Fight Back News Service is circulating the following October 3 statement from the U.S. Palestinian Community Network (USPCN).

Normalization with the racist, settler-colonialist, zionist entity of Israel often begins with a U.S. directive aimed at Arab regimes, as evidenced by the first attempt with the Camp David Accords in 1978, which led to a “peace” agreement between Egypt and Israel. In essence, normalization coerces Arab regimes in the region to accept their subjugated status as compliant agents, which serves the zionist agenda and its U.S. imperialist patron. In light of the fast pace of change in today’s world order, the U.S. finds it necessary to push for normalization in order to maintain its global, imperialist dominance over Arab nations and thwart their progress toward independent, modern democracies.

Therefore, the current Saudi Arabian (and previous efforts like the Abraham Accords and others) push towards normalization with the zionist enemy fundamentally signifies a recognition of the settler-colonialist state’s legitimacy and an attempt to erase our people's historical and national rights in all of Palestine. Any discussion about the so-called “two-state solution” is nothing but an attempt to stall and buy time to create new realities on the ground that will be impossible to reverse. This is when submission, surrender, and betrayal become the inherent traits of Saudi Arabia or any other Arab regime that normalizes relations with Israel. The Saudis and the other normalizers have always supported the repression of the Palestine national liberation movement, and believe that peace deals with Israel will eventually quell Palestinian resistance and bring quiet and “stability” to the region.

Within the normalization context, the zionist entity aims to establish economic, security, and political dominance over neighboring Arab nations, while extending its influence to North African nations as well. All these countries are envisioned as expansive markets for global – predominantly U.S. – capital, perpetuating their dependency and disintegration under the auspices of sell-out regimes, especially that of the most reactionary and traitorous of them all, the criminal kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Although our Arab masses reject normalization, and have been resisting it in the Gulf and other Arab nations like Egypt and Jordan for decades, these deals – brokered by a U.S. government that pays lip service to “democracy,” but promotes all the dictators (who are also, unsurprisingly, the normalizers) in the region – also allow Israel to focus its military firepower on the Palestinian people, as the militaries of the submissive and surrendering Arab states are neutralized.

#Palestine #USPCN #SaudiArabia #Zionism #Israel

San José, CA – Earlier in the day, I glanced at oil prices and saw that they were down 40% for the day at about $10 a barrel. Pretty bad, I thought. Then after financial markets closed, I got a call about it. I looked and saw that the closing price was negative $37.63 and let out an f-bomb, the first of about a half a dozen in my three minute conversation.

Oil futures for May fell more than 300%, from $18.27 on Friday, April 17, to deep in negative prices on Monday, April 20. With futures for June down but still at positive at about $20 a barrel, typically speculators could profit by buying the cheap May future, taking the oil delivery, and then selling the June future and delivering the oil in June. Normally this arbitrage would keep the futures prices within about $10 of each other. But the world is so awash in oil that there is almost no place to store extra oil in the United States. Thus, speculators and hedge funds were willing to pay to take the oil off their hands.

This crisis of overproduction in the oil market is mainly because of the steep drop in oil purchases because of the worldwide recession triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. Socialist China, where the pandemic began, had to lock down their country in a successful attempt to control the virus. New infections are now down to less than 100 per day, many, if not most, from Chinese returning from other countries. But the cost was steep, as the total production of goods and services, or GDP, fell more than 6% from a year earlier. This is China’s first fall in GDP since they began to report it in 1992. Even though China’s manufacturing is returning, service industries are slower to come back. Now that China has become the world’s largest importer of oil, world oil markets took a big hit.

But the pandemic situation in Europe, another major oil importer, is much worse. Despite the news about ‘reopening’ some of the economies, COVID-19 is still raging, with the United Kingdom alone reporting almost 6000 new infections. Together with Spain, Italy, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, each of which had over 1000 new infections reported, and other European Union countries, there were about 20,000 new COVID-19 cases despite stay-at-home orders across the continent. This has cut deeply into European imports of oil.

But Europe pales beside the United States, with almost 30,000 new infections reported, and much of the country (but not all) trying to stay at home. More than 20 million people in the United States have lost their jobs in just the last four weeks, and layoffs continue. Oil consumption in the United States has fallen by one-third just in the last month. The United States is still the world’s largest consumer of oil, which puts a huge dent in world oil consumption. While the U.S. is no longer a big oil importer, the drop in consumption means that the extra oil is piling up in the United States.

While not the main reason, a trigger for the recent collapse in the price of oil even before today was a price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia, the two biggest oil producers. While they were trying to gain market share from each other, they had a mutual target in mind: U.S. oil producers, where it is more costly to produce oil.

Even though the price of oil is now well below the cost of producing oil in the United States, U.S. oil companies cannot just turn off production. The big increase in U.S. oil production over the last ten years has been shale oil. The hydraulic fracturing or fracking process has never been turned off before and could lead to equipment damages or even not being able to restart production.

The drop in oil prices dragged down the stock market on Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average down almost 600 points or 2.5%. The Dow has fallen 20% from its all-time high earlier this year as Wall Street investors have faith in the huge efforts by the Federal Reserve and the federal government. In contrast, oil prices (using the barely positive $1.26 as oil prices bounced back after the close of U.S. trading) are down 97% from the beginning of the year, and show a much more pessimistic view of the real economy right now.

#SanJoséCA #International #US #MiddleEast #Asia #PeoplesStruggles #stockMarket #SaudiArabia #Russia #DonaldTrump #COVID19 #OilFutures

The attacks serve as the latest in an ongoing war of resistance by Yemen that began nearly five years ago. On one side, there are Ansar Allah (also known as the Houthis) and its allies in the camp of resistance including Iran, Syria, and the political organization Hezbollah, and the Palestinian movement; on the other side, Saudi Arabia and their coalition forces – made up in one form or another of the United States, Israel, several Gulf States, and others.

The involvement of the Saudi-U.S. coalition forces represents an intervention into the sovereign affairs of the Yemeni people. Ansar Allah has led the armed resistance against this foreign invasion. With the success of this attack, the tide of the war may have dramatically shifted in favor of the patriotic forces.

The conflict in Yemen has produced the greatest humanitarian crisis in the world today, with tens of thousands of people dead, many more wounded, and millions either on the cusp of starvation, victims of disease brought on by the war, or on the move as they flee for safety. Despite the magnitude of the crisis and the fact that the fighting has been raging for nearly five years, the U.S. corporate media has hardly covered Yemen at all. Until now, that is.

Over the last several days, mainstream media outlets have released story after story about this massive strike. A key piece to this narrative being spun by the Western press is that the attacks did not originate from Yemen, but Iran instead. The Iranian government has denied these allegations. As ever, U.S. President Donald Trump was quick to address the situation. The administration claims to be looking into the situation. Trump declared that they are “locked and loaded, depending on verification,” implying that they’re more than ready to retaliate directly in some capacity.

Combining the denial of the Iranian government with the bluster of President Trump leads to the conclusion that the pinning of the attack on Iran is a part of the broader U.S. shift toward open military aggression. The situation represents a danger not only to the people of Iran and the greater Middle East, but to all peace-loving people on the planet.

The demands of the anti-war movement in the U.S. must be clear: No to war on Iran! End military aid to Saudi Arabia! U.S. hands off Yemen!

#MilwaukeeWI #AntiwarMovement #OppressedNationalities #Iran #US #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #SaudiArabia #Houthis #DonaldTrump

The Anti-War Committee calls on its supporters to demand Congress and the Trump administration immediately cease all support for Saudi Arabia’s military assault on Yemen.

In March 2015, Saudi Arabia, with the support of President Obama, began waging a ruthless war against Yemen, with the goal of protecting Saudi and U.S. shipping, oil, and imperialist interests in the Middle East. The invasion began in reaction to the September 21 Revolution of 2014, when the Houthi movement for Yemeni self-determination, which for years had protested growing Saudi influence over Yemeni society, led a takeover of the most populous areas of Yemen including government institutions in the capital Sanaa. The war has been waged by a so-called “coalition” of Saudi-aligned governments in the region, together with the United States, and has involved a brutal aerial bombing campaign, a ground invasion and a blockade of Yemeni seaports.

While the ground assault has failed to capture significant territory from the Houthi-aligned forces, the aerial assaults—which have persisted for nearly four years—have destroyed much of the country’s infrastructure along with countless lives.

War on Yemen has Created a Grave Human Rights Crisis

International monitors have documented Saudi bombings of Yemeni refugee camps, hospitals, funeral processions, school buses, and many other civilian targets. Casualties from individual bombings have climbed into the hundreds; tens of thousands of Yemenis are estimated to have been killed overall.

The U.S./Saudi coalition has also blockaded seaports of the Houthi-held areas of Yemen, preventing food and medical supplies from reaching millions of people. As a result, famine has spread across Yemen, with international aid organizations estimating that hundreds of children die of malnutrition daily, and that 14 million Yemenis—half of the pre-war population—are at risk of starvation.

Adding to the carnage, the U.S./Saudi war and blockade have caused what international medical groups have deemed the worst cholera outbreak in human history, with over one million cases and thousands of deaths.

End U.S. Military Intervention!

None of this could have taken place without the initiative, weapons, intelligence, and approval of the United States. The U.S. supplies targeting information and intelligence for Saudi attacks, refuels Saudi planes in the air, has deployed Navy destroyers in the blockade, and supplies arms and training to Saudi forces. There are even U.S. “boots on the ground” near the Yemeni border. As of early 2018, about a dozen Green Beret commandos were stationed in Saudi Arabia along the Yemen border.

Historically the Saudi regime has proven itself a willing partner of NATO powers, chiefly of the United States. The war on Yemen is no exception, as it willingly aids the US in its bid to cement its domination of the oil-rich Middle East and the strategic Gulf of Aden shipping lanes, where Yemen’s southwest coastline forms a narrow choke point connecting Europe to Asia’s ports. Both the US and Saudi Arabia have also been eager to portray the war on Yemen as part of their long-standing beleaguerment of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which neoconservative warmongers and regime-changers for decades have sought to punish for its rejection of Washington’s diktats.

In 2017, Trump and Saudi rulers crafted a US arms sales deal totaling $350 billion, all to fuel the profits of CEOs and shareholders of big corporations like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Boeing. These arms sales continue the direct complicity of the United States government in Saudi war crimes against Yemen.

Khashoggi’s Case Sheds Light on Horrors of War in Yemen

Meanwhile, the outcry from U.S. media and political leaders about the brutal murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi has been naive at best, and hypocritical and deceitful at worst. While his murder has led to some increased scrutiny of the war on Yemen, the shock being expressed belies the U.S. government’s years-long collusion in exactly the sort of violence and human rights abuses Khashoggi was silenced for writing about. Unsurprisingly, on November 14, House Republicans moved to block a vote to end US military involvement in Yemen under the War Powers Act. While a separate bill in the Senate would end arms sales for Saudi use in Yemen, the bill simultaneously threatens to levy even more sanctions on Iran—sanctions that are already choking off medical and humanitarian supplies—over its alleged support for the Houthi movement. We demand an end to US wars and blockades, with no exceptions!

No Ban, No Bombs, No War!

While continuing the war on Yemen, President Trump has outlawed Yemenis from traveling to the U.S. under his racist Muslim ban. It is criminal for the U.S. to bomb and attack other countries and then turn away refugees when the U.S. has destroyed their homelands! It is outrageous for Trump to ban Yemenis from traveling to the U.S. while destroying their country and starving their people. Trump, since the campaign trail, has painted the Middle East and Muslims in general as “terrorists” and this anti-Muslim rhetoric and this racist travel ban are legitimizing the increase in hate crimes and hate speech against our Muslim neighbors. We cannot be silent in the face of this bigotry! We need to speak out against the racist Muslim ban and the foreign policies which cause refugees to flee.

Take Action!

We at the Anti-War Committee know that the Congress will only end US support for Saudi Arabia if we demand with a united voice: STOP SUPPORTING THE WAR ON YEMEN!

Call Senator Amy Klobuchar at 202-224-3244 and Senator Tina Smith at 202- 224-5641 to tell them to vote against all aid to Saudi Arabia and to voice opposition to US coordination in the war on Yemen.

#TwinCities #AntiwarMovement #OppressedNationalities #US #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #TwinCitiesAntiWarCommittee #SaudiArabia #DonaldTrump

The news came after more than a week of investigation and public pressure on the Saudi government by journalists and state officials around the world. Days earlier, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had called on the Saudis to release whatever surveillance footage they had of the embassy, which was met by Saudi denials of involvement. Even President Trump gave into pressure from U.S. lawmakers and others to acknowledge the disappearance, by calling Kashoggi’s fiancé and making a statement.

But the revelation of Turkish surveillance footage within the Saudi embassy has adds another layer to this complex web of brutality and intrigue.

According to officials, these recordings show a Saudi special forces team of 15 men – called an “assassination squad” by Turkish media – capturing Kashoggi upon entry to the embassy. In a scene suited for a horror film like Saw, video and audio show this hit squad torturing and interrogating the U.S. journalist for hours before ultimately killing him and dismembering his body. They likely loaded Kashoggi’s remains onto a plane headed back to Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia.

As a well-known journalist for a prominent U.S. newspaper, Kashoggi heavily criticized the Saudi royal family’s repressive monarchy and its murderous war on Yemen – the likely motivation for his murder at the hands of the Saudis.

On October 10, the Washington Post published a report by the U.S. State Department showing they knew of a Saudi plot to capture Kashoggi. In response, State Department officials commented on the disappearance. Whether U.S. officials warned the journalist of his imminent danger remains unknown.

The news brought a renewed wave of criticism and disgust aimed at Saudi Arabia, which had previously denied any involvement in Kashoggi’s disappearance. Activists and some politicians in the U.K. and the U.S. have called for a full stop of arms sales to Saudi Arabia in response to this murder.

Erdogan’s decision to make public the Turkish government’s own surveillance footage will likely shake the uneasy relationship between the two states, as well. Saudi Arabia has provided crucial investment for Turkey’s energy sector in recent years, and the two have cooperated, if unevenly, in attempts to overthrow Bashar al-Assad’s national democratic government in Syria. The existence of these recordings paints a different picture: two regional rivals spying on each other to get the upper hand.

The U.S. has relied on Saudi Arabia as one of its main proxies, along with Israel, to dominate the Middle East. As the world’s largest producer of petroleum, Saudi Arabia remains critical to global energy markets, and the U.S. has maintained a close relationship with the repressive royal family to secure its cooperation.

Since taking office, the Trump administration has strengthened this toxic relationship. On his first major international trip as president, Trump signed an arms deal with Saudi Arabia totaling around $110 billion – money that would go towards their disastrous three-year war on Yemen. During the trip, the Saudi royal family rolled out the red carpet for Trump and his advisors and won the egotistical president’s favor through flattery. Since then, the Trump administration has consistently backed Saudi actions, whether through direct support or providing diplomatic cover – even as it threatens key U.S. allies like Canada.

Under the rule of Prince Mohammad bin Salman, Saudi Arabia has become increasingly bold and vicious in its actions, both at home and abroad. Last November, Saudi forces kidnapped Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, forcing him to issue statements denouncing Hezbollah aimed at stirring up civil war. Increasingly aligned with Israel, Salman’s monarchy has ramped up efforts to destabilize other nations, including other Gulf states like Qatar, and to push for war with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Domestically, Salman jailed rival members of the royal family in the name of ‘anti-corruption’ in 2017. He ordered the public beheadings of dozens of dissidents, including a prominent Shi’a cleric. Internal terror, always a fixture of Saudi society, has become more brazen and far reaching under Salman’s reign.

Saudi Arabia’s almost complete dependency on oil and low-paid foreign labor has plunged the ruling family into a sustained crisis. A global drop in oil prices and revenue from petroleum forced the monarchy to take on massive foreign debt, even as it continues to wage unrelenting warfare on neighboring Yemen. Salman’s anti-corruption campaign, backed by the Trump administration and praised by liberal journalists like Thomas Friedman, has nothing to do with government accountability – it is a move to eliminate internal challenges to Salman’s authority and consolidate wealth in the increasingly desperate Saudi state coffers.

As the U.S.-backed, Saudi-led war on Yemen continues, officials have ceased reporting casualty numbers and UN offices have withdrawn much of their aid to victims. Civilian casualties now number in tens of thousands, according to most observers. Saudi Arabia’s blockade of its neighbor – the poorest nation in the Persian Gulf – has stopped critical food and medical aid from reaching the people. Devastation of public health infrastructure and water sources, deliberately targeted by Saudi warplanes, has led to the resurgence of diseases like cholera. War is literally starving the people of Yemen to death.

The brutal murder of the journalist Kashoggi reflects the monstrous nature of U.S. imperialism and its wars, whether waged through proxies like Saudi Arabia in Yemen or directly in places like Afghanistan. It’s an important event that should draw vocal criticism from people across the U.S. who value peace and free speech.

#UnitedStates #PeoplesStruggles #torture #SaudiArabia #Kashoggi #MiddleEast

On Nov. 5, 2017, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri appeared in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and abruptly announced his resignation. In his resignation speech, Hariri denounced the Islamic Republic of Iran for supposedly interfering in Lebanese politics through Hezbollah, which makes up part of Hariri’s own coalition government.

The unexpected announcement, made from Saudi state-run television, raised suspicions across the Middle East. Many speculated that Riyadh forced Hariri’s resignation in a clumsy effort to ratchet up aggression towards Iran. Hezbollah and other national democratic forces in Lebanon vocally deny any attempt to drive Hariri from power and claim that the former prime minister, a close associate of the Saudi royal family, was coerced into making the announcement.

The same day as Hariri’s abrupt resignation, Saudi Arabia also announced they had intercepted a Burqan 2H ballistic missile fired by Yemen’s defense forces on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh. Saudi authorities claimed the missile was provided to Houthi rebel forces in Yemen by Iran, supposedly proof of the Islamic Republic interfering in the region.

As Saudi Arabia attempts to destabilize Lebanon and continues its three-year carnage in Yemen, the risk of regional war grows. Beneath these sparks of political and military crisis, however, exists an even greater crisis for imperialism in the Middle East. The United States’ efforts to dominate the region, especially with the use of Israel and Saudi Arabia as attack dogs, are crumbling as resistance grows. The heightened risk of war reflects the desperate attempts by the U.S. and its allies to crush that camp of resistance, particularly Iran.

Hezbollah is the target of Saudi interference in Lebanon

Saudi authorities are almost certainly holding Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri prisoner and pressured him into resigning, according to Sayid Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah.

“We deem the resignation of Hariri illegal and invalid,” said Nasrallah on Nov. 10. “All of a sudden, out of nowhere, Saudi Arabia called the prime minister on an urgent matter without his aide or advisers, and was forced to tender his resignation, and to read the resignation statement written by them.”

Hariri holds dual Lebanese-Saudi citizenship, prompting some observers to speculate that Saudi Prince Mohammad bin Salman placed the billionaire prime minister under house arrest alongside the other Saudi officials caught up in a recent crackdown.

In the immediate aftermath, Saudi Arabia has attempted to inflame sectarian tensions in Lebanon by calling for Sunnis to take to the streets against the predominantly Shi'a Hezbollah. But despite these calls for disunity, the response across the country to Hariri's resignation was near unanimous in denouncing Saudi interference. All major political players have called on Saudi Arabia to allow Hariri to return to Lebanon and resolve this crisis.

Hezbollah called for calm and stability while the nation sorted through this bizarre incident. “Lebanon had enjoyed unprecedented stability over the past year,” said Nasrallah. “We declare that the prime minister of Lebanon has not resigned. Saad Hariri is our political opponent, but he is also our prime minister.”

Beyond Hezbollah, Lebanese president Michel Auon appealed for calm. Even members of Hariri’s own party, the Future Movement, expressed concern at Saudi interference in Lebanese affairs.

The target of Saudi Arabia’s interference is Hezbollah. While officially Shi’a Muslim in its religious orientation, Hezbollah is a progressive non-sectarian national liberation movement. Its leader, Sayid Hassan Nasrallah, preaches liberation theology and anti-imperialism. The organization has a mass base among poor and working class communities in Lebanon, and its armed wing has supported the Palestinian liberation movement and Syria’s national democratic government. In 2006, Hezbollah defeated a brutal 32-day-long invasion of Lebanon by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF), marking a new chapter in its resistance to foreign domination.

While Saudi Arabia has long interfered in Lebanese political affairs, the Arab uprisings that began in 2011 forced the bulk of their attention elsewhere – Syria, Bahrain and now Yemen. In that period, Hezbollah made marked gains both in its electoral strategy, its social influence, and its military capacity, culminating in their presence in the ruling parliamentary coalition government that Habibi headed. With Lebanese elections on the horizon, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the U.S. fear that Hezbollah's victorious return from Syria may translate into serious gains in parliament

“It is clear that Saudi Arabia and Saudi officials have declared war on Lebanon and on Hezbollah in Lebanon,” Nasrallah stated.

Saudi Arabia descends into further crisis

Saudi Arabia’s erratic and violent actions reflect a growing crisis for the gulf monarchy, both internal and external. For over half a century, the Saudi monarchy functioned as a vital part of U.S. dominance in the Middle East. In exchange for its enormous oil reserves and support for the U.S. dollar as the world reserve currency, the U.S. provided the Saudis with both military protection and cheap weapons of war to defend its power.

But deep social and economic contradictions exist behind the wealthy façade of Saudi power. Dependent on migrant labor from neighboring countries, like Yemen, and the exploitation of petroleum, Saudi Arabia saw its status sharply decline with the global drop in oil prices. Attempts to drive competitors, like U.S. shale oil producers, out of the market by ramping up its own production backfired, further driving down prices – and with it, Saudi revenues.

Forced to run huge budget deficits, the Saudis have become desperate to shore up their financial situation. On the economic front, they announced plans to sell shares in its state-owned oil industry, ARAMCO. Even more drastic, Saudi leaders agreed to offer oil futures contracts denominated in Chinese Renminbi, backed by gold, in September 2017.

Saudi Arabia’s deep economic crisis has triggered an acute political crisis as well. Earlier this year, Saudi Prince Mohammad bin Salman relaxed restrictions on women driving cars – one of the more bizarre and widely criticized aspects of the country’s theocratic oppression of women. Far from the image of a ‘reformer’ promoted by the U.S. corporate media, Salman’s move was a cynical attempt to make Saudi Arabia appear ‘more modern’ and drive up foreign tourism. It accompanies announcements to build extravagant beach resort hotels and attract foreign capital from corporations like Virgin Airlines.

Unfortunately for Salman, this concession to the Saudi women’s movement angered the hardline conservative religious elements in the House of Saud, sharpening a power struggle within the ruling family. Salman has responded by savagely cracking down on dissent, beheading Shi’a religious clerics, and even jailing other members of the royal family in the name of “fighting corruption.” In reality, Salman, who is just as corrupt as the royals he throws in prison, cares only about consolidating his power in a time of crisis.

Saudi Arabia’s gangster ‘Game of Thrones’

Salman's purge shows the gangster nature of the Saudi monarchy. Between suspicious plane crashes, the extrajudicial executions of political rivals, and the bizarre jailing of opponents in the Ritz Carlton hotel in Riyadh, it plays like a scene from the movies Goodfellas or Scarface. By some estimates, Salman's so-called anti-corruption dragnet have arrested nearly 500 members of the Saudi monarchy and expropriated their wealth. But there's something bigger at work.

Corrupt wheeling and dealing between Saudi royals and international oil tycoons is a key component of the gulf monarchy's wealth. Salman now labels these backroom deals, struck with U.S. and European oil corporations by members of the Saudi government, as “corrupt” and illegal, even though the Saudi monarchy has known and encouraged these practices for decades.

Salman instead hopes to consolidate his power before the death of his father, King Salman, and stabilize Saudi Arabia's massive budget deficits by liquidating competitive elements of the royal family. The younger Salman, a junior member of the royal family, faces external instability and internal crisis, which raises concerns for his power after his father eventually abdicates the throne. Prince Salman himself jumped another Saudi prince, long thought of as the next in line after King Salman, much to the frustration of other elements in the royal family.

Prince Salman's crackdown is a move of desperation from a young, brash monarch who sees the writing on the wall. It's a response to severe crisis, not corruption.

The massive wave of arrests came on the heels of a visit by Jared Kushner, chief advisor to Trump, to Saudi Arabia. During the visit, Kushner praised the Saudis for purchasing U.S. arms and “modernizing” the country – sentiments later echoed on Twitter by Trump, who also praised Salman's crackdown on rival elites.

It isn't hard to see why Trump would support – and many believe greenlighted – Prince Salman's purge. Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, the most prominent royal arrested in Salman's crackdown is estimated to be the 45th wealthiest men in the world, with large shares in Fox/Viacom and Twitter. But unlike Prince Salman, who has intimately tied his rule to the Trump presidency, al-Waleed voiced criticisms of Trump during the 2016 U.S. election, at one point even calling for the billionaire mogul to drop out of the race. From the White House’s perspective, Prince Salman is weeding out potential obstacles for U.S. domination.

The Saudi killing fields in Yemen

Equally troubling for Prince Salman is the disastrous Saudi-led war on Yemen. While the Saudi state claims they intercepted the ballistic missile fired on Nov. 5, both the Houthi-led resistance in Yemen and many international observers report that the strike was successful. But far from unprovoked aggression by the Houthis, the missile was fired in response to the Saudi coalition bombing of a market in northern Yemen three days earlier, which killed 26 people, mainly civilians. This act of Yemeni resistance highlights the failure of the Saudi war effort. Prince Salman, the primary architect of the Saudi war on Yemen, now faces the reality that the Houthi movement has withstood even the most brutal carnage inflicted on it.

In response, the Saudi-led coalition waging war on Yemen announced a comprehensive total blockade of the nation, closing land, air and sea ports to aid workers and journalists. Aid agencies connected with the UN and other providers were not notified prior to the implementation of the blockade. Effectively this move cuts Yemen off from the outside world while Saudi warplanes and mercenary death squads strangle the Yemeni people.

The consequences of this latest blockade will devastate Yemen further. Every ten minutes, a child in Yemen dies from conditions stemming from the savage, Saudi-led, U.S.-backed war on the country, according to UNICEF.

United Nations officials say that Yemen will face the world's largest famine in decades, larger than the monstrous famines in South Sudan and Somalia earlier this year, if the Saudi-led coalition doesn't lift its blockade. Out of Yemen's population of 28 million people, about 20 million “do not know where they're going to get their next meal,” said one UN official.

Famine isn't the only heinous result of the Saudi blockade. Since the war began nearly three years ago, Yemen has suffered the largest outbreak of cholera, a deadly disease nearly eliminated by modern medicine, in over a century. Yemen's cholera epidemic, which has stricken more than 900,000 people, is the result of the nation's devastated water and health care infrastructure, which Saudi-coalition warplanes have deliberately targeted. By blocking access to clean water and medical supplies, the Saudis have guaranteed the epidemic will spread and kill more people.

The Saudi-led war on Yemen could not continue without the support of the U.S. Every step of the way, the U.S. and the U.K. have backed the Saudi-led slaughter by refueling warplanes, selling death machines and providing diplomatic cover. The U.S. and the U.K. are the two largest sellers of arms to Saudi Arabia. British arms sales to Saudi Arabia have increased 500% since the war began three years ago, according to a report by the Independent newspaper in the U.K.

Even Sweden, a country that many people in the U.S. don't associate with imperialist war, has stepped up its arms sales to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) – one of the partners in the Saudi-led coalition attacking Yemen.

For the entirety of the three-year assault on Yemen, the Saudis and the U.S. have claimed the Houthi rebels are proxy forces for the Islamic Republic of Iran. In reality, the Houthi insurgency began in 2004 among the rural populations living in northern Yemen, who make up about a third of the entire country. Influenced by the liberation theology of Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah, the Houthis formed with the goal of driving out U.S. imperialism, Saudi domination and their puppet rulers.

Today, the Houthis lead a united front against the Gulf monarchy coalition that seeks to dominate Yemen by force. Deposed Yemeni ruler Ali Abdullah Saleh, once an ally of the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, has joined the united front along with elements in the nation’s south. Together they comprise a united front resisting the U.S.-backed, Saudi-led war on Yemen.

Israel and Saudi Arabia: Partners in crime

Despite the blank check of support offered by the Trump administration, Israel has seen its position in the Middle East decline sharply. Like Saudi Arabia, the Israeli government backed the seven-year war in Syria in hopes of toppling President Bashar al-Assad, a key regional partner of Iran and a supporter of the Palestinian liberation struggle. It covertly assisted fighters from al-Qaeda and the Islamic State and bombed the Syrian Arab Army several times to no avail.

Worse than Assad remaining in power, though, is the strengthening of Hezbollah in Lebanon. As the Syrian civil war winds down, Hezbollah returns from the battlefield victorious, better armed and with greater influence in regional politics. As a key ally to both Palestinians and Iran, Hezbollah poses an existential threat to Israeli power. They defeated the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in the summer of 2006 and have only grown stronger since that time with battle-tested experience fighting the Islamic State death squads in Syria. Publicly released threat assessments by the Israeli Defense Forces in 2016 identified Hezbollah as the main external threat to Israeli security.

Wikileaks cables have revealed growing ties between the Israeli government and Prince Salman, who see a common foe in Iran and the entire camp of resistance. Saudi Arabia, for its part, never supported Arab resistance forces like Hezbollah, who they blamed entirely for the 2006 Israeli invasion, but their collaboration with Israel has deepened. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for instance, released a statement after Hariri’s resignation hysterically denouncing Iran and Hezbollah.

In Washington, Israeli lobbyists have begun working closely with lobbyists from the Gulf monarchies in Washington, particularly from the UAE. After securing greater arms sales to their countries in the latest U.S. military budget, these lobbyists have a singular goal in mind: Build consensus for war with Iran.

Imperialism and the camp of resistance

On Nov. 10, the Syrian government declared final victory over the Islamic State. While pockets of conflict will likely continue, this effectively means the end of the nearly seven-year war in Syria.

The Islamic State (IS), born out of the disastrous U.S. occupation of Iraq, functioned as a proxy army for the U.S. in Syria. While President Obama and later Trump formally declared war on IS, the U.S. contained the bulk of its offensive against the right-wing Salafist militia to Iraq in hopes of pushing the group away from Iraqi oil derricks and into Syria. Often U.S. warplanes bombed Syrian Arab Army forces that were actively fighting IS on the ground. All doubts over the real target of U.S. bombing missions in Syria ended on April 6, 2017, when President Trump fired 59 tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian government air base.

At the center of these victories are the anti-imperialist forces in the Middle East, which comprise a camp of resistance. Anchored by the Islamic Republic of Iran, the camp of resistance includes the Syrian Arab Republic, Hezbollah and the patriotic forces of Lebanon, the Palestinian liberation organizations, the Houthi insurgency in Yemen and other allied national democratic movements in the Middle East.

The goal of the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Israel is to destroy the camp of resistance in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia, in alliance with the Israelis, has taken stock of the major battlefields in the Middle East. The influence of the camp of resistance is expanding. Almost seven years of trying to topple the Assad government in Syria has failed, and the attempts to stop the Houthi movement in Yemen have proven disastrous for the Gulf monarchies. Hezbollah's influence in Lebanon and beyond has grown. And worst of all for the U.S., Iran's influence has grown.

With Trump’s move to sabotage the Iran nuclear deal last month, the risk of region-wide war in the Middle East rises each day. Imperialism is a brutal, vicious system that guarantees high oil profits for the 1% while brining death and destruction on the rest of the world. All people opposed to that system should resist the threats of war and work to bring an end to the slaughter in nations like Yemen.

#SaudiArabia #MiddleEast #Yemen #Hezbollah #SaadHariri

“The free Yemeni people with all its tribes, popular committees and army refuse the presence of foreign forces on its territory, as it consider the U.S. presence a clear colonization,” the statement said.

“Once again we affirm that the presence of U.S., UAE and other forces is an occupation aimed at spoiling our country and wealth,” the statement added, stressing that this occupation will be met with resistance by all means.

The U.S. Defense Department is stating the number of troops sent is small; but the U.S. is rushing arms to the Saudis, refueling their aircraft and supplying intelligence. Thousands of Yemenis have been killed by the Saudi bombing campaign.

The U.S., Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and others began a war on Yemen in March, 2015, with the aim of dominating the country.

#WashingtonDC #Occupation #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #UnitedStates #SaudiArabia

Saudi Arabia's vicious assault on the people of Yemen continues nearly one year after its initiation – and there's no obvious end in sight. In March 2015, a Saudi-led military coalition largely made up of the other reactionary monarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) launched a military intervention in Yemen. Called Operation Decisive Storm, this intervention began as a response to the overthrow of Yemen's corrupt government by the popular Houthi insurgency.

To date, Operation Decisive Storm has left over 2800 Yemeni civilians – many of them children – dead, and displaced thousands. For all the carnage and brutality, though, Saudi Arabia's intervention comes from a place of weakness, not strength. And in the face of mass popular resistance and widespread international opposition, the operation has fared poorly for Saudi Arabia and its imperialist backers.

As monopoly capitalism plunges the world deeper into crisis, the U.S. and its partners like Saudi Arabia lash out in increasingly brutal ways to maintain control of the oil-rich region and these actions spark fierce resistance by the anti-imperialist forces in the Middle East. The Houthi uprising in Yemen is part of this camp of resistance and the Saudi-led military intervention speaks to the eroding rule of imperialism in the region.

Yemen's revolutionary history

Yemen has a vibrant history of resistance to foreign domination. Because of its strategic location in the Gulf of Aden, Yemen drew the attention of both the British and Ottoman empires, which colonized and divided it into a north and south territory in 1904. After the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire following World War I, Britain continued to exercise control over Yemen through corrupt rulers and sultanates – not unlike the U.S.'s relationship to the Gulf monarchies today. However, in 1962, nationalist forces in the northern Yemen, inspired and supported by Gamal Abdel Nasser's anti-colonial government in Egypt, overthrew the British and Saudi-backed monarchy and proclaimed the Yemen Arab Republic in its place.

This rebellion spread to southern Yemen in 1963, when communists and nationalists united to form the National Liberation Front of Yemen (NLF) and launched an armed struggle for liberation. Facing defeat, Britain granted independence to South Yemen in 1964 and withdrew from the country entirely two years later. The new NLF government immediately proclaimed itself the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY) in 1970, aligned with the Soviet Union and set itself the goal of building socialism.

For the next 20 years, Yemen remained divided – a capitalist north and a national democratic, leftist south – until the PDRY agreed to a unification proposal in 1990. For the vast majority of the Yemeni people, however, unification proved economically disastrous. Per capita income for Yemeni workers dropped 10% between 1989 and 1993. In the same period, prices for food and basic goods skyrocketed, unemployment reached 25% and nearly one in three Yemenis lived in poverty.

While the majority suffered extreme hardships from unification, the small class of wealthy in the north made dramatic gains in this period by privatizing the south's socialized industries, confiscating peasant land and stealing oil revenue from government coffers. This unified Yemeni government, led by Ali Abdullah Saleh, also aligned itself closely with the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, generating popular discontent and protest. After the outbreak of a brief civil war in the south by former PDRY elements, Saleh's government heavily repressed the Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP) to eliminate any challenge to its rule.

The Houthi insurgency and the national democratic revolution

Shortly thereafter, Saleh's government faced another challenge to its rule – this time from the north. The Houthi insurgency began in 2004 among the rural Shi'a populations living in northern Yemen, who make up about a third of the entire country. Yemen's Shi'a communities faced extreme poverty and persecution from Saleh since before reunification. Influenced by the liberation theology of Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah, the Houthis formed with the goal of driving out U.S. imperialism, Saudi domination and their puppet rulers.

Triggered in part by the wave of Arab uprisings in 2011, the Houthis joined with other popular forces in Yemen to drive Saleh out of power. Fearing the loss of Yemen as a neo-colony, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia installed another puppet, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, in his place. Hadi's government continued the corrupt economic policies of Saleh and abandoned the political reforms agreed to by opposition forces. Hadi, like Saleh, also allowed the U.S. free reign to conduct drone strikes throughout the country.

The crisis in Yemen reached a boiling point in 2014, when Houthi rebels stormed the presidential palace in Sanaa, the country's capital, and placed Hadi under house arrest. Having seized state power and having begun laying the ground for an inclusive democratic republic, the Houthi government immediately came under military siege by the Saudi-led GCC coalition.

The empire strikes back

On the whole, this intervention has not gone well for Saudi Arabia. It began as an aerial bombing campaign, but the Saudi-led coalition eventually committed ground troops to directly fight Houthi forces. The coalition has experienced high casualties and it has largely failed to unseat the Houthis from country's populated urban centers.

Furthermore, these attacks on Yemen have forged a large united front of unlikely partners. In May 2015, deposed President Saleh and a large section of Yemen's national military announced an alliance with the Houthi insurgency aimed at defeating the Saudi-led coalition. Although Saleh ruled Yemen as an ally of the U.S. before popular protests forced his resignation in 2012, he has come out in support of the national democratic forces resisting foreign intervention.

Saudi Arabia faces widespread international opposition to its campaign in Yemen, largely owing to the many documented atrocities committed by coalition forces. An as-of-yet-unpublished U.N. panel report from January found evidence of “widespread and systematic” targeting of civilians by coalition forces, including “bombing residential neighborhoods” and “treating the entire cities of Sa’dah and Maran as military targets.”

While not actively engaged in combat, the U.S. stands firmly behind this vicious war on Yemen. From their perspective, a Houthi-led national democratic government in Yemen would oppose U.S. drone strikes and counter Western aggression toward the camp of resistance. As Saudi Arabia's main supplier of weapons, warplanes and military equipment to the tune of several hundred billion dollars, U.S. imperialism literally makes the entire assault possible.

Crisis and resistance in the Arabian peninsula

U.S. imperialism is in a period of deep crisis, particularly in the Middle East. The occupation of Iraq ended in defeat for the U.S. and the occupation government it left to govern now leans towards Iran. Its attempts to destabilize the national democratic governments of Iran and Syria have failed. Popular democratic forces in countries like Bahrain and Yemen shook, and in some cases overthrew, long-standing puppet governments.

At the center of these victories are the anti-imperialist forces in the Middle East, which comprise a camp of resistance. Anchored by the Islamic Republic of Iran, the camp of resistance includes the Syrian Arab Republic, Hezbollah and the patriotic forces of Lebanon, the Palestinian liberation organizations and other allied national democratic movements in the Middle East.

Saudi Arabia's attack on Yemen reflects its growing desperation and weakening ability to project influence in the region. Along with the U.S., Turkey and the Gulf Cooperation Council monarchies, Saudi Arabia invested heavily in toppling the Syrian government in order to strike a blow against Iran – its largest competitor for regional influence. The failure to overthrow Assad – due in part to intervention by Hezbollah, Iran and Russia – and its inability to control the anti-Assad opposition groups like Islamic State speak to the sharply declining influence of Saudi Arabia.

As an anachronistic religious monarchy built by imported migrant labor and the craven exploitation of natural resources, the House of Saud's wealth masks its vulnerability to crises in imperialism. Fearing an increase of U.S. domestic oil production, the Saudi monarchy flooded the world market with cheap oil, which further drove down falling energy prices. As a result, the country faces a widening deficit from the decline in oil revenues and eroding investor confidence by imperialist powers.

The Saudi monarchy increasingly reacts to this deepening crisis with brutal and disproportionate political repression. Opposition movements terrify the House of Saud, which promotes anti-Shi'a sectarianism to drum up support for aggression against Iran. This fear fuels increasingly drastic actions, like the execution of Shi'a cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, along with 46 other dissidents and prisoners, at the start of 2016.

Saudi Arabia exaggerates the level of Iranian support for the Houthi insurgency. Iranian officials have expressed solidarity with the Houthis as part of the camp of resistance. Reports indicate that they have provided weapons to the insurgents in response to the GCC's brutal onslaught. Facing the looming threat of U.S. and Israeli aggression, Iran has an obvious interest in seeing anti-imperialist movements like the Houthis come to power because it strengthens the camp of resistance.

However, the Houthi insurgency is not a proxy army of Iran like the Western media portrays. It's a popular movement with strong roots among the Yemeni people, who have had enough brutality inflicted on them by imperialist powers. And their stand in the face of unrelenting attacks deserves our support and solidarity.

#UnitedStates #AntiwarMovement #Imperialism #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #SaudiArabia

As refugees escape untold violence and chaos in countries like Iraq and Syria, they are being rejected, ignored, or actually pushed away from countries like Great Britain, Saudi Arabia, France and the U.S.

Yet, the biggest travesty of it all is that those countries refusing entry to thousands fleeing the Middle East are the very same countries that created the widespread violence, instability and chaos throughout the region that have caused so many to escape. It is those very same countries that created the impossible conditions that currently exist in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere in the region. It is vital that the people of the world looking on to the plight of these refugees recognize the culprits behind their suffering and unite on how to end it.

It is the policies and actions of the U.S., NATO and their Arab allies (Saudi Arabia, in particular) that have caused such destruction and such misery as to lead so many in the Middle East to flee. Thousands have been killed over recent years as a result of NATO airstrikes, and a combination of American weapons and Saudi funds that have been given to extremist thugs and organizations that have brutally murdered thousands.

The turmoil is all part of a regional plan, drafted by the U.S. and supported by its allies, which would have all opponents of Western imperialism and Israeli Zionism removed, destroyed or killed. The destabilization campaigns of the U.S. and its allies are what have led to the brutal violence, mass destruction and utter chaos in countries like Syria and Libya. Without NATO, led by the U.S. and its tools in the regions, the innocent people crossing the Mediterranean for Europe would still have their homes and their lives. Without the might of U.S. imperialism smashing down on the Middle East, there would be no refugee crisis today.

Those angered by the images that have been shown in the news must, too, be angered by the culpability of the U.S. in creating this wretched sight. And, upon recognition of these facts, we must call on the U.S. to take its bloody hands off of the Middle East. We must demand an end to U.S. funds and arms being sent to thugs in the region to use against innocent civilians. We must oppose the relations between and the actions of the U.S., NATO, Saudi Arabia and Israel. And on the streets of every city where there are good people filled with grief and anger for those who have died fleeing their homelands, let there be organizing and protest against U.S. imperialism. For only when that most terrible monster is destroyed can the people of the Middle East begin to live their lives in peace.

#MiamiFL #ImmigrantRights #Iraq #Syria #SaudiArabia #refugeeCrisis #MiddleEast

Hadi, a puppet of Saudi Arabia and backed by the U.S., wanted the talks on their terms: that the only discussion would be implementation of the UN resolution telling the Ansurallah, or Houthis as they are called in the West, to withdraw from the territory they control in Yemen. The Ansurallah said that there should be no preconditions. UN head Ban Ki-Moon likewise said there should be no preconditions for the negotiations.

The Ansurallah movement is in the right. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is an aggressor, having launched a war to punish the Ansurallah for daring to oust a dictatorial government. KSA has purchased a regional coalition and a UN resolution against the people of Yemen. But the Saudis are like all occupiers – they can impose terrible sacrifice on the people, but they can’t break their resistance, or defeat them. The Saudi military even lacks the will to carry out a ground invasion.

So the Saudis are faced with the choice of sending the former president to the negotiations without his demand being met. This will be a diplomatic victory for the Ansurallah. Or they can refuse to send Hadi, which would also be a victory for the Ansarallah.

Both scenarios are defeats for the KSA, because the most of the world, including Russia, China and many countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, doesn’t support the Saudis. Time is not on the side of the Saudis.

The Houthis and their alliance with former president Saleh, and through him with the Yemeni army, are taking more parts of the country, defeating the forces fighting for the U.S.-supported Saudis and the fugitive ex-president Hadi.

#ChicagoIL #AntiwarMovement #Yemen #SaudiArabia #Ansurallah #Houthis #MiddleEast

Washington, D.C. – In the context of a Saudi massive bombing campaign, the Army of Yemen, with the backing of Popular Committees, struck back by launching a scud missile at the Prince Khaled airbase, located in the southwestern Saudi city of Khamees Mushait. The government of Saudi Arabia says that the missile was shot down with its U.S.-supplied Patriot missile system.

Throughout the Middle East, Saudi Arabia is fighting against progressive and national democratic forces. In addition to the Saudi war on Yemen, the government of Saudi Arabia is suppressing the popular democratic movement in Bahrain – home to a major U.S. naval base – and is a major backer of the terrorists who are attacking the government of Syria.

According to widespread press reports in the Middle East, meetings are taking place between the governments of Israel and Saudi Arabia for the purpose of coordinating their common opposition to Iran.

Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest arms importer, with many of its purchases of sophisticated weapons systems coming from the U.S.

#WashingtonDC #AntiwarMovement #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #SaudiArabia #MiddleEast

Since late March, Saudi Arabia has been waging a war on the people of Yemen in order to block the progressive and national democratic group known as the Houthis. A large section of the Yemeni Army has also joined the resistance.

The U.S. government has stepped up weapons shipments to Saudi Arabia, is refueling Saudi aircraft, and is providing intelligence to the Saudi military.

#WashingtonDC #WashingtonDCDC #AntiwarMovement #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #SaudiArabia

According the April 28 report, “Abdul Sattar Monem al-Bashiri, a Yemeni security official, told FNA that the popular committees and the Yemeni army are moving towards the Saudi border region of Najran in order to suppress the Saudi army aggression and thwart an impending Saudi ground assault into Yemen.”

He further said the purpose of the movements is to control the borders and to cut off the supply route of the terrorists which is used to smuggle arms and equipment from neighboring Saudi Arabia.

“The army and the popular committees are doing very transparent and goal-oriented actions,” he said, “indicating that the Yemeni troops do not plan to go deep into the Saudi territories.”

The U.S., along with Saudi Arabia and other Arab reactionaries, are waging a war on the progressive forces of Yemen.

The U.S. has been rushing arms to reactionary Arab states, refueling Saudi aircraft that are waging a murderous bombing campaign against Yemen, and has dispatched a number of warships to the region.

#WashingtonDC #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Yemen #SaudiArabia

Chicago, IL – 40 people gathered in Millennium Park here, April 25, to protest the U.S./Saudi bombing of Yemen.

In Yemen, a movement of the poor and oppressed people is fighting for bread and justice, against imperialism, monarchy and Zionism. The fight back there is led by the Ansurallah movement, which the Western media calls the Houthis.

Saudi Arabia has been bombing for a month, causing over 1000 deaths. The World Health Organization reports over 3487 wounded, most of them civilians. The U.S. is providing the Saudis with data on targets and mid-air refueling of their bombers.

Joe Iosbaker of the Anti-War Committee-Chicago spoke to those gathered and pointed out that this has to be seen as a U.S./Saudi War. “The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has no arms industry. Their weapons come from the U.S. Saudi Arabia could not act if the U.S. withdrew their support. We have to demand, “U.S., Saudi Arabia, hands off Yemen!”

#ChicagoIL #AntiwarMovement #JoeIosbaker #Yemen #AntiWarCommitteeChicago #SaudiArabia

Heads of state abruptly changed plans and rushed to Riyadh to greet the 79-year-old new ruler King Salman. President Obama, British Prime Minister Cameron accompanied by Prince Charles, French President Hollande, Afghanistan President Ghani, Spain’s King Felipe VI, Turkish President Erdogan and Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif were all anxious to be assured of the regime’s continuation.

Saudi Arabia is an absolute and brutal dictatorship. The country is named after the royal Saud family that has expropriated the country’s fabulous oil wealth, and treats it as a wholly owned family asset. Their control is maintained by massive state-organized repression. All forms of political dissent and social organization, from political parties to trade unions, are banned under pain of death.

Executions by decapitation in public squares are held on average once every four days. Capital crimes include adultery, homosexuality and political opposition to the regime. Public stonings are also a common form of execution. Other punishments include eye gouging, limb amputation, tooth extraction, surgical paralysis and public lashings.

Wealth and poverty

Government departments are treated as fiefdoms. Their enormous budgets are unaudited and at the family’s personal disposal. Personal and state funds are completely commingled. All family members are guaranteed astronomical monthly allowances from birth, the amount depending on their proximity to the king’s inner circle. The Saud family, with almost 4,000 members, extends privileges up to 30,000 others related by marriage.

The cabinet is made up of Saud family members. The key ministries — interior, foreign affairs, the military commands, National Guard and regional governorships — are held exclusively by family members.

The government does not gather data on poverty, literacy, unemployment or health coverage. However, the Saudi newspaper Okaz reported in July 2012 that 60 percent of the population lived below the poverty line.

A third of the country’s population of 27 million are immigrants with no rights, no status and no social benefits, who make up 80 percent of the work force.

Saudi unemployment is estimated at 10 percent by the CIA World Factbook, but 28 percent among young men aged 15 to 24, who lack needed skills. Women are not considered part of the work force.

Women enslaved

Women in Saudi Arabia have the lowest literacy in the region. More than 1.5 million migrant women work in domestic slavery. A 2012 report from the International Trade Union Confederation on workers’ rights in Saudi Arabia reported alarming levels of child labor, discrimination and forced labor.

All women, regardless of their class position, have no rights to employment, property or education. They cannot step one foot out of their homes unless covered head to toe in a long black abaya and accompanied by a male family member.

Women in powerful positions in the West ignore the reality of Saudi women. For example, Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund, hailed King Abdullah as “a strong advocate for women.” (Washington Post, Jan. 23) U.N. World Food Program Executive Director Ertharin Cousin praised King Abdullah: “He was a true humanitarian leader, always on the side of the world’s hungry poor.” ( www.un.org, Jan 23)

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon joined in the imperialist outpouring of praise, expressing in the same statement his gratitude for the king’s “generous humanitarian and developmental support” throughout the Middle East.

Because Wall Street, U.S. oil corporations, military industries and banks reap such enormous profits from this gang of thieves, they have done everything possible to arm, train and reinforce the Saudi military. The role of the corporate media is to provide a veneer of respectability to this family of looters.

This narrow ruling elite relies on five U.S. military bases, Western arms and military training for its protection and survival. The U.S. Fifth Fleet, based in nearby Bahrain, defends the status quo with aircraft carriers, 20 ships, nuclear submarines, 103 strike aircraft and 20,000 sailors and marines.

In return, the Saudi royal family pays protection money to U.S. military industries like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and Boeing. Billions also go to British, French and German military corporations. The Saudi military budget in 2013 was $67 billion, the fourth largest in the world, after the U.S., China and Russia.

Saudi spending on weapons comes to 9.3 percent of its gross national product, the highest in the world. The economy is the least diversified of any oil-producing country, with more than 90 percent of its export earnings coming from oil. Virtually everything else must be imported.

Until the 1970s, four U.S. companies were the sole owners of Saudi oil – free and clear of taxes and duties. As revolutionary upheavals in the region led many countries to demand full control of their resources, Saudi oil was carefully nationalized into a conglomerate called Aramco. Exploration, drilling, pumping, transport and the building of pipelines, ports and terminals were all structured to return maximum profits to U.S. corporations. While the Saud family can take immense wealth for themselves, the vast majority of these funds must be held in U.S. banks or be used to purchase U.S. materials.

Contras and terror militias

This opaque, unaudited economy makes Saudi Arabia a perfect conduit and funding source for U.S. wars, military adventures and secret agencies. At the same time, the U.S. State Department can claim that it knows nothing about who is funding terrorist militias — from the Nicaraguan contras in 1983 to ISIS in 2015.

When Congress denied funding for the reactionary contras in the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan covertly arranged for the Saudis to send them weapons to overthrow the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Saudi money was a key component in the CIA’s war against the progressive Afghan regime that began in 1979. Working with Washington, it has also funded reactionary militias in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon that have metastasized into a viciously sectarian and destabilizing force throughout the Middle East.

Prince Bandar bin Sultan, a former Saudi ambassador to Washington from 1983 to 2005, is considered a mastermind of the Saudi terror network. He is now director general of the Saudi Intelligence Agency.

Saudi wealth also keeps other military dictatorships in the region afloat. In Egypt, the Saudis provided $1 billion to help General al-Sisi’s coup against the elected Morsi government. After the coup they pledged an immediate $8 billion to stabilize the military regime and have now committed more than $20 billion to maintaining that dictatorship.

The continued rule of the House of Saud is based on a thin, corrupt layer of extreme privilege. Dependent on immigrant labor, foreign trainers and technical experts, it is hated by its own people. U.S. imperialism has staked its continued domination of the region on a detested and narrow grouping that lacks popular support or legitimacy.

Sara Flounders is co-director of the International Action Center

#UnitedStates #SaudiArabia #MiddleEast