Almost nothing infuriates me more than the royal family of Saudi Arabia. This week, they cut up an American resident and journalist from the Washington Post, Jamal Khashoggi to pieces, for lightly criticizing the regime.
They lashed and imprisoned a blogger, Raif Badawi, for criticizing the regime and questioning the role of Islam in state affairs. His sister, a women’s rights activist, has also been imprisoned.
President Trump has refused to acknowledge that Saudi Arabia takes part in such grotesque acts. Trump has personal business dealings with the Saudi’s and wants to sign arms deals with them. Such deals will only further U.S ties with a regime just as reprehensible as Iran’s and North Korea’s.
American conservatives have failed the test of being concerned about “radical Islam”. You hear a lot of rhetoric from American conservatives about the Iran deal, but none about the “Saudi Arabia deals”.
In August 2018, when Canada raised concerns about the imprisonment of women’s right activists in the Kingdom, the Saudi’s threatened 9/11 against Canada through an internet meme. The U.S conservative leadership refused to take a side in the diplomatic brawl.
Don’t let the new crown prince, Mohammed Bin Salman, fool you with distractions such as letting women drive and opening up movie theaters. He is a brutal leader who imprisons reformers and activists. He has launched a brutal war in Yemen. He has bombed children, women and innocent civilians in a proxy war with Iran.
How can the U.S be tough on radical Islam and win the war of ideas if they support the number one terrorist state in the region? How can the U.S expect Islamic countries to reform if it spits in the faces of reformers like Raif Badawi and Jamal Khashoggi?
How can the U.S expect Muslims to side with them in the war on terror when they fund Mohammed Bin Salman’s new campaign against civilians in Yemen with U.S bombs?
Why is it that the U.S and other western countries only rightfully condemn Iran’s regime but not Saudi Arabia’s regime? The Saudi’s have oil. Do you also know that U.S imperialism helped bring about the fundamentalist regime in Iran because the U.S installed the Shah of Iran instead of a leader loved by the people?
Why must the west depend on Saudi Arabia for oil instead of using renewable energy sources? I find it so funny that just because of Saudi Arabia’s oil wealth, they can bully Canada and the U.S without any repercussions.
Since the U.S is letting journalists get chopped up and secularist’s beaten and jailed, the U.S has lost all moral credibility. I don’t ever want to hear about “radical islamic terrorism” from American conservatives when they have let President Trump dance with a country that have just chopped up a journalist and have let women drive just a year ago.
U.S liberals should support reformers in Muslim countries instead of focusing on their “identity politics” and “cultural appropriation” games.
Saudi Arabia, Iran and I.S.I.S are examples of radical Islamic terrorism. All of them treat women like slaves. The U.S uses rhetoric such as “bomb the shit out of them” for two of these regimes.
With Saudi Arabia, the U.S does sword dances with them, sell’s them weapons that kill civilians in Yemen and let them cut up U.S journalists. Meanwhile, we let Muslim and Ex Muslim liberal reformers die and rot in prison.