The Kingdom of Saud's Game of Thrones

[Baron von Kriterium]

There have been quite a few developments in the Kingdom the past several days.

Today:

Multiple reports and rumors that the King will hand the Crown to Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) within 48 hours.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/876832/Saudi-Arabia-King-Salman-ruler-Prince-Mohammed-bin-Salman

Saudi Arabia orders its citizens to leave Lebanon immediately.
http://www.spa.gov.sa/viewfullstory.php?lang=en&newsid=1686201#1686201

Lebanese government believes that Sauds are detaining PM Hariri. Lebanon wants him to return to formally resign. The newspaper Al Akhbar reports that Hariri will agree to retire from political life and move to Europe. The Saudis will install Hariri's brother (after first travelling to Riyadh to pledge allegiance).

Tuesday:
On Sunday, just after Lebanese PM Hariri's resignation, Israel sent a cable to all of its embassies. That message was leaked and revealed support of the Sauds. The link is in Hebrew and, perhaps Google didn’t translate well, but it seems to indicate Israeli support of MbS.
http://news.nana10.co.il/Article/?ArticleID=1272790&sid=126

Monday:
- Prince Abdul Aziz bin Fahd was allegedly killed during a firefight with authorities.

- As part of the wide-scale political purges conducted by MbS, Riyadh ordered the arrest of Ahmed al-Jarba and Riad Hijab, two former Saudi backed proxies who were vying to take control of Syria and establish a Takfiri state. While Ahmed al-Jarba and Riad Hijab never had meaningful support in Syria, the Sauds had consistently backed them and their colleagues in an effort to destabilise Syria.

- As reported by Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-lebanon-politics-saudi/saudi-arabia-says-lebanon-has-declared-war-on-it-idUSKBN1D62NQ?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=Social
“Saudi Arabia said on Monday that Lebanon had declared war against it because of attacks against the Kingdom by the Lebanese Shi‘ite group Hezbollah.”

Sunday:
A helicopter crash killed another Saudi prince, Mansour bin Muqrin. When taken in totality, the ‘crash’ does not appear to be an accident.


Saturday:
- The weekend started off with the resignation of the Lebanese PM, Saad Hariri. The stated reason for the resignation was fear of an assassination by Hezbollah. However, this resignation, when discussed with the supposed death of Prince Abdul Aziz, gives some credence to the theory that the Hariri resignation has more to do with internal Saudi affairs than the Saudi attempt to bring instability to Lebanon.

- The MbS purge begins, including the commander of the national guard, Miteb bin Abdullah. Now, this guy is a son of the late King Abdullah and has long been considered a potential future king.

- A ballistic missile was fired from Yemen into Saudi Arabia. The Sauds blame Iran, of course.

June 2017:
The former Crown Prince, Prince Nayef, was ousted. He is still under house arrest.

[Ducay]

GoT is a perfect analogy. It really is a modern day monarchy drama - complete with the money, killings, feuds, and power struggles.

I approve of this only due to uptick in oil prices it has caused and the fact the "new school" is much more interested in moving more secular and slowing down the crazy islamist sect of Islam the KSA has been exporting in the last few decades

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Ducay

I approve of this only due to uptick in oil prices it has caused and the fact the "new school" is much more interested in moving more secular and slowing down the crazy islamist sect of Islam the KSA has been exporting in the last few decades

Well the oil prices bit makes you sound like a bit of a sociopath but I'm definitely with you on the rest of it. A more secular KSA is definitely good news for the rest of the world.

[_Q_]

Do we really think that MBS is going to be more secular than his father? What would lead you guys to believe that? Actually genuinely curious.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by _Q_

Do we really think that MBS is going to be more secular than his father? What would lead you guys to believe that? Actually genuinely curious.

Sorry, I should have stated that I'm hopeful that will happen. I'm not familiar enough with the situation or the players involved to give a take on what I think will happen.

[Ducay]

Originally Posted by _Q_

Do we really think that MBS is going to be more secular than his father? What would lead you guys to believe that? Actually genuinely curious.

He has stated he wants to stop the whole "lets go crazy around the world with Wahabbism" thing

"Not only that: The prince also promises to transform Saudi Islam into a more tolerant brand of religion that does not fund extremist mosques in the West or underwrite jihadists in the Middle East. "

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/artic...al-arab-spring


And not even going to reply to the troll and derail good discusssion

[Agamemnon]

I think the KSD uses it's religious exports hand-in-hand with its political exports.

If the Saudi-Iranian conflict continues to heat up (already two proxy wars in Syria, Yemen, political battles over Lebanon), the ME could be WWIII in a couple years.

Too bad Iran and KSD can't cooperate, together they would easily rule the entire ME, bring stability and prosperity to the whole region, and with their (current) oil wealth, transform the region into an ultra-modern lifestyle. But I guess Shia/Sunni distinctions are more important...

[Baron von Kriterium]

There are two predominant trains of thought concerning the events ongoing:

1) KSA/Israel/USA have had their plans foiled in Iraq and Syria. Yemen is not going well for KSA despite an overwhelming advantage. The sanctions against Qatar have not gone as planned, either (IE, they could not get Qatar inline with the rest of GCC). Iran has gained influence in the region - at the expense of KSA. Hezbollah is stronger than ever with battle-hardened troops. Lebanon could now be in the cross hairs in order to eliminate/reduce the Iranian influence.

2) MbS may wish to liberalize the economy. He sees Dubai and might want to duplicate that scenario. To do that, he needs to purge the "old guard". That doesn't necessarily mean he will secularize, though, in my opinion.

[blankall]

A few additional factors are in play here:

1. The KSA does not traditionally just pass down leadership from father to son in a strict hereditary way. The King is typically chosen from a pool of half-brothers, brothers, uncles, cousins etc.. from one generation. The new appointment is a huge change, as it involves passing power down to the younger generation. This move is also a power play to concentrate power in one hereditary line.

2. The KSA is under genuine threat from the extremist groups it helped create. The KSA has spent the last century exporting Wahabism to consolidate power/wealth in Riyadh and Mecca. Now they realise this has backfired, as the extremists they created don't want anything to do with a royal family.

3. Iran has made huge steps forward in terms of exporting its own threats. Iran's actions in Yemen and Syria show it to be a major player. Iran has also shown that it is capable of wooing Russian support. The Saudis are now surrounded by Iran's proxy armies and the Sunni extremist armies, both of whom seek to displace them.

[Oling_Roachinen]

Thread should be labelled as TV show only, some of you guys are clearly posting book spoilers.

[lazypucker]

So the Saudis run their country like how Kim runs his - fire missiles at other countries, assassinating family members, etc...

[Baron von Kriterium]

And Kuwait has ordered its citizens out of Lebanon.

http://www.kuna.net.kw/ArticleDetail...85&language=en

It almost reads verbatim like the Saudi's a few hours ago.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by Baron von Kriterium

There are two predominant trains of thought concerning the events ongoing:

1) KSA/Israel/USA have had their plans foiled in Iraq and Syria. Yemen is not going well for KSA despite an overwhelming advantage. The sanctions against Qatar have not gone as planned, either (IE, they could not get Qatar inline with the rest of GCC). Iran has gained influence in the region - at the expense of KSA. Hezbollah is stronger than ever with battle-hardened troops. Lebanon could now be in the cross hairs in order to eliminate/reduce the Iranian influence.

2) MbS may wish to liberalize the economy. He sees Dubai and might want to duplicate that scenario. To do that, he needs to purge the "old guard". That doesn't necessarily mean he will secularize, though, in my opinion.

It does seem to be a very complicated, convoluted situation. Trying to understand the dynamics is difficult. I found this but can't be certain if it is accurate:

Quote:
One can’t understand U.S.-Russian relations, nor much else of what is happening in the world, without knowing the relevant historical background; and the origins and nature of the Sunni war against Shia are arguably the most essential part of that. Just how the United States came to back the Sunnis, and how Russia came to back the #####es, in this war, will be discussed in subsequent articles.
This great intra-Islamic conflict, little understood outside the Middle East, came into clearer-than-ever focus on 2 August 2013 when Sami Kleib at al-Monitor headlined “Saudi Arabia Tries to Cut a Deal With Russia Regarding Syria”, and he reported about Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan al-Saud’s trip to Moscow, as the Director of Saudi Intelligence. It was an extraordinary private meeting, because the Sauds and the Russians have been enemies ever since the Sauds allied themselves with the Americans against the atheistic Soviet Union in 1945. Kleib wrote that:
Like all Saudi Arabian leaders, Bandar wants to deal a blow to Hezbollah and weaken Iran. And they will do anything to accomplish that, including hitting President Assad’s regime.

But why did Saudi Arabia change its mind and decide to send Prince Bandar to a country that “supports the genocide in Syria”?
To find the answer, first look for Iran.
Then, Kleib noted the central point:
Saudi Arabia faced a choice: to reach an understanding with either Iran or Russia.
Saudi Prince Bandar — sometimes called “Bandar Bush” because he was virtually accepted as a member of the Bush family — had been forced into a position of choosing between Russia and Iran as an ally to join with the Sauds’ war to dislodge Assad from Syria; and he chose Russia to become an ally with the Sauds, instead of choosing the Sauds’ ‘fellow’-Muslims, #####e Iran.
Why did the Sauds choose Russia, over Islamic Iran, to join them?
Russia, to the Sauds, represents (even today), as Kleib put it, “the ‘capital of communist atheism’.” (After all: Putin had once been a communist, though he was now a follower of the Russian Orthodox Church.) Iran, by contrast, represents the leadership of what to the Sunni Sauds is their real competition: #####e Islam.

Quote:

Before the Sauds-Salafists (Wahhabists) can defeat atheists and former atheists (Russia), and also defeat non-Islamic religionists (such as the vast majority of Europeans and Americans), they must first settle their scores against the #####es — above all, against Iran.
Furthermore: the fundamentalist Salafist-Wahhabist Saud family, in 1945, allied with the Christian-majority nation of America, against the atheistic Soviet Union; and, today, Russia is (reverted to its being) an overwhelmingly Christian-majority nation; so, some of the Sauds’ sheer animus against Russians has, indeed, subsided a bit. However, by contrast, Iran has become (after the 1979 ousting of the American stooge Shah) assertively #####e, which is, perhaps, to the Sauds, even more infuriating than is atheism.
However, it actually goes much deeper back than that: It goes back to the deal in the year 1744, that the fanatical anti-Shia cleric Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab and the ambitious gang-leader Muhammad ibn Saud (the founder of Saudi Arabia) made, which established simultaneously the Saudi-Wahhabist nation and the Wahhabist sect of Islam, both of which are joined-at-the-head with Saud’s descendants, so as to constitute the existing nation of, actually, Saudi-Wahhabist Arabia. (It’s actually not only Saudi. The Sauds fulfill their contract, because, if they didn’t, the Wahhabist clergy would support a revolution to overthrow them.) This deal was the most clearly and succinctly described in the 1992 U.S.-Library-of-Congress-published book by Helen Chapin Metz, Saudi Arabia: A Country Study (and the highlighting of a sentence in it here is by me, not by Metz):
Lacking political support in Huraymila [where he lived], Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab returned to Uyaynah [the town of his birth] where he won over some local leaders. Uyaynah, however, was close to Al Hufuf, one of the Twelver Shia centers in eastern Arabia, and its leaders were understandably alarmed at the anti-Shia tone of the Wahhabi message. Partly as a result of their influence, Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab was obliged to leave Uyaynah, and headed for Ad Diriyah. He had earlier made contact with [and won over to his hatred of Shiia] Muhammad ibn Saud, the leader in Ad Diriyah at the time, and two of [Saud’s] brothers had accompanied [Saud] when he [in accord with Wahhab’s hate-Shiia teachings] destroyed tomb shrines [which were holy to Shiia] around Uyaynah.
Accordingly, when Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab arrived in Ad Diriyah, the Al Saud was ready to support him. In 1744 Muhammad ibn Saud and Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab swore a traditional Muslim oath in which they promised to work together to establish a state run according to Islamic principles. Until that time the Al Saud had been accepted as conventional tribal leaders whose rule was based on longstanding but vaguely defined authority.
Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab offered the Al Saud a clearly defined religious mission to which to contribute their leadership and upon which they might base their political authority. This sense of religious purpose remained evident in the political ideology of Saudi Arabia in the 1990s.
Muhammad ibn Saud began by leading armies into Najdi towns and villages to eradicate various popular and Shia practices. The movement helped to rally the towns and tribes of Najd to the Al Saud-Wahhabi standard. By 1765 Muhammad ibn Saud’s forces had established Wahhabism — and with it the Al Saud political authority — over most of Najd.
So: Saudi Arabia was founded upon hatred of Shia Muslims, and it was founded upon a deal that was made in 1744 between a Shiia-hating fundamentalist Sunni cleric Wahhab, and a ruthless gang-leader Saud, in which deal the clergy would grant the Sauds holy legitimacy from the Quran, and the Sauds would finance the spread of Wahhab’s fanatical anti-Shiia sect.

Quote:

The Sauds are thus obsessed with Iran, and with its foreign #####e allies, such as Assad in Syria, Houthis in Yemen, and Hezbollah in Lebanon — and want them all dead, if those #####es won’t become subservient to Sunni clerics.
The United States is (and since 1945 has been) allied with the Sauds. But the U.S. was now reaching out to Iran, for a deal on nuclear inspections. This antagonized the Sauds. So: the Sauds were considering the possibility of becoming allied instead with Russia against both Assad and Iran. This despite the fact that America’s aristocracy (such as the Bushes*) is obsessed to overthrow or else cripple Russia, so as to give the U.S. aristocracy virtually a power-monopoly over the entire world.

Quote:

As regards the Saudi obsession to defeat Iran: The billionaire Saudi Prince al-Waleed bin Talal was reported on 2 July 2015 to have said in Saudi Arabia’s newspaper Okaz (with highlighting here by myself, to indicate what I see as the most important parts):
All my Muslim brothers and sisters must understand that it became a moral imperative for all inhabitants of war-torn Middle-East, namely Arabs, to desist their absurd hostility toward Jewish people. My sovereign, King Salman has instructed me to open a direct dialogue with Israel’s intellectuals building amicable ties with our Israeli neighbors.
The same English-language site then reported on 27 October 2015 that he said in Kuwait’s newspaper Al Qabas:
I will side with the Jewish nation and its democratic aspirations in case of outbreak of a Palestinian Intifada (uprising) and I shall exert all my influence to break any ominous Arab initiatives set to condemn Tel Aviv, because I deem the Arab-Israeli entente and future friendship necessary to impede the Iranian dangerous encroachment. … The whole Middle-East dispute is tantamount to life and death for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia from my vantage point, and I know that Iranians seek to unseat the Saudi regime by playing the Palestinian card, hence to foil their plots Saudi Arabia and Israel must bolster their relations and form a united front to stymie Tehran’s ambitious agenda.

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/...tocracies.html

[Jeff Lebowski]

Saudi assault in Yemen:

United Nations officials say Yemen will face the world’s largest famine in decades if the Saudi-led coalition refuses to lift its blockade on deliveries of aid.

The U.N. says aid agencies were given no prior notice of the Saudi decision to shut down all land, air and seaports in Yemen. Meanwhile, medical experts warn the clampdown will worsen Yemen’s cholera epidemic, which has sickened more than 900,000 people.

https://www.democracynow.org/2017/11...total_blockade

[Ducay]

Seems Hezbollah and Saudi/Emerati are playing chicken together in Lebanon today; with the latter recalling all citizens and warning Hezbollah is declaring war.

[Jeff Lebowski]

• In Syria, the government of Bashar Al-Assad would have collapsed years ago without the help of the Iranian-backed militant group Hizballah, Russian airpower solicited by Iran and Iranian soldiers euphemistically referred to as military advisors. The combined forces are slowly but steadily taking back land from both ISIS and other groups of rebels that the Saudis had backed.
• In Yemen, where Saudi Arabia had hoped for a quick and decisive victory when it led an armed attack in 2015 in support of the country’s official President Mansour Al-Hadi, it has instead become bogged down in a costly war of attrition with the Zaidi Houthis, a Shi’ite sect that drew much closer to Iran after the Saudi attack.

Yet the reaction from the Islamic Republic to Saudi bellicosity has been uncharacteristically muted. While strongly denying any role in arming the Houthis, Tehran has limited itself to calling for peace and unity and blaming Mohammad bin Salman’s accusations on problems inside the kingdom.

For Iran, an escalation of the proxy wars into a direct confrontation with Saudi Arabia would be counterproductive to say the least, especially since events on the ground are going their way, at least for the time being. Iran is not eager to test Saudi Arabia’s modern and state-of-the-art military hardware, purchased from the United States at a price tag of billions of dollars.

But now, especially after the 2015 nuclear deal it reached with global superpowers, the influence of the Islamic Republic runs high in many Middle Eastern capitals, and beyond. Tehran played host to Russian President Vladimir Putin and hopes to have French President Emmanuel Macron pay an official visit, in what would be a first since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Barely a week goes by without the Islamic Republic’s most travelled foreign minister, Javad Zarif, either hosting foreign diplomats or visiting them around the world.
The Islamic Republic, finally within sight of its goal of becoming the region’s dominant power, considers a direct military confrontation with the House of Saud — which they believe to be on the verge of collapse — as far from desirable. Discretion, in their view, is the better part of valor.

http://time.com/5016809/iran-saudi-a...n-yemen-proxy/

[blankall]

I wonder if the Saudis feel as secure in their relationship with the USA as the Ayatollahs/Assad do with Russia. In the event of a popular uprising in the KSA, my guess is that the USA may try to displace the Saudi monarchy with their own puppets. Meanwhile Russia has already shown that it will fight to keep Assad in power.

This seems like a very sudden turn on the Sunni militants, which the Saudis had previously backed.

[Baron von Kriterium]

Tensions appear to be rising...

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsCont...ting-to-d.aspx

The Baghdad Post reports that Saudi jets have mobilized and are preparing to strike Lebanon (Hezbollah).

http://www.thebaghdadpost.com/en/sto...llah-positions

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by Baron von Kriterium

...
The Baghdad Post reports that Saudi jets have mobilized and are preparing to strike Lebanon (Hezbollah).

http://www.thebaghdadpost.com/en/sto...llah-positions

That video was hilarious.

P.S. Also cute is how the forum censors the word #####e...

[Jeff Lebowski]

Lots of intrigue as to how things have unfolded:

There was no line-up of Saudi princes or ministry officials, as would typically greet a prime minister on an official visit to King Salman, senior sources close to Hariri and top Lebanese political and security officials said. His phone was confiscated, and the next day he was forced to resign as prime minister in a statement broadcast by a Saudi-owned TV channel.

Saudi Arabia has dismissed suggestions it forced Hariri to resign and says he is a free man. Saudi officials could not immediately be reached for comment on the circumstances of his arrival, whether his phone had been taken, or whether the Kingdom was planning to replace him with his brother. Hariri has given no public remarks since he resigned and no indication of when he might return to Lebanon.

Hariri went to his Riyadh home. His family made their fortune in Saudi Arabia and have long had properties there. The source close to Hariri said the Lebanese leader received a call from a Saudi protocol official on Saturday morning, who asked him to attend a meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
He waited for about four hours before being presented with his resignation speech to read on television, the source said.
“From the moment he arrived they (Saudis) showed no respect for the man,” another senior Lebanese political source said.

“What happened in those meetings, I believe, is that (Hariri) revealed his position on how to deal with Hezbollah in Lebanon: that confrontation would destabilize the country. I think they didn’t like what they heard,” said one of the sources, who was briefed on the meetings.
The source said Hariri told Sabhan not to “hold us responsible for something that is beyond my control or that of Lebanon.” But Hariri underestimated the Saudi position on Hezbollah, the source said.
“For the Saudis it is an existential battle. It’s black and white. We in Lebanon are used to gray,” the source said.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-l...-idUSKBN1DB0QL