Jizya is a term used from the early days of Islam, more than 1400 years ago. It was a form of added tax that non-Muslims paid the Muslim ruler in ancient times. It also meant money paid by weaker neighboring infidel sovereigns to the Islamic Caliphate as a substitute for a ghazwa, or an invasion. A form of tax, or even ransom.
Yesterday, U.S. President Donald Trump got paid a huge Jizya by the Saudi monarchy. Some claim it is to the tune of $460 billion over a period of ten years. More than half the total current value of the Saudi Sovereign Fund which is supposed to make up for future depletion of oil reserves. Much of this money is for the purchase of more weapons and their service contracts, almost certainly including American technical operations and maybe even aiming and launching. So much weaponry for a country with about 16 million citizens (plus about 10 million imported temporary foreign laborers and housemaids and/or quasi-slaves).
No doubt, Mr. Trump (and his family) seem to have made out like a bandit, or should I say he made out like a Saudi prince? The devil, however, is in the details. Just what adventure, if any, has he committed the United States to undertaking. What new war in the Muslim lands, especially in the Persian Gulf have they talked him into promising?
If the Saudi princes are foolish enough to want to repeat their failed Yemeni adventure on a much larger scale in the Persian Gulf. They will no doubt fail again, and more spectacularly so: that has been their record. Then will Trump and his inexperienced foreign policy minions get into another Gulf War to save the princes from their own folly? Another endless war? As they seem to be planning for Yemen now?
Donald, Melania, and Ivanka seem to have conquered the elites of Riyadh, as well as the extremely controlled Saudi media. No wonder, the odds were in their favor, with no Saudi women within sight. They will come home laden with gifts that rightfully belong to the poor of Saudi Arabia (yes, there are many poor people and poor places, shockingly many, that the media cameras did not cover).
So the Arab world now has its first American emperor. The Sunni Muslim world now has its first orange non-Muslim Caliph. Congratulations to both.
FYI: Many religious Muslims, including many of the Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia (the same sect of Al Qaeda and ISIS) will treat this as a new Crusade by what they call infidels. Secular Arabs and Muslims will consider Trump’s new anointment as a return of the old European imperialism of past centuries.
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum
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