Monthly Archives: May 2015

Arabian Peninsula, Culture, Humor, Saudi Arabia, Wahhabi

The Overlooked Faces of Real Saudi Reform………..

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Since the creation of the modern Saudi state some hundred years ago there have been three constants. These three constants have defined the country that the ruling family arrogantly renamed after themselves. They called it the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The three constants have been: (1) Wahhabism; (2) Absolute family rule and the subsequent kleptocracy; (3) Goateed kings and princes, from Abdulaziz through kings Saud, Faisal, Khaled, Fahd, Abdullah, and Salman, including several crown princes like Sultan and Nayef. The first two have been widely exported with plenty of Saudi money. Wahhabism now covers a vast area from Indonesia to Morocco, including AQAp and ISIS. It has noticeable influence in major European cities. This last expansion into Europe has led to the phenomenon of Islamophobia.

The last constant, the goatee beard (saksooka), did not take much hold outside the Arabian Peninsula. There are a few exceptions, for example Saad Hariri in Lebanon but he is the Saudi man in that country and sporting a goatee is like raising the Saudi flag. There might be one or two others in Lebanon with goatee beard, but I have not seen them nor heard of them. Inside Arabia, the goatee has ruled. Any prince worth his salt who aspired to reach the top of the hierarchy had to sport a goatee, preferably dyed jet black (Kiwi brand). Any minion who aspired to rise in the bureaucracy had to do the same.

Now King Salman has started his rule with a new face, literally. He has appointed a crown prince with no goatee beard, a first. He has appointed his son as deputy crown prince, also without a goatee, but with an Emirati style trimmed beard. It is worth noting that the crown prince apparently has no male heirs, comforting thought for his deputy.

That is the new future of the Arabian Peninsula, so long as the Al Saud rule it. That is the new face of Saudi reform, literally, and almost certainly the extent of it. No more goatee………….

(P.S: Now if they can get rid of the moustache, then they might have a slew of kings and princes who are as hairless as Francois Hollande or David Cameron or Angela Merkel).

    

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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, GCC, Muslim Brotherhood, Persian Gulf, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, UAE

In the Beginning: Shifting Dynastic Alliances in the Gulf GCC……….

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In the Beginning………….

There were two major recent Middle East alliances: (1) the alliance of Qatar and Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood-MB- (that was after the MB regime in Egypt was overthrown by the Al Sisi military coup) and; (2) the alliance of military-ruled Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Now the old alliances have been shaken and jumbled so that there are, for now: (1) the alliance of Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Turkey (hard to believe that five years ago the Saudis used to accuse Qatar of being allied with Iran and Iraq and Syria and Lebanon) and; (2) the alliance of the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE potentates shared an intense mistrust and hatred of the Muslim Brotherhood, while the Qatari potentates financed and supported the Brotherhood. Apparently the Qatari potentates have so much money that they are always looking for some foreign ally willing to accept some of it, including the FIFA sports officials. The Qataris still support the MB, but the Saudis have modified their view somewhat of their ancient ally and later enemy the Muslim Brotherhood. After all they are allied with the Brotherhood in both Yemen and Syria. The UAE still violently opposes the MB and has moved closer to Al Sisi of Egypt even as the Al Saud have moved closer to Qatar and Caliph Erdogan of Turkey.

Now apparently the Saudi opposition, the Wahhabi branch of it that is overseas, is confused or conflicted about the Saudi-Qatari ties. One school of thought claims that the new Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammed Bin Nayef Al Saud strongly influences, nay dominates, the Qatari Emir Tamim Al Thani. Another school of Wahhabi opposition thought sees the influence reversed: it claims that it was Emir Tamim of Qatar who influenced the Saudis and talked them into easing up on the Muslim Brotherhood.
They both agree that the real power in the UAE, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed, lost out because he had betted on and was closely allied with Saudi Prince Meteb Bin Abdullah who has lost out after his father died.

P.S:So far only Oman and Kuwait have remained outside these flexible shifting sub-alliances among the potentates of the GCC. Probably wisely, for now.

    

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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, Cinema, GCC, Saudi Arabia, Yemen

A Fatwa in Arabia: Gone With The Wind Minus Rhett and Scarlett…………

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“Displaced Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi said he is sure that the Houthi rebels will be defeated in the near future. Yemen Reconciliation Conference to Provide Basis For Any Future Talks. The Houthi rebels will be defeated in the near future, displaced Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi said Sunday at a conference on Yemen reconciliation. The conference in the Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh involves over 400 representatives of the country’s political forces and the international organizations. The representatives of the Houthi rebel group, the main opposition force in Yemen, do not participate in the conference…………”

This futile Saudi-organized conference on Yemen is a monologue rather than a dialogue. The most important actors in Yemen are not attending. It is like Gone With The Wind without Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara. No Houthis or former dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh representatives were invited or would attend anyway. Hadi and those with him could never fill the place of either Rhett or Scarlett, or even the fat slave Mammy of Tara.
That is where escaped deposed president General Hadi of Yemen gave his latest fatwa that “the Saudis will win their air war against the Houthis soon”. Hadi had also announced two weeks ago a grandiose plan for Yemen to join the Gulf GCC, which was ignored by everyone especially the GCC. He also issued a string of meaningless decrees appointing and disappointing commanders who had mostly fled Aden with him to Riyadh. Any commander worth his salt who remained in Yemen would ignore his orders after he abandoned them for the safety and luxury of Saudi hospitality.    

Then there is my own famous and potent fatwa on Yemen and Hadi’s prospects in Sanaa. Here it is.   
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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Europe, Islamophobia

Fascist Hootenanny in Denmark? Geert Wilders, New Dawn, Fellow Travelers may Dominate Bornholm Event……..

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“As many as 100,000 participants are expected to attend the Baltic sea island Bornholm event but this year’s first-ever attendence by far-right politicians will prove a challenge to Denmark’s tradition of openness and freedom of speech. The presence of Wilders – who has received scores of death threats over the years for his anti-Islamic views – will also mean a large security upgrade at the popular festival. The press freedom organisation, Trykkefrihedsselskabet, invited Wilders to speak. Georgios Epitideios, a former general and Golden Dawn member of the European Parliament, has also confirmed his participation. Golden Dawn, from Greece, is considered to be a neo-Nazi party. Epitideios was invited by ’The Danes’ party’, a small ultra-right party, which has no elected representatives at the national or local level. “We have chosen to debate, among other things, what we want in Europe. And it is natural to invite a party that is really big,” head of the party, Daniel Carlsen, told Berlingske Tidende. The news has already caused several politicians to cancel their participation…………………”

It looks like the crazies, the Euro-nuts, may take over that particular asylum at Bornholm, Denmark. Especially now that the most prominent speaker may be Geert Wilders, the Dutch anti-Islamic fellow traveler, fresh from the Texas conference that was closed by an act of Jihadi terrorism. His presence will certainly put Islam and Islamophobia front and center of the event. It should be one hell of a hootenanny in Denmark.  

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Culture, Indonesia, Marriage, Misogyny, Sex, Wahhabi

Virginity Tests: from Indonesia to Ipanema………

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“Indonesia urged to ban virginity tests for fiancées of officers, female recruits. Indonesian authorities have been urged to cease the “invasive” and “discriminatory” practice of “virginity tests” for female recruits and fiancées of military officers in the country’s armed forces. International military physicians are set to gather in Bali, Indonesia on May 17-22, 2015, to urge the country’s president, Joko Widodo, to stop the practice, according to Human Rights Watch…………….”

Virginity tests aren’t new: the Egyptian military famously used them extensively during the Tahrir Uprising in 2011. But they used them against female protesters whom the military and bureaucracy suspected of being promiscuous and engaged in sex with male protesters. In their minds it made sense: why else would young women come out to face the regime goons and risk life and limb unless it was for sex? That also fits in somehow with the Saudi clerical claims that allowing women to drive cars would end virginity overnight in that country. At least “no more virginity as they know it” ( you can use your imagination and figure it out).

Apparently Indonesian officers are allowed to marry virgins only and the state take the responsibility of ensuring that. No more surprises on the wedding night in Indonesia. There are no doubt other places where this practice is de rigueur, possibly Malaysia.
I tell ya Wahhabism and its, er, practices have spread all over the globe, possibly with the exception of Ipanema.

    

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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, GCC, Media, Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia

Laughingstock of MENA? Oligarchs Hijack the Anger of Arab Youth, LOL…….

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KuwaitCox2        SaudiObama1

A lot of conferences and symposiums and fora are held in the Gulf region. All allegedly representing the whole Arab world, from the Gulf to the Atlas Mountains. Another one was held recently in Dubai which seemed to trend toward pinning the blame for Arab problems on anybody but those responsible: the Arab establishment.

Just why are the Arabs angry? And how angry are the “young Arabs” at being “a laughingstock” according to Roger Cohen and Amr Moussa? And do the masses of Arab youths from Iraq to Morocco really give a hoot about the preferences and prejudices of unelected Gulf oligarchs? 

And who best expresses the anger of Arab “youth” according to most Western media types and pundits?
Why, it is first of all Amr Moussa, former Egyptian foreign minister then secretary general of the Arab League under Hosni Mubarak. Who else can express revolutionary anger but an octogenarian man of the establishment? Then after that who else but the absolute Saudi princes, then the absolute oligarchs of the UAE and Bahrain and Qatar.

And why are the Arab youth allegedly supposedly perhaps so angry that Persian Iran has influence in the Persian Gulf, but they are not angry that Britain, France, Monaco, and Colombian mercenaries are building bases in the same Persian Gulf faster than petro-money can finance them? And why are these “youths of the whole Arab world” allegedly represented by a handful of foreign absolute kings, princes, potentates, and their paid media minions?

And why are Arab youths, according to Amr Moussa and others, not angry at their rulers instead of being angry at foreigners who take advantage of meddling opportunities created by the rulers? Shouldn’t they be angry, as they used to be in past decades, at their rulers for enabling foreigners (Iranians, Turks, Israelis, Westerners) to wield influence?

All this puzzling “stuff” I gleaned from the recent article by Roger Cohen in the New York Times.  Written in the warm afterglow of a well-fed six-star conference in the United Arab Emirates. While the Yemenis next door got bombed and starved by the same brotherly and sisterly Arab oligarchs.          

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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Saudi Arabia, Yemen

Mocha Con Kafka: Southern Arabia as a Testing Ground for Royal Weapons……..

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KuwaitCox2        SaudiObama1

Finally the Saudi princes had a chance to use their hundred billion dollars of weapons stockpiles. They chose Southern Arabia, or events chose Yemen for them.

Except that they used it in their usual shadow-dancing: they used the best Western weapons that money can buy, at a huge cost of prices and bribes, but they used them in yet another Arab country. A country that has not attacked them. This time the poorest Arab country outside Africa became the testing ground. Last time it was Bahrain, but that was a security operation. This one in Yemen became a genocidal massacre of people, destruction of cities and infrastructure and food supplies. A genocide against a whole country, even as the local Yemeni factions are killing each other, largely but predictably ignored by Western media. The remnants of Arab liberals, with keen trained eyes focused on Saudi, Qatari, and Emirati money, have largely ignored the attack on Yemen.

The Saudis harkened to the simpler days of Desert Storm, when the cause was clear: Saddam’s Baathist army had occupied a sovereign country and was trounced by an American-led  Western coalition, with  a few Arab brigades for window-dressing. Never original, they came up with Decisive Storm, which has proved anything but decisive. The ragtag Houthi tribals and their Yemeni army allies withstood the air assault and forced a ceasefire. The escaped former president of Yemen, General AbdRabuh Hadi (Bin Zombie) and his foreign minister and their corrupt Islah (Muslim Brotherhood) partners kept urging more war and a land invasion, into a war they had both escaped and would not fight. The Saudis may have even used the fateful motto “Mission Accomplished”, a la George W Bush in the early days of the Iraq War.

So, will the absolute repressive tribal non-elected Saudi and Qatari potentates force a democratic elected government on Yemen? Would that be through the reinstatement of the weakling General Hadi and his corrupt Islah (local Muslim Brotherhood) allies? Oddly, or maybe not, Islah is Arabic for Reform, but it was anything but reform). Both prospects are unlikely: there an Arab saying that “one can’t bestow what one doesn’t have : فاقد الشيئ لا يعطيه“. An excellent and appropriate saying in the rich Arab tradition. But the Middle East strives to be a little bit more Kafkaesque than the rest of the world.
    

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Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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Europe, Russia, U.S. Foreign Policy, U.S. Senate

The Foreign Oligarchs’ Demand for Senator McCain………

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There have been some reports that president Poroshenko of Ukraine has appointed Sen John McCain as an adviser. I commented on Twitter that maybe now the Nusra Front , the Al Qaeda franchise that leads the Syrian opposition, is trying to recruit him for Syria.

But wait, there may be more: new rumors that the Saudis are vying with the escaped general Hadi, former Yemeni president, to get the senator. They were all impressed with his travel prowess………

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

 Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter [email protected]     

Uncategorized

BBC Applying Lipstick to the Saudi Pig in Yemen……….

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“Certainly, Saudi Arabia has shown an ability to conduct a high volume of air strikes (sometimes as many as 125 strikes a day), proving wrong those that doubted the Kingdom’s ability to sustain complex extra-territorial operations……….. So has the Saudi operation been a success? Yes and no. If the definition of success is the removal of strategic and tactical threats to the Saudi homeland, then yes the Saudis basically achieved their aims…………”

They were using the best Western weapons, hundreds of billions of them, including billions of bribes commissions to princes, bombing an enemy that had no credible air defenses, and still they did not achieve their goals. That usually means defeat. The Houthis now control almost all of North Yemen, and they have gained more territory in South Yemen, including in Aden, since the Saudi air assault started. Al Qaeda AQAP have also expanded their zones of control since their main rivals were busy fending off Saudi air attacks.

This piece of BBC propaganda is putting a pretty face on an ugly defeat in Yemen. A pig with lipstick is still a pig. Even a Wahhabi halal pig.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

 Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter [email protected]     

Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, GCC, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Terrorism, U.S. Foreign Policy

Persian Gulf Game Theory at Camp David: Obama and State-Sponsored Terrorism……..

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“US President Barack Obama has labeled Iran a “state sponsor of terrorism” and countries in the Gulf region have a right to be concerned about Tehran’s activities. The move comes less than three months after Iran was taken off a US terror list………..”

On the eve of his ill-advised Camp David summit with the kings, princes, and potentates of the GCC, Mr. Obama feels the need to placate his guests. Or so he has been told.

Mr. Obama surprised many today by dusting up and reusing the old T-for-Terrorism word about Iran. No doubt that is how he was advised by some advisers steeped in the nuances of Persian Gulf Game Theory. He is trying to placate the Gulf kings, princes, and potentates some of whom are frustrated that they may not get what they feel they are entitled to. They, his guests, are playing the old game, showing more anger than they feel. A bargaining chip, but hopefully he knows that.

Speaking of state-sponsored terrorism: it is time to lay that silly term to rest as a derogatory term. Almost every state sponsors its own favorite groups of terrorists, whether at home or abroad. As the saying goes: almost “everybody does it”.
You’d think all the ideology, money, weapons, and volunteers for Al Qaeda, ISIS, DAESH, Nusra Front and others have come from Shi’a Iran. Not from Wahhabi Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Persian Gulf Salafis. You’d think Iranians planned and financed and executed the attack on the USS Cole and then on the United States on September 11, 2001 (FYI: Saddam was not involved either, in spite of what Dick Cheney says). You’d think it is Iranian warplanes raining death and destruction over impoverished Yemen and its people. You’d think……………

Coincidentally, it may get the Republican warmongers in the Senate (McCain, Graham, et al) off his back for a day or two.


Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter
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