Do you all think Silicon Valley should make a public statement and distance themselves from MBS?
After all the photo-ops among executives at Apples, Google and FB it looks embarrassing to have a photo with a possible murderer out there. Or from the PR perspective, it's best to keep quiet and not remind the public at all and hope no one would bring it up?
> Do you all think Silicon Valley should make a public statement and distance themselves from MBS?
Silicon Valley should have made a public statement a long time ago about what MBS is doing to Yemen. It's quite ridiculous that being directly responsible for the deaths of thousands is A-OK, but ohhh kill one journalist and the western world loses their shit.
> kill one journalist and the western world loses their shit.
I would argue that the Western world largely didn't care, but the journalistic class which controls a large chunk of what people think is happening had a tantrum. This was not a "look at what Trump did this week" tantrum, but rather a "these guys just killed one of us, YOU HAVE TO CARE" tantrum.
You can tell it's this because the journalists themselves don't really care that he died trying to expose what is happening in Yemen - they only care that a fellow journalist died a fairly gruesome death.
Also witness the journos circling the wagons around a guy who, by most accounts, is an obnoxious fucknut, because the White House got tired of his shit and pulled his pass.
Expecting the press to be objective or reasonable where their own prerogatives and interests are concerned is foolish.
I am not excusing any belligerents in the Yemen conflict, however the cause of that conflict is a coup that resulted in a failed extremist state. Conditions for the people of Yemen would be dire no matter which way that military intervention went. This is, unfortunately, the reason why that conflict isn't getting more attention.
The only reason Saudi Arabia is bombing their neighbor is MBS decided he needed a successful military victory to highlight and cement his power as the true ruler of Saudi Arabia.
Yemen is the poorest country in that part of the world and poses no threat to SA.
The only reason the US aides SA in bombing and starving Yemen is they asked.
Countries cannot figure anything out if they are internally conflicted or poorly organized regardless of the peacefulness or wealth of their neighbors.
As an example look at Botswana. They are moderately well-off only because of low corruption and strong internal organization even though their neighbors are incredibly corrupt and have frequent political/military turmoil.
What?? Africa, Latin America, whole swathes of planet earth, time and over again that disagree vehemently with that. Who needs enemies (or hostile neighbors) when corrupt and greedy denizens breed within.
What are you talking about? Latin America and Africa have had non stop foreign intervention since the 16th century. Rich angry neighbours / foreign interventions have always created huge amounts of corruption and instability and are the root cause of many of these countries problems.
You also seem to be implying that African and Latin American people are just naturally more corrupt than the inhabitants of other nations which is a kinda bizarre theory.
As an American living in the Middle East the biggest problem is over simplification of complex external political issues, because then nothing and everything are simultaneously the US's business.
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How do I prove that you are a completely useless idiot who tries to legitimize blowing children to pieces?
I guess it doesn't need a proof, reading your comments I can tell that you are a ruthless low life.
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Only a servile culture would have led to all those SV head honchos prostrating themselves as they did for the prince...I took one look at the photos and wondered how is it that none of their handlers advised them against it...Wannabe reformed dictators using eager and naive westerners to burnish their reputation is an old and well known tactic.
If it went down anything like how the Saudi aid reported, practically everything was done over Skype. As we know that the intelligence community has been granted unfettered access to Skype, this entire investigation seems like a show crafted to sway public opinion, making me doubtful anything will change.
Still, always interesting to see how much more important one US resident is versus thousands of Yemeni civilians.
This is probably an unpopular opinion: I do think the US should do more about a US person being killed versus a person with no legal/jurisdictional ties to the US.
This isn’t to say that the US should care less about a non-US person, but that the issues with violation of state sovereignty (aka Westphalian sovereignty) are too grave to advocate action.
>This isn’t to say that the US should care less about a non-US person, but that the issues with violation of state sovereignty (aka Westphalian sovereignty) are too grave to advocate action.
If this is the issue, the US should not start/participate/assist in wars that violate international law, should not run a drone strike program that allows an arbitrary death sentence without any trial, should stop their policy of regime change and interference in foreign governments, and the countless other ways we usurp sovereignty.
In theory I completely agree with you, but this bridge has long since been crossed, and I doubt that it is the reason the media only cares if there is a tie to the US.
> this entire investigation seems like a show crafted to sway public opinion, making me doubtful anything will change
What would the purpose of such a show be? Before the whole thing, US relations with Arabia were much more positive than US public opinion toward Arabia. If the US wanted to distance itself from Arabia, it wouldn't need to swing public opinion by staging a show trial; public opinion was already there.
>The murder of a journalist should always be big news. They're directly fighting oppression and abuses of power.
It's almost never big news. This is far from the first journalist Saudi Arabia has killed for opposing the Royal Family, plus who knows how many Yemeni journalists have been killed over the past few years.
>Also the investigation was not a show. It highlighted extreme abuse of power.
The event itself highlights this, the investigation was barely necessary. The Saudis changing their story was a naked delay tactic that was likely coordinated with the "investigators."
I'd love to be proven wrong, but years of watching the media only care when there's some strong US connection has left me too cynical.
Just like the supreme court can't cover every case that exists, the media can't cover every story that exists.
I guess they both have to pick the most powerful stories/case to cover that sets precedent and can be applied to other similar stories/cases going forward.
What precedent had this set? That our allies have free reign to kill journalists unless they are American residents? And if they do kill American residents, they'd better prepare for a light scolding? As currently the bill to end US support of the war in Yemen was blocked, and it has been a whole three days since "coalition forces," or American assisted planes, bombed a bus in Yemen killing seven civilians.
It could have easily turned out differently. Our president was thinking about handing over a US resident to Erdogan so he can be killed, just so he could get Erdogan to lay off of Bin Salman for killing another US resident. And let's not forget how we experienced a coordinated terrorist attack by 15 Saudis that killed thousands of Americans and we decided to go to war with Iraq and Afganistan to get them back. Our diplomatic/business relationship with SA has always been more important than American lives.
The only thing that made this different is that this time there were some people in power who decided to make it a big deal.
This is just so lazy. Yes many of the 9/11 guys were Saudi citizens, but you can’t draw straight lines between that and the Saudi government. Toppling the house of Saud is an explicit goal of Al Qaeda. It’s like suggesting Snowden is clearly acting on behalf of the US government because, duh, he’s a US citizen.
As for people in power making the Khashoggi case a big deal, that would be the Turkish government. They have many reasons for disliking the Saudi leadership, so many I won’t even try.
‘Donors in Saudi Arabia’ isn’t the same thing as the Saudi government. They are very sloppy with their money though, hence the reference to secondary funding (not a direct line) of groups including Al Qaeda, but that’s more like Al Qaeda supporters embezzling Saudi aid money that intentional support by the house of Saud for a group that hates them and that attacked a city the Saudi royal family has invested billions of dollars in.
The problem with the Saudis is they are very sloppy with their money, pretty incompetent and see certain forms if jihadism as legitimate. The incompetence means they often act counterproductively. Those are all problems and the western world needs to try to manage and limit the damage they cause. However hallucinating conspiracy crap on top of that just obscures the picture and makes tackling the real problems a lot more difficult.
And the taliban didn't finance or plan the attack on the US, they merely wouldn't give up those who did. Even if the Saudi government isn't directly financing salafist or wahhabist terrorism (and it's not clear that they aren't [1]), they certainly aren't doing anything meaningful to stop the massive amount of it that is coming out of their borders or out of the madrasas they've been funding all over the world. Afghanistan never had a strong diplomatic/business relationship with the US, so they get the hammer at the slightest malfeasance. As I said before, the diplomatic/business relationship with SA is more important than American lives.
These terrorists are upset about the same thing you are, the ties that essentially make Saudi Arabia a vassal state. Cracking down on them only strengthens those ties, fostering more anger.
Turkey has been playing a masterful game of "trickle truth" perfectly timed with the media cycle to undermine the Saudi regime. I'm surprised at how well they're managing international propaganda considering that many of their previous efforts on other issues were clumsy and ineffectual.
>>Officials cautioned, however, that the American and Turkish intelligence agencies still do not have direct evidence linking Prince Mohammed to the assassination.
The evidence included an intercept showing a member of the kill team calling an aide to Prince Mohammed and saying “tell your boss” that the mission was accomplished.
That just means they don't have evidence they're willing to disclose, because the disclosure is outweighed by the potential harm to the national interest.
The noteworthy thing here is not that the Saudi's are doing stuff like this but that the CIA is calling them out on it instead of helping their former ally to bury the bodies and get away with it.
It's a big change. The Saudi's have been instrumental for decades in the foreign policy of the US in the middle east. And that's despite al queeda, IS, etc being founded by Saudi's and openly funded by them. For decades it was very convenient for the US to provide active military support to the Saudi's in various ugly wars by proxy in the region and look the other way when it came to such things like genocide, occasional bombing of schools, hospitals, etc., Muslim extremists, and public beheadings.
However, recent focus on energy independence and a string of embarrassing incidents around e.g. Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen, etc. seems to be souring the relationship. Times are changing.
Erdoğan wants him, but in return for what? Maybe preventing the audio of the killing ending up on YouTube (or otherwise made public). If the CIA is saying MBS ordered the killing, the effect is maybe the same.
Also: why does the CIA care what happens to Gulen?
Doesn't Gulen have a right to challenge this in US Courts? Any lawyers here...does he have a chance in courts? The process in Turkey surely seems political.
According to mutual agreement between Turkey and US, US is actually obliged to return him Turkey. As far as I understand from what I read Erdogan does not want him back to Turkey but extradited to a 3rd country, not sure why. Probably he won't be able to run his network as efficiently as he can from say South Africa.
Strange, if true. AFAIK, all agreements are subject to federal court review, he has right since he's in USA /has Green card.
If all fails, he has the right to ask for political asylum. A judge would grant him one in light of what's going on in Turkey with tens of thousands rounded up overnight and jailed. Will he get a fair trial in Turkey? We pretty much know the answer
Not sure where you're getting that... Erdogan has been demanding that Gulen be extradited directly to Turkey since at least 2016, and I'm sure earlier.
Interesting, very interesting. Which "American officials" leaked this to the NYT, and why?
> The Central Intelligence Agency has concluded that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, ordered the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to American officials
1. Leaked late on a Friday. The traditional time to release news that you hope gets forgotten ASAP. So the "sources" wanted this story out there, but not too out there? Maybe this isn't significant; maybe the leakers wanted the news out there sooner but the NYT didn't run the story right away.
2. Leaked to a liberal-leaning news source as opposed to one more friendly to conservatives. Don't know what to make of that decision either but it was a conscious one.
3. What were they hoping to accomplish by making it public?
Most obvious explanation: they leaked this because they didn't trust the White House to tell the public about this; they feared the White House would simply bury this finding in order to maintain their relationship with Saudi Arabia.
Alternate explanation: The White House leaked it themselves. Gives them an "excuse" to punish Saudi Arabia while claiming they had no choice in the matter since the "CIA leak" tied their hands. In other words, they are attempting to eat their cake and have it too... punishing the Saudis and trying to maintain a good relationship with them.
(folks, why the downvotes? If you don't want politics on HN, fine, but I didn't post the story. I just replied to it... and I hardly feel my post here is partisan or negative in any way...)
>Most obvious explanation: they leaked this because they didn't trust the White House to tell the public about this; surely they feared the White House would simply bury this finding in order to maintain their relationship with Saudi Arabia.
Prediction: The White House is going to maintain its relationship with Saudi Arabia anyways. All this might do is force the administration to make some sort of symbolic gesture of finger wagging at them.
This is a fairly standard way that the CIA releases press reports. Technically they can't release the information without clearing huge amounts of red tape, and they don't like publicly admitting who they spy on as it could cause an incident.
As for why, this story attracted a lot of attention from journalists, many of whom knew him. This story is being released when the professionals are the only ones paying attention, Friday evening, and is meant to reassure them that the CIA is taking care of this.
As for why the NYT, them and the Post regularly do this for the CIA, and the Post would be a poor choice.
Given the link between the US and the KSA, from a pure analyst view, if the CIA is giving away conclusion like that publicly, it's highly probable that something is brewing and under preparation somewhere.
My mechanic from Dubai concluded this 5 weeks ago.. nothing in Saudi Arabia moves without MBS ordering it. Most likely, MBS watched the killing, and possibly dismemberment, live via encrypted video link.
Everybody is dragging their feet not to blame MBS. Why? it's just because murderer is a filthy rich guy. You do not need be from Dubai to arrive the same conclusion.
My new YC application is for an app that detects when dang goes home for the weekend by detecting when cranks start commenting on threads for links to non tech news.
After all the photo-ops among executives at Apples, Google and FB it looks embarrassing to have a photo with a possible murderer out there. Or from the PR perspective, it's best to keep quiet and not remind the public at all and hope no one would bring it up?