Re: Lets face facts
See also Putin. And Trump, who’s managed to convince a sizeable proportion of religious folk that he’s somehow promoting Jesus’ values.
Back to the House of Saud tho. Without those $hitheads, their $$$$ and the unfortunate fact that that the Wahhabi branch is an outlier bunch of fanatics, we’d get along much better with Muslims.
I'm wondering if Putin & Trump are quietly relieved that they're not the villain in this piece. Although Putin may be hoping to benefit from arms sales if the US ends up sanctioning Saudi. But religion. The US is still pretty religious, as listening to the radio in the Bible Belt would show. Much hellfire & damnation, and many votes to be won or lost from an electorate which may hold views not too dissimilar from 'Muslim fanatics'.. Which is hardly suprising given the Abrahamic roots.
And we'd probably get along much better with Muslims if there was less Islamophobia. There's a billion or so Muslims, and the majority aren't sharpening swords for a spot of head chopping. But we're not entirely blameless, especially in our proxy wars in the Middle East and elsewhere. Fanatics have been encouraged and even armed to face our enemies in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria etc etc and it's hardly suprising there's been some blowback.
And of course Saudi's stuck literally between a rock and some hard cases. It's guardian of Mecca by virtue of geography, and thus has to manage the politics that go with it. Much as Israel does with Jerusalem, and with many of the same challenges. Assassination politics are also nothing new, despite these strange and terrible events. So a journalist probably murdered in Turkey, which is not exactly known for it's press freedoms either. Or particularly friendly with Saudi. So much politcing going on around things as crude as money, or regional stability.. And prospects for more blowback, ie Saudi pivoting towards Russia, counter-sanctions and de-dollarisation, MbS becoming less reformist to maintain power, or a coup and Saudi turning into another Libya.
On the plus side, unlike the first half of the 20th Century, we can have live updates. Figuring out wtf? was happening across the world pre-modern communications must have been a lot harder.