam is a religion of love, compassion and tolerance, and its message was sent by the Almighty as a mercy to the whole humanity,” the king said… The king stressed that Saudi Arabia’s humanitarian activities were not aimed at achieving any mundane benefits but to win the pleasure and reward of God. “We are happy to serve Muslims all over the world.” The king added: “Islam works for goodness and reform and promotes constructive activities. It follows moderation, backs dialogue and brings people together.” King Salman continued, “The holy month generates in our minds the feelings of empathy and compassion toward the fellow human beings. It also teaches us great lessons.” He called upon Muslims to make use of the great blessings of Ramadan through fasting, prayers and righteous deeds. “Muslims should do their duties in the best form and deal with others nicely.”

While those exhortations about moderation, goodness, reform, constructive activities, righteous deeds are still ringing in our ears:

A man was beheaded in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, with the convicted murderer's execution becoming the 89th case this year, according to an AFP count. The death toll has already overtaken the total for all of 2014. [RT, May 27, 2015]

For our part, we have written about Saudi Arabia here several times. We wonder whether Saudi Arabia’s actions exemplify (as its Custodian says above) Muslims dealing with each other nicely. We think not so much, but sometimes it’s better not to be judgmental. 

Here are some randomly selected slices of what we see when we look at the Saudis from our terror-centric standpoint:

• 25-Jan-15: Summing up the life of an absolute monarch in the mainstream media: “The Saudi political system, a blend of absolute monarchy and Islamic extremism, has one of the world's worst human rights records. There is no democracy and basic freedoms are limited… It punishes dissidents, including currently with multiple rounds of publicly lashing a blogger, amputates hands and legs for robbery, and enforces a system of gender restrictions that make women not just second-class citizens, but in many ways the property of men…”
• 19-Oct-14: Saudi Arabia's sense of where it fits in the war against the terrorists: “…All in all, the notion that the Saudi government claims to be at the "forefront of combating terrorism" raises some questions about what the word forefront could possibly mean when they use it.”
• 2-Apr-14: Charm, offense and antagonism-avoidance: “The country most closely identified with the 9/11 terrorists gets a flying visit from the world's most powerful political figure because America's policy makers see themselves in a charm offensive directed at a regime that calls its atheists terrorists. We're not sure about how much charm it generated. But offensive? Surely.”
• 11-Mar-13: Know the neighbours: Saudi Arabia: “A recent report about the jailing of human rights activists in Saudi Arabia got us thinking about what sort of country it really is. So allow us to share some of what we found in a brief hunt on the web…”

British prime minister David Cameron being invested with
the Saudi Order of King Abdul Aziz from King Abdullah in 2012. It's given
to foreigners for "meritorious service" to the Saudis [Image Source]

Then there’s the matter of how Saudi Arabia looks to its powerful customers, competing with each other for Saudi business and especially for Saudi investment.

The paragraphs below come from the official report of a debate in the UK Parliament’s House of Lords about the fate of (believe it or not) a blogger who has incurred the wrath of the Saudi insiders and may pay for this with his life. Lord Avebury, speaking last Thursday, asked

Her Majesty’s Government what representations they have made to the government of Saudi Arabia about the confirmation of a sentence of 1,000 lashes and 10 years in prison against Raif Badawi.

And got this answer from the UK’s Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Baroness Anelay of St Johns:

My Lords, we are extremely concerned about Raif Badawi’s case and have discussed it at the most senior levels in the Government of Saudi Arabia... The case is under active consideration and we will continue to watch it closely.

Not so reassured, another peer, the Lord Bishop of St Albans, pressed on with a pretty sharp question:

My Lords, your Lordships’ House will not be unaware of the discrepancy between the attitude to human rights displayed in Saudi Arabia’s public condemnation of the Charlie Hebdo atrocities and this case, where somebody is being punished on the basis of religion. Does the Minister agree that there is a considerable dissonance between the public image that Saudi Arabia is seeking to present and the country’s internal affairs?

Not a bad enquiry.  But the reply from the Baroness is a stunner:

My Lords, I think we have to recognise that the actions of the Saudi Government in these respects have the support of the vast majority of the Saudi population. Against that background blah blah blah

HRH Prince Charles, the prince of Wales, in Saudi
Arabia 2013 [Image Source]

and on she droned. 

Now think about her observation for a moment. One of the UK government’s most senior makers and executors of foreign policy says yes, we are watching, yes, we know as well as you what the Saudis do, but let’s not forget most Saudis support their leaders’ views.

Really? How she, or anyone, can know this is a puzzle. We tend towards the view, exemplified in an article by someone who studies such matters at the Washington Institute: 

What issues are of concern to ordinary Saudis? How does the average citizen view the state of the domestic economy? What are the prevailing public attitudes toward religious extremism? …Even in the short term, the Saudi government, while far from democratic, is no doubt sensitive to social crosscurrents and diverse reactions to its initiatives. As a result, understanding Saudi public opinion is an important part of gauging the country's likely future direction. Opinion polls, however, are almost unknown in the kingdom, and anecdotal or indirect measures of these very delicate subjects are notoriously unreliable.

A British commentator, writing about this two days ago in The Independent UK, asks what every Brit ought to consider shouting into their TVs or at their MPs:

How medieval does a regime have to be before ministers pause to consider the relationship? Three years ago today, Saudi Arabian police arrested Raif Badawi for the crime of running a website “that propagates liberal thought”. His blog had put the case for secularism in observations such as this: “States which are based on religion confine their people in the circle of faith and fear.” As if to prove his point, a Sharia court hauled Badawi back into the fearful circle, sentencing him to 600 lashes and seven years in jail for “going beyond the realm of obedience”. Last year, deciding that he had been let off too lightly, a judge upped the punishment to 1,000 lashes and 10 years’ imprisonment plus a fine of one million riyal (about £170,000). What does our government think of this? …No answer has yet been forthcoming. Perhaps the “vast majority” of Saudis are indeed fanatical sadists who rejoice to see liberal bloggers whipped. Or, then again, perhaps they aren’t. No one knows: this is an absolute monarchy, not a marginal in the West Midlands being polled by Lord Ashcroft. Even if you were a Saudi who deplored the flogging, you wouldn’t say so publicly… It’s almost as if the House of Saud is showing off to Isis, the new kid on the block: “Publicly beheading apostates? Pah. We were doing that when you were in nappies…” How medieval does a regime have to be before British ministers pause to consider whether it is one with which we can do business? So long as the regime in question remains our most lucrative export market for arms, the answer is: “My Lords, I think we have to recognise…”

Now keep in mind what it means when Her Majesty's British government supports policies that have the support of the vast majority of this foreign population or another. For instance, more than 70% of Palestinian Arabs, according to scientific and respected Arab-run opinion polls, support Hamas' blood-drenched approach to violence against Israelis. And more concretely, fully 80% support (and 20% oppose) attempts by individual Palestinians to stab or run over Israelis in Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank as of December 2014. On any serious view, the Mahmoud Abbas PA regime honours those acts of terror and their perpetrators. So is Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office OK with those acts of murder-by-car too? 

(We have had some recent personal experience of trying to extract a rational response to terror-related questions from the British foreign policy establishment. We want to write about this in the next few days.)

Finally, a brief comment on how Saudi views are projected outside its own borders, in particular its views on terror. A senior figure at a serious-sounding Washington/London think-tank in a published January 2015 article sums that up for us:

[F]or decades the Saudis have also lavishly financed its propagation abroad. Exact numbers are not known, but it is thought that more than $100 billion have been spent on exporting fanatical Wahhabism to various much poorer Muslim nations worldwide over the past three decades. It might well be twice that number. By comparison, the Soviets spent about $7 billion spreading communism worldwide in the 70 years from 1921 and 1991... [A] Wikileaks cable clearly quotes then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying "donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide." ...Other cables released by Wikileaks outline how Saudi front companies are also used to fund terrorism abroad.

Might be interesting to know Baroness Anelay of St Johns' view of that.