SUSRIS » 2004

Bombings, Attacks At Riyadh Security Sites Special Report #1

Editor — Thu, 30 Dec 2004 17:10:22 +0000

Summary

Nine terror suspects and a bystander died after militants launched coordinated car bombings and battled security forces in the Saudi capital.

Militants launched coordinated car bombings and battled security forces in the Saudi capital last night (Dec. 29) in attacks that killed 10 people, caused oil prices to jump and signaled that Islamic extremists are keeping up their fight despite the kingdom’s crackdown on al-Qaida. A car bomb detonated near the Interior Ministry in central Riyadh — killing a bystander, according to Saudi TV — was followed soon after by an explosion when suicide attackers tried to bomb a troop recruitment center. (London Free Press/AP)

Details

Attacks began at about 8:35 p.m. in central Riyadh near the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of Saudi security forces. (AP)

Two militants detonated a car bomb by remote control in a traffic tunnel near the ministry. Al Riyadh, a state-controlled newspaper, said the attack was a suicide bombing, quoting a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, Brig. Gen. Mansour al-Turki. A limousine driver was killed. (AP)

A half hour after the first blast and five miles away, a second explosion went off at a center for recruiting security troops. Police said two suicide bombers tried to storm the center but blew up their car prematurely after police fired on them. The Interior Ministry said 12 security officers and an unspecified number of bystanders were slightly injured. (AP)

Three attackers were killed at the sites of the blasts, according to media reports, and seven others were killed after a chase to the north of the capital. (AP)

More than 90 people were injured in the attacks, mostly security forces and bystanders. (AP)

Prince Ahmed bin Abdel Aziz, the deputy interior minister, told Saudi TV, “This is a heinous and disturbing crime.” He said the attackers were all Saudis and described them as “terrorists (who) took a great risk because they know that their end is imminent.” (AP)

Saudi police hunted for suspects Thursday (Dec. 30) after insurgents bombed two security headquarters in Riyadh, setting off violence that left 10 attackers and one bystander dead in what appeared to be the latest blow by al-Qaida-linked militants against the Saudi royal family. (AP)

Despite the relative puniness of the attacks, oil markets quickly reacted to the violence with a jittery bump up in prices, with key prices in the United States rising $1.87 a barrel, to $43.64. (NYT)

The effect of the attacks was more psychological than physical.. ..They showed that the militants are still capable of striking in the very heart of the capital despite an 19-month, nationwide police crackdown that, the police say, has killed or captured three-quarters of the most wanted terrorists inspired by Al Qaeda and dismantled much of their network. Hundreds of suspected sympathizers have been detained. (NYT)

Early Wednesday, a man was killed in Riyadh after tossing a bomb and shooting at security agents, a security official said. On Tuesday, another suspect and a bystander were killed in a shootout in the same Riyadh neighborhood, an Interior Ministry official said. (Washington Post)

The attacks came two weeks after al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden called on his followers to focus attacks on his homeland. While damage to the Interior Ministry was minor, it was a bold assault on the government body at the center of Saudi Arabia’s fight against Islamic extremists. (AP)

Source: Guardian/Washington Post/AP/NY Times

Complete Reporting

Militants launch bomb attacks in Saudi capital (London Free Press/AP)

Car Bombers Target Saudi Security Units (Washington Post)

Car bombings rock Riyadh (Khaleej Times/AFP)

Saudi Forces Kill Bomb Suspects (BBC)

Ministry Targeted (Saudi Gazette)

Suicide Bomber Attacks Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry (New York Times)

Saudi Police Look for Suspects in Blasts (Guardian)

Saudi forces kill insurgents after blasts (Al Jazeera)

Blasts rocks Saudi capital (ITV)

U.S. warns Americans in Saudi Arabia (Washington Times/UPI)

Car Bombs Detonated Near Saudi Security Buildings (ABC News/Reuters)

10 Die As Militants, Saudi Police Clash (Guardian)

Blasts rock Saudi capital (CNN)

Saudi security sites ‘targeted by rebels’ (Gulf Daily News)

Two Explosions Hit Riyadh (Arab News)

Three Terrorists Gunned Down in Riyadh (Arab News)

Resources/Background

Terrorism Timeline – Saudi Arabia and the Global War on Terrorism – SUSRIS Web Site

U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attacked (Dec. 6) Special Report #1 Special Report #2

Attack on U.S. Consulate General in Jeddah – Amb Oberwetter briefing

Al Qaeda Shifts its Strategy in Saudi Arabia

“Keeping Cool about Jeddah,” By Anthony H. Cordesman

Attack in Khobar (May 2004) Special Report #1 Special Report #2

Al Qaeda Shifts Its Strategy in Saudi Arabia

Editor — Tue, 28 Dec 2004 17:12:57 +0000

Focus Placed on U.S. and Other Western Targets in Bid to Bolster Network, Officials Say

By Craig Whitlock

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Al Qaeda forces in Saudi Arabia have shifted their strategy and are now almost exclusively searching for U.S. and other Western targets in the kingdom while avoiding attacks on domestic institutions in a bid to strengthen their flagging network, according to security officials and Saudi experts on radical groups.

While al Qaeda retains its primary goal of eventually toppling the Saudi royal family — as Osama bin Laden made clear in an audio recording released Thursday — an 18-month campaign of car bombings, gun battles and kidnappings has so far failed to generate many new recruits and has resulted in a backlash among many Saudis, even those who otherwise are critical of the government, the officials and experts said.

More than 80 people have died in the attacks, the majority of them Saudis or non-Western immigrant workers. Many people in the kingdom are not only angry over the bloodshed but also fearful of al Qaeda’s attempt to turn Saudi Arabia, a deeply conservative tribal society, into an even more conservative Islamic theocracy, several Saudi reformers said in interviews.

“People want government reforms and changes, but they are more scared of al Qaeda extremists,” said Mansour Nogaidan, a former Islamic radical who has moderated his views but is still one of the most prominent critics of the Saudi government. “The common people — those people who thought their life might improve if the government changed — they are not ready to lose all this for what some young teenagers have in their minds as a utopia.”

Despite an al Qaeda-sponsored attack on the U.S. consulate in Jiddah this month that left 9 people dead, including the four assailants, Saudi government officials expressed confidence that they are steadily gaining the upper hand in their fight with the militants.

Security forces have arrested or killed 17 of the 26 most wanted militant leaders in the country. Two others on the most wanted list are believed to be dead or badly injured, while a key operational planner reportedly fled the kingdom, Saudi security officials said.

Saudi officials said that they have dismantled three of four known al Qaeda cells and that the insurgents are finding it harder to obtain ammunition, weaponry and money. The size and scope of the attacks have also dwindled since last year, when car bombs in Riyadh blew up two Western residential compounds and caused more than 200 casualties.

“The people who are still there are not as skillful as the ones who were there in the beginning,” said Brig. Gen. Mansour Turki, a spokesman for the Saudi Interior Ministry. “We feel more confident than we did in the beginning of this fight. We thought it would take much longer to be in control. We cannot deny that there are still possibilities that the terrorists could execute more acts, but they are not as strong as they were a year ago.”

Still, few people are predicting that the attacks will end anytime soon.

“The hands-on folks see this as a serious engagement that has some time to run,” said a Western official involved in counterterrorism efforts in the kingdom, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “They don’t see this as ending near term. It’s going to take a period of time. Is it months? Is it years? We don’t know.”

Turmoil in neighboring Iraq is also fueling anger against Americans. A number of Saudis involved with al Qaeda in the kingdom became radicalized after going to Iraq to fight U.S. military forces there, American and other Western counterterrorism officials said.

Last month, 26 Saudi clerics signed a fatwa, or religious edict, declaring it a duty for Muslims to fight the U.S. presence in Iraq. The fatwa was vague as to whether it was encouraging Saudis or Iraqis to resist the U.S.-led occupation, but American officials said they took it as a serious threat.

“The intent behind the clever words was to encourage young people — and by that I mean jihadists — to kill American soldiers in Iraq, and that is something we must protest vigorously,” said James C. Oberwetter, the U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

For the moment, al Qaeda is seeking to recover from the loss of leaders who have been arrested or killed. Abdulaziz Muqrin, a former cell leader who asserted responsibility in the deaths of three U.S. military contractors last summer, including the beheading of Lockheed Martin employee Paul M. Johnson Jr., died in a shootout with Saudi police in June. Murqin’s replacement, Saleh Awfi, is believed to be dead or seriously injured, Saudi officials said.

Internet postings monitored by Saudi intelligence show that al Qaeda operatives and sympathizers cannot agree on who is in charge these days, or even what strategy they should adopt to remain viable, officials said. The internal disputes have simmered for more than a year, but are now becoming more of a handicap for al Qaeda because it does not have a firm leadership in place, officials said.

The dissension goes back to early 2003, before the start of the attacks that began in May of last year and quickly rattled the desert kingdom, helping to drive up the price of oil worldwide.

On the run after the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, top al Qaeda leaders including bin Laden and chief ideologue Ayman Zawahiri pressed local operatives in Saudi Arabia to launch an offensive to destabilize the royal family. Local leaders in the kingdom had been building cells and amassing weapons for more than a year, but asked for more time, saying they were unprepared for an all-out assault on the Saudi government and were worried about a public backlash, officials here said.

After a debate, bin Laden ordered the local cells to go ahead with the strikes anyway, officials said. “The internal guys here thought it would be a mistake because it would foul their own nest,” said another Western official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “They were overruled, but they were right — it has fouled their own nest.”

While the opening attack — a May 2003 car bombing of a compound in Riyadh housing Westerners — caught the government off guard, the al Qaeda cells had difficulty sustaining themselves as Saudi security personnel began arresting hundreds of suspected militants.

“It immediately condemned their ship,” said Nawaf Obaid, head of the Saudi National Security Assessment Project, an independent institute that is preparing to publish a study, along with the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, about the al Qaeda terrorist threat in the kingdom. “They weren’t ready for it. They didn’t have the support or the manpower that they originally thought they could muster.”

Another turning point came last April, when militants detonated a car bomb in front of a five-story police building in Riyadh, killing four people and injuring about 150. Unlike previous attacks, most of the casualties were Saudi civilian employees, prompting many Saudis to rally around the government.

Soon after, al Qaeda began shifting its targets to avoid Saudis. In May, militants attacked a Western compound in the oil-producing city of Khobar, killing 22 civilians. Gunmen burst into a residential and office compound, looking for hostages and shouting, “Where are the Americans?” The next month, three U.S. military contractors were killed after assailants followed them home from work in Riyadh.

On Dec. 6, gunmen mounted a direct assault on one of the most prominent U.S. targets in the kingdom: the consulate in Jiddah, a half-century-old building overlooking the Red Sea. During the middle of a three-hour gun battle and standoff with Saudi police, the assailants made it a point to lower the U.S. flag flying outside the consulate’s main entrance and light it on fire.

The flag was singed, but not destroyed, and embassy personnel raised it again later that day. But U.S. officials said it was clear that the militants had placed a renewed emphasis on attacking American symbols in an effort to drum up support.

Al Qaeda Shifts Its Strategy in Saudi Arabia

By Craig Whitlock

Washington Post Foreign Service

Sunday, December 19, 2004
Reprinted with permission.

The Outlook For The World Oil Market

Editor — Sun, 19 Dec 2004 17:14:29 +0000

The Outlook For The World Oil Market
By John Browne

[The following paper was delivered by BP Group Chief Executive Lord Browne at the Empire Club of Canadian Toronto on 10 December and was published in the Middle East Economic Survey in the 20/27 December 2004 edition (Vol. XLVII, No. 51/52).]

It is a great pleasure to be back in Canada, which is a country that is very important to us in BP and to the whole of the world energy market. We very much appreciate the links that we have here. We already invest some $8bn Canadian dollars here, and I hope we soon will be able to invest a little more.

You asked me to talk about the outlook for the world oil market. I think it is appropriate to start with the immediate events which are shaping people’s thinking about the market, and raising new concerns about the question of energy security. The price of Brent on the international market has fluctuated over the last 12 months from around $25/B a year ago to over $45/B for a period in the autumn to just below $40/B today.

To understand the reasons for those shifts, you have to look back at the events of the last five years. What’s changed and what are the consequences of those changes? Back at the end of the 1990s, we all were accustomed to an oil price which averaged a reasonably stable $18/B, with only very occasional excursions into the low $20s, and one brief fall at the end of the 1990s to $10. That was the picture for a decade, from the end of the first Gulf war onwards.

Throughout the 1990s, technological advances had opened the range of what was possible. Advances in seismic technology reduced the risks and costs of exploration. Advances in deep water technology opened up new areas for exploration and development. Advances in reservoir management technology pushed up recovery factors. And political change also had opened new doors. International companies were able to invest in areas previously closed to them – including Russia, Central Asia, the Caspian, and China. So there had been a series of developments which had created a situation in which costs were falling, and in which prices were moderate and seemed liable to decline rather than increase.

The factor which changed the outcome was the decision in April 2000 by the OPEC member states to use their market power to set a price framework for oil at around $25/B – varying up or down from that level by no more than $3/B. That was a major step, and OPEC’s successful management of their production set prices at those levels throughout the period, from 2000 to the end of 2003.

The next fundamental change came on the demand side. The growth in demand for oil in 2003 and 2004 has been so strong that for the first time in 30 years, the rate of oil demand growth worldwide almost matches the growth of GDP. That is the context in which the rise in prices we’ve seen over the last 12 months has developed. That rise is driven by demand, particularly the dramatic growth in demand in China, which has increased its imports of oil by 400% in just 4 years, and is reinforced by concern about supply security. For most of the last two decades, the market has operated with around 3mn b/d of spare capacity. This year, that spare capacity has fallen to around 1mn b/d – an amount less than is produced in a number of areas where continuity of supply has been threatened by disruptions – including Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela. There has been no shortage, but there has been a fear that a shortage would develop.

Fortunately, the market operates in a very effective way. Partly in response to this increased price, and in response to the confidence inspired by OPEC’s effective management of the market, the private sector part of the industry began to increase its spending on exploration and production. The top 30 quoted companies have increased their investment in exploration and production by more than 15% a year during the last five years. They now invest almost $100bn a year between them. That already is producing increased supplies. A whole series of major new fields are coming on stream over the next three years – in the Caspian, in Angola, and in the deep water of the Gulf of Mexico.

Those new developments should help to restore stability to the market. So will the growth in OPEC capacity. If, as can be reasonably expected, the growth in demand resumes its normal growth path of around 1.5% per annum, surplus capacity should build over the next three years back to a more comfortable level of around 3mn b/d. In the absence of any further major disruption, prices might then revert to a level set by the decisions of the OPEC member states on production. Given the revenue needs of many of those states, which have large, youthful populations and which have not yet succeeded in diversifying their economic development away from oil, it seems realistic to expect that with the insecurity premium removed, prices might stand at around $30/B.

That is a reasonable level which will reward investment by the private sector and generate sufficient revenue for the producing states, but which will not do major damage to the global economy or to those who depend on oil imports. Such an outcome, however, is not the end of the story. None of the developments I’ve described should be taken to mean that the issue of energy security has been resolved.

There are two substantive issues, each of which poses challenges for energy security over the medium and longer term. The first is about supply and demand. The demand for energy continues to grow, with the growth underpinned by the increase in population numbers and by the gradual spread of prosperity. The world’s population grows by almost 10,000 an hour – almost a quarter of a million every day. In 10 years time the world will have an additional one billion citizens – making 7.3bn in total. All those people need food, housing and all the other basic products and services which require energy. More and more of the world’s population can afford the energy they want to buy. The spread of prosperity, especially in China, India, and parts of Latin America, adds to effective demand on a daily basis. The result is that there are tens of millions of new consumers of commercial energy every year.

The current projection from the International Energy Agency (IEA) is that global demand for all forms of commercial energy will rise from the current level of around 190mn b/d oil equivalent (b/doe) to some 240mn b/doe by 2015. A rise of almost 30%. That forecast is made on quite cautious assumptions about economic growth rates. The numbers could turn out to be significantly higher. How can that demand be met?

Some place their faith in renewable and alternative forms of energy supply. Power from the wind and the waves. Power from solar panels. We believe those are important sources of future supply. We in BP are investing in research and development work in photovoltaics – the technology which supports solar power – and in various other forms of alternative energy supply. One day, one or more of those new sources will provide a significant proportion of global energy demand. But the evidence is that day is still a long time off. Today, all the renewable and alternative forms of energy supply provide just 2.5% of world demand, the bulk of which currently comes from biomass. Research continues in many other countries around the world. But in every case, we still are at the stage of research and experimentation. We believe renewables will provide material supplies of energy in the long term. But the long term could be 20 or 30 or more years away. The estimate from the IEA is that in 2015 they will provide only 3.3% of total demand.

What sources then will meet the demand? Some people believe that the key lies in the potential of nuclear power. That certainly is possible. But it seems a remote possibility on the timescale of a decade. Nuclear currently supplies 7% of world energy demand. The first generation of nuclear stations are reaching the end of their natural lives. Last year, only two new nuclear stations were commissioned and public doubts both about safety and about the uncertain long term costs continue to constrain new investment. In the US, no new stations have been commissioned for over two decades, while in Europe the forecasts suggest that on current trends nuclear capacity will decline rather than increase over the next 10 years.

And that leaves hydrocarbons – coal, oil and gas – to meet the balance. The mix will vary from one country to another. China, for instance, will no doubt continue to use large volumes of coal, but in terms of convenience, oil and gas seem set to remain the fuels of choice. In reality, energy security is about the supply of oil and gas to meet demand which could grow, again taking the IEA figures, to around 93mm b/d of oil and 64mm b/doe of natural gas by 2015. That would represent a 20% increase in oil demand from today’s level and a 45% increase in the consumption of gas.

Can the oil and gas industry meet that demand? In physical terms the answer is clearly yes. The resources are there. The world holds some 1,000bn barrels of oil which have been found but not yet produced, and some 5,500 tcf of natural gas – also found but not yet produced. At current consumption rates, that is 40 years of oil supply and 60 years of gas. In addition, the US Geological Service estimates that some 800bn barrels of oil and 4,500 tcf of natural gas are yet to be found. And that does not include the very substantial heavy oil resources here in Canada and in Venezuela, which also are beginning to appear to have real potential as a source of future supply.

In terms of physical resources, then, energy security is within reach. There is no fundamental physical reason why there should be a shortage in the next 10 years, or indeed for many decades beyond that. The challenge for energy security is that supply is not co-located with demand. The fundamental fact is that now, and for the foreseeable future, four regions will account for the bulk of trade on the import side of the equation – the US, Europe, Japan and China. Even assuming that all four develop their own indigenous resources to the limit of what is economically rational, and diversify their energy supply sources where practicable, they still will need substantial and growing volumes of imported oil and gas.

Over a 10 year period, the trade in oil, in particular, will grow as a proportion of total demand, because production from the mature provinces in the developed world is plateauing and beginning to decline. Oil trade is likely to rise as a proportion of consumption, from 50% today to almost 70% by 2015. Gas trade will also rise over the same period.

As I have discussed, there is no shortage of resources. But the export side of the trade equation displays an even more powerful concentration of activity. By 2015, three areas will account for almost 80% of all the oil traded in the world each day. The three are Russia, West Africa and the Gulf States of the Middle East. By 2015, on the IEA estimates, Saudi Arabia alone will be required to export some 15 to 16mn b/d of oil to balance the world market – and that assumes that both Iran and Iraq are by then producing and exporting at something close to their full capacity.

That is a manageable situation, of course, but it does emphasize the need for the development of a wide variety of sources of supply, and of the infrastructure necessary to bring those supplies to market. Canada is very important in that process. The energy produced and traded from this country – potentially including heavy oil – is a crucial element in the overall picture, and so is the infrastructure which can take those resources to the markets where they are needed, in North America and internationally.

That is one element of concern about energy security. The other concern is the environmental challenge associated with the growth in hydrocarbon consumption. In part, that is about the level of pollution caused, particularly in the cities as hydrocarbons are burnt. In part, and potentially more seriously, it is about the impact of increasing emissions of greenhouse gases on earth’s atmosphere – the issue of climate change or global warming. The detailed science of climate change is still provisional. There are many things we don’t know. But science is always provisional and in business we are used to working in circumstances where we don’t know all the facts for certain. That means we have to make judgments in conditions of uncertainty, weighing all the risks. On the basis of the available evidence about climate change, the clear judgment must be that there is a powerful case for precautionary action.

It would be too great a risk to stand by, do nothing and to wait so long that when the impact on the climate really does begin to be felt, the action which has to be taken will be so fundamental as to cause serious damage to the world’s economy. There is a very strong case for precautionary action designed to limit any increase in the world’s temperature to around 2 degrees Celsius. That translates into a stabilization of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at around 500 to 550 parts per million. That is the best current estimate of the level of safety and, of course, as knowledge advances that estimate could be adjusted and refined.

Can that stabilization be achieved? The answer is yes. It would mean putting ourselves on a trajectory to the point where in 2050, 50% of global needs for energy would be met by conventional fossil fuels and the other 50% would come from fuels with lower carbon emissions – in some cases with zero emissions. Each of those two halves would be about the size of today’s energy industry. I believe that is achievable. A great deal of work and experimentation has been undertaken over the last few years – by governments, by academics and by the business world. We may not have a full international agreement, but we have a great deal more knowledge and experience than we did seven years ago. People have demonstrated that emissions can be reduced – and at a very low cost – simply by reducing waste and inefficiencies. We did that in BP, and we found that we actually made money in the process. Cutting out waste is a first step, but beyond that people have also begun to demonstrate that there are practical ways of managing the problem.

Some of the possible steps involve advances in efficiency – such as raising the mileage per gallon of vehicles from 30 to 60 or eliminating waste, for instance, by ending the process of flaring the natural gas which is produced in association with oil. Some of the steps involve changing the product mix – using, for instance, natural gas to fuel power stations rather than coal, or looking further ahead, taking action to encourage the growth of solar power or some other form of energy supply which does not generate carbon emissions. There also is the possibility of developing coal gasification technology. And some of the steps involve the development of new techniques which are just emerging, to capture and store the carbon so that it never reaches the atmosphere. We in BP are developing a project in Algeria which takes carbon out of gas which is bound for Europe and reinjecting it into storage. That is a large scale test of what is possible. If it works, it will reduce emissions by the same amount as would be achieved if we took 200,000 cars off the road.

Of course, there are many uncertainties. The decisions that require changes in life style may be unacceptable. The technology of carbon sequestration may be unattainable. There are uncertainties, but they are not all on the negative side. Technology is moving very quickly and will almost certainly offer new opportunities over the next half century – possibilities we can’t even envisage at the moment. What we need above all is an agreed target – set for the long term and supported by a trading system which allocates resources effectively and efficiently. The European Trading System is an important step in that direction, and could set a global standard which leads the way forward. So two major challenges for the world oil market which will remain, even if prices subside from their current levels.

What conclusions can we draw? First, that the world needs a secure supply of oil to provide heat, light and mobility – and that it needs an effective market mechanism to ensure that the supply is available when and where it is required. Second, that there need be no shortage of oil and there need be no damage done to the world’s natural environment. We can work our way through all the challenges. The third point is that this is a common problem. Energy security in one country is impossible. So is environmental security. There is one market and one global climate. That means that we all have to accept the reality of the challenges and the fact that their solution will require the combined actions of all those involved in the industry – governments and companies, public sector and private alike. We can’t live in denial.

That need for a collective cooperative response is true in respect of energy security and in respect of the environmental issues. The private sector can do a great deal, but it can’t operate effectively unless there is an effective framework which enables infrastructure and investment to proceed, and which incentivises innovation and the development and application of new technology. I’ve spent more than 35 years in the oil industry now, including some very happy years here in Canada, and I’ve seen the market move through many different phases. The market will never be placid and calm. No one who wants a quiet life should ever work in the oil industry. But it is a fascinating and very exciting place to be. And I’ve always found from my experience that the market is a very dynamic phenomenon. It produces answers, often unexpected answers, precisely because it stimulates innovation and creativity.

And that experience gives me the greatest confidence that however great the challenges answers will be found, and that the oil market, and the industry as a whole, will be as important to the economy of this century as it was in the last.

[Reprinted with permission of MEES]

Forum for the Future

Editor — Fri, 17 Dec 2004 17:16:50 +0000

This NID provides background information on the Forum for the Future and links to a variety of news reports, op-eds and reference documents.

Background

“… the Forum for the Future hopes to provide a setting for an informal, flexible, open and inclusive dialogue, devoted to strengthening democracy and the participation of civil society, to developing skills training, and to encouraging the growth of modern economies that generate wealth and that are well integrated into the global economy.”
Rabat Chairs’ Summary

At the first meeting of the “Forum for the Future” in Rabat, Morocco, which was held December 10-11, 2004, the countries of the Broader Middle East and North Africa met with the Group of Eight (G-8) industrialized democracies to discuss political, economic and social reform in the region. A preparatory sub-ministerial meeting was held on December 10, 2004 in the same venue.

On June 9, 2004, members of the G8 nations adopted a declaration titled “Partnership for Progress and a Common Future with the Region of the Broader Middle East and North Africa,” at the Sea Island Summit near Savannah, Georgia.

The Forum was hosted at the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation in Rabat.

“Political and economic reform have to go hand-in-hand if not at the same pace,” said U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell before the forum. “Some countries are ready to deal with economic reform before political reform. Other countries are more prepared to move with political reform and the economic reform will catch up.

“The general point here is that each country has to design the pace at which it will move. Will we give encouragement to these efforts? Certainly. Will we provide resources? Yes. The Middle East Partnership Initiative is part of that effort and so I think this is an exciting, long-term initiative that really gets its kickoff tomorrow. I think it is going to be something that will gain momentum as we go further.”

The Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) is a program supervised under the U.S. State Department. MEPI was founded to support economic, political and education reform efforts in the Middle East. This initiative incorporates the use of global private sector businesses and non-governmental organizations. MEPI’s economic focus is to improve region-wide economic and employment growth driven by private sector expansion and entrepreneurship. In the political realm, MEPI supports democratic participation in the political process, where people have a choice in governance, and there is respect for the rule of law. MEPI also supports programs that promote full and equal opportunities for women in society.

The “Forum for the Future” participants endorsed the following actions according to the U.S. State Department:

Democracy Assistance Dialogue: The Dialogue’s participants will focus in 2005 on, among other things, providing electoral assistance, improving the role of women, and advancing relations between the region’s governments and civil society, through programs and projects supporting democratization and public participation.

Literacy: To advance the region’s efforts to halve the illiteracy rate over the next decade and improve education, especially for girls and women, Forum participants will develop a literacy plan of action for the region and convene a meeting of Education Ministers in May 2005 in Jordan.

International Finance: Recognizing that the private sector is the engine of economic growth and job creation, Forum participants established the International Finance Corporation’s Private Enterprise Partnership for the Middle East and North Africa facility to support small and medium-sized enterprises. They have already contributed over $60 million of the $100 million goal for the facility. Forum participants also welcomed the proposal for a Network of Funds to improve the effectiveness of official financing in the region.

Entrepreneurship: Morocco and Bahrain, working with other Forum participants, will establish two entrepreneurship centers in 2005 to provide the region’s young people with opportunities and skills they will need to succeed professionally.

Microfinance: Working with the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), Forum participants have established a microfinance consultative group and will open a technical hub and microfinance training center in 2005 in Jordan. CGAP is also working with Yemen and other countries in the region on developing microfinance projects to assist the region’s small entrepreneurs, especially women.

Investment: The Investment Task Force, a private sector, CEO-led group, will focus on increasing investment in the region to spur economic growth and create jobs. The Task Force will work with the region’s governments and the OECD to remove impediments to investment, including those related to governance.

The second “Forum of the Future” is scheduled to be held in Bahrain in November 2005.

Press Reporting

Arabs Reject U.S. Push for Reform (Washington Post)
Senior Arab officials attending an international conference to promote democracy in the Middle East emphatically rejected on [Dec. 11] the Bush administration’s assertion that greater democracy in the region would help end terrorism. They argued that the administration’s strong support of Israel made it difficult to undertake political reform or to stop extremists driven by hatred of U.S. policies.. ..”Let us face it,” said the Saudi foreign minister, Prince Saud Faisal. “We perceive no clashes of civilization or competing value systems. The real bone of contention is the longest conflict in modern history.” [more] [Free Access/Registration May Be Required]

Arabs Rebuff American Calls for Speedy Reforms (Arab News)
While agreeing that political, social and economic liberalization is desirable, senior Arab diplomats disagreed with outgoing US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s argument that reforms could not be delayed for any reason. Speaker after speaker at the “Forum for the Future” conference here said progress would be difficult, if not impossible, without a resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict and lambasted the perceived US bias toward Israel. [more]

Arab and Western Ministers Voice Different Priorities (New York Times)
Foreign ministers from the Arab world met with leaders from the West on Saturday at a conference dedicated to advancing political change in this region. Instead, Arabs vented their frustration with American support for Israel. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, in an opening statement to the group, spoke of efforts to make “participation in political and public life more inclusive” – the ostensible subject of the conference. Nonetheless, one by one, representatives of 20 Arab states talked largely about economic development and the ever-present thorn in debate here, the Arab-Israeli conflict. [more] [Free Access/Registration May Be Required]

Powell’s final push for Arab reform (BBC)
The controversial US initiative will open a dialogue on political, economic and social reforms in North Africa and the greater Middle East, with economic aid from the G8 as an incentive. [more]

Political, Social and Economic Reform in Saudi Arabia Interview with Usamah Al-Kurdi – Part 2

Editor — Wed, 15 Dec 2004 18:27:22 +0000

Editor’s Note:

We have been pleased from time to time to feature presentations by Engineer Usamah al-Kurdi made to various conferences and panels. He is a member of the Saudi Arabian Majlis Ash-Shura, the Consultative Council and a leader in Saudi-US business relations.

The Council, established in 1993, advises the government and the King on a broad spectrum of issues. It consisted of 60 members initially but membership was increased to 120 members in 2001. Its charter includes expressing its opinion on the general policies of the State such as: general plans for economic and social development; the review and interpretation of laws; the review of international treaties and agreements and concessions; and the review of annual reports provided by the government.

In September he participated in the National Council on US-Arab Relations’ conference for policymakers in Washington and a forum on reform sponsored by the Middle East Institute and Foreign Policy magazine. As he was preparing for the latter event he took time to talk with us on the issues of US-Saudi relations and reforms in the kingdom.

Engineer al-Kurdi’s interview with SUSRIS is provided in two parts. Today, we feature his comments on the progress of reforms in Saudi Arabia. Last week, we featured his interview on the U.S.-Saudi relationship.

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Political, Social and Economic Reform in Saudi Arabia
Interview with Usamah Al-Kurdi

Part 2

SUSRIS: We’re talking today with Usamah Al-Kurdi, who is a member of the Majlis Ash-Shura, the Consultative Council in Saudi Arabia. He has graciously given time to talk about reform in Saudi Arabia. Thank you for joining us today.

Usamah Al-Kurdi

Usamah Al-Kurdi: You’re welcome.

SUSRIS: Can we start with an overview of the reform efforts that have taken a number of different areas — political, economic and so forth — in Saudi Arabia in recent years?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Reform has become a policy of Saudi Arabia — no less than 10 years ago. Many people are surprised to hear me say that. About 10 or 11 years ago, the first political reform steps took place in Saudi Arabia when four decisions where taken by the government.

One was the creation of the Shura Council or the Consultative Council. The second is the issuance of Saudi Arabia’s Basic Law of governance. The third was the law that created the regional councils. There are 13 different regions of Saudi Arabia, and now, as a result of that law, each region has a council. The fourth law was the law that stipulated a term for ministers of four years.

So, since 1993 when these laws were issued and the Shura Council was created, reforms have continued to take place. I try to keep a diary of all the reform steps that were taken in Saudi Arabia. The King’s annual address to the Shura Council, the one that was delivered about two years ago, left no doubt of the fact that this is becoming the policy of the government and that it would continue reform.

Now, in response to questions relating to international pressure to reform, I say that people need to understand Saudi Arabia a little bit more before trying to impose reform from outside. This is not only for Saudi Arabia, but I think it applies to all countries, particularly Middle Eastern countries. In my opinion, these initiatives to impose reform on other countries that are coming from the United States and other countries might do more harm than good.

What we need at this time is to learn from the experience of others. What we need at this time is to take our time with reform because you can’t go too fast with reform. We have seen bad experiences around the world. We don’t need more pressure. There is already dialogue and discussions in the country. Again, we’ve been doing that for 10 or 11 years. Do we need the experience of others? Yes, we do. We’re soliciting that when we need to. Reforms have started to happen in Saudi Arabia, are happening, and there is a commitment to continue doing so.

SUSRIS: The U.S. put forward a number of initiatives, as you referred to. However, Secretary of State Powell recently mentioned that the countries in the region should embrace reform at their own speed and in their own way. Are Saudi Arabians satisfied now about the United States’ governments views of the process of reform in Saudi Arabia, or is there still anxiety between the two governments?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I think the importance of reform is that it satisfies the needs and aspirations of the people themselves. It should not have anything to do with any relations between any two countries. The first principle of democracy is people managing themselves.

No other country can come into Saudi Arabia and say this is the kind of reform you should be pursuing or whether or not this other country is happy about the reform that is happening in Saudi Arabia. This is an issue that should be left completely to the Saudis. In my opinion, we are doing very well.

SUSRIS: Can you discuss the specific steps that have been taken since reform was introduced as a policy in Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Let’s look into the area of politics for example. I mentioned earlier the four laws that have been issued. I think these are really important political reform steps — again, the creation of the Consultative Council, the issuance of Saudi Arabia’s law of governance, the term of four years for ministers, and the regional councils.

Another very important reform step that was taken was the change that has occurred in the Consultative Council law, giving it more power and giving it more authority. This is another step in the reform in the political area.

A very important step was the decision to proceed with municipal elections. Municipal elections will take place in Saudi Arabia soon. The timetable says that the voting day for the region of Riyadh will be the 10th of February next year. The Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia and the Southern Provinces’ voting day is the 3rd of March. The area of Mecca and Medina, Jeddah and the North regions — the voting day is the 21st of April. So, this is the level of commitment that the government has to reform.

Let me also mention the membership of the Consultative Council in the International Parliamentary Union, signifying that they recognize the Consultative Council as a parliament for Saudi Arabia.

Another area that I have been watching for the past 10 years is the emphasis on the creation of civil society. There have been many organizations were created in Saudi Arabia that operate in many different areas of society. I think this is going to be a factor in reform moving forward. It will make a big difference for Saudi Arabia.

Look at the list of initiatives that Saudi Arabia has put forward: the peace initiative of Crown Prince Abdullah at the Arab Summit in Beirut in 2002; the peace initiative for Iraq also; the GCC Educational Reform Initiative. Let’s not forget that over 20 years ago, Saudi Arabia submitted the first peace initiative with Israel in Fez.

These are all areas that Saudi Arabia feels the need to reform and the need to help. The creation of civil society committees for human rights — one in government and one private — in Saudi Arabia and the fact that these two committees are now operating is another big step forward.

A major decision, in my view, was the airing of the Consultative Council sessions on TV. I think this will create more interaction between the people and the Consultative Council — in light of the fact that the Council is appointed. In my view this is a very important step.

There was the creation of the National Dialogue Center, which meets every few months. The coming session is in about a month and will address the issue of children in Saudi Arabia. So, there are plenty of areas, as you can see, that are being addressed in the area of political reform.

SUSRIS: Can we talk a little bit about the press in Saudi Arabia? At the most recent annual Arab-U.S. Policymakers Conference, a panelist commented they had talked with a diplomat who had been out of the Kingdom for a number of years, and when he came back, the thing he noticed most was the proliferation of media and some of the ideas that were being expressed. How would you characterize the press in Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I am amazed at the development that is taking place in our media in the past 10 years. The media participates in real discussions, addresses serious issues in the country and covers events that they did not used to cover in the past. I am delighted at what has happened to our media and in their ability and interest in covering many reform issues in Saudi Arabia.

The change is dramatic. Again, the experience of this diplomat is a clear example as to one of the major changes that took place in Saudi Arabia. I’m very happy with it.

SUSRIS: Can you talk a little bit about women’s issues in political reform? Many American observers are interested in the current state of women’s development in the public and private life.

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Let me repeat what I said earlier that democracy is the people governing themselves the way they see fit. My opinion — and the opinion of many people in Saudi Arabia — is that all issues should be decided by Saudis.

Now, having said that, I also say that most Americans think women in Saudi Arabia are being deprived of their rights, but one needs to look closely at what is happening for women in Saudi Arabia and recognize the fact that this may be how the people want to be ruled.

Having said that, I look at the women in my family, and I see how highly educated they are and that all of them have careers and have jobs. So, I say that the system that allowed these women in my family to actually do that is a system that existed for many years.

Despite this fact, there is always wanting and hoping to improve and develop and do better. One major step that the government has taken is what I call the “women empowerment” decision, which included more educational opportunities for women, more job opportunities for women, more services by the different government departments for women, and the Labor Department has announced that they will pay a lot more attention to women’s employment than they did in the past. So, I foresee this resolution taking effect, and the results will be seen quickly.

SUSRIS: Can you give us a forecast on the political side of the reform question? How you see the situation developing in the next couple of years in Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I see improvements in all areas of life. For example, the social area. I have seen a lot more attention to the issue of child abuse than had happened in the past, and in the issue of domestic violence. Look at the changes that have taken place in the area of education and textbooks. Look at the testimony given to the Congress by Congressman Cunningham, who visited Saudi Arabia recently. He realized that textbooks in Saudi Arabia, including the changes made to them, are not what others are trying to portray them as. His testimony was quite positive.

Look at the attention we are paying to the issue of employment and job creation in Saudi Arabia, not only through economic development but also through the funds and organizations that are expected to pay more attention to the issue of placing more Saudis in the job market and lessen dependence from the expatriate labor market.

Look at the restructuring that we went through for charity organizations. Most are now obliged by law to direct their attention to domestic issues. All international charity work is done now through one organization, which coordinates all foreign charity work.

Look at the creation of the small and medium enterprises funding bank. That in my view will dramatically impact our society because of the sudden increase in monies that are being allocated for this matter.
The most recent thing that is happening in Saudi Arabia is the census. We are now going through and counting everyone in Saudi Arabia. I think that will affect the development projects and also the elections that I mentioned earlier.

The reason I listed all these things — and these in my view are the reform steps taken in the social area, — is because I wanted to demonstrate that these are not simple steps, which will have an impact in a couple of days. These are long-term steps that will impact the development of the whole country over many decades to come.

SUSRIS: Turning to economic reform , can you be more specific about the steps taken in the last five or 10 years to reform the economy in Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I think the area of the economy is the most comprehensive reform sector in Saudi Arabia. That reform is on three axes. One axis was the issuance of new laws and the upgrading or updating of other laws. So, in that area, we saw the labor law being rewritten. We saw the new law of insurance being issued. We saw the capital markets law being issued. And, a few other laws have been rewritten to accommodate the 21st-century. In the areas of laws, quite a bit of work has been done.

In another axis is the area of creation of new organizations to support economic development. We saw the creation of a Supreme Economic Council, which in my view is an excellent tool to fast-track economic decision-making. We saw the creation of the tourism organization. We saw the creation of the investment organization, and we saw the creation of a few other organizations. This was the second axis where organizations were created to support economic growth.

The third axis, which in my view is most important, is the opening up of new areas of investment, whether through privatization or completely new areas of investment. For example, we haven’t given the area of mineral resources too much attention in Saudi Arabia. In my view, we were just too busy with the production of oil.

So now, we are doing a lot of work there. The mining code is being rewritten, and the area of investment there is being opened for international and domestic investors. We are trying to develop our transport network, so we saw the opening up of air travel for privatization. We are seeing new roads being built either through privatization or by the government. The railroad is taking priority in Saudi Arabia. We also saw an increased interest in private-sector investment in higher education as well as in power generation and water desalination. A whole host of new areas are being opened up for investment in Saudi Arabia.

Privatization has been declared the policy of the government, and we see steps in that direction. I would like to see further steps taken, but I am satisfied that this is a policy that will impact our economy and further develop it.

SUSRIS: Can you just give us a snapshot of how the Supreme Economic Council and the Investment Authority are constituted, how they operate, and where they are going in the future?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Well, that can’t be done very quickly. But again, the Supreme Economic Council is a fast-track organization for economic decision-making. It puts together the organizations in charge of the economy in the government plus participation by the private sector. We have seen the Supreme Economic Council spearhead many of the important decisions, including the issue of privatization and the indigenization of the labor force. The Investment Authority [SAGIA] is there primarily to help foreign investors until they are up and going. I’m delighted at the performance of these two organizations.

SUSRIS: In what areas of economic development should American businesspeople have a better appreciation?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: In addition to all these other areas of investment that I mentioned earlier, and they are extremely important and have tremendous moneymaking possibilities, let me give you some numbers to indicate to you the economic or investment possibilities in Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia in 2003 exported a total of $100 billion worth of goods and imported $30 billion worth of goods. So, you can see the trade balance is very high in favor of Saudi Arabia. But, more importantly, the current account of Saudi Arabia in 2003 was positive at the level of $30 billion. This is the first time we have a positive current account that high in the past 20 years. I expect all these numbers to go even higher for 2004.

All these numbers tell you that there are plenty of investment opportunities. There is plenty of capital available for investment in Saudi Arabia and the business community of the United States needs to pay more attention to this.

SUSRIS: Are there any implications in the state of the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States that could impact business connections in the future?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I don’t think so. I think what we are going through now is a temporary phase that will end very soon, and there will be a better understanding between the two countries. But, what is most important, I think, for the business community of both countries who want to engage in business activities, is to recognize the future challenges that face Saudi Arabia. They need to be able to support these challenges so that we all succeed in overcoming them.

Some of these challenges include, as I mentioned earlier, the privatization process. I think we should continue in that area. We still need to resolve the issue of our public debt and the government budget deficit. Although this is being taken care of to a large extent by the increased oil prices, we don’t expect this to be the way we deal with these things.

The third challenge would be to create enough economic growth that should exceed the population growth of 3.5 percent. We should continue to achieve better economic growth. Our accession to the World Trade Organization [WTO], in my opinion, is a very important matter that should be looked at very closely by both business communities. They should make use of the advantages that will come out of Saudi Arabia’s accession to the WTO. Of course, consider the issue of improved cooperation between Saudi Arabia and the other GCC countries, in the form of the customs union that they now have in effect, and improved cooperation between Saudi Arabia and the other 21 Arab countries as a result of the free-trade zone that has been signed and will become effective early in 2005. These two things will create even more business opportunities.

SUSRIS: Thank you Usamah Al-Kurdi for speaking with us today. You’ve given us a great deal to think about in terms of the political, social and economic developments in Saudi Arabia.

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Thank you very much. I hope this is useful for your readers.

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About Usamah Al-Kurdi

A member of Saudi Arabia’s Consultative (Shura) Council, an important force for change in the Kingdom, Usamah Al-Kurdi served as Secretary General of the Council of Saudi Chambers of Commerce from 1997 – 2001. He is a Member of the Board of Saudi Arabian Airlines and was Vice President of the Saudi Consulting House, a forerunner of the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA). Mr. Al-Kurdi also served on the boards of Saudi Arabia’s National Industrialization Company and the Royal Commission on Jubail and Yanbu (industrial cities).

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By and About Usamah Al-Kurdi on SUSRIS:

Attack on U.S. Consulate General in Jeddah

Editor — Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:39:25 +0000

Ambassador James C. Oberwetter: First let me express our condolences to the families of the five locally employed staff of the Consulate and one local guard employed by the United States, who all died in the line of duty. Our deepest sympathies to their families and to the ten injured locally employed staff. To the Saudis who also experienced injuries during the firefight at the gate and on the premises, our best wishes of full and speedy recovery. To the Saudi security forces who freed the compound from the five terrorists — three of them were killed, two wounded — our special thanks. I also thank our diplomatic security team and our regional security team at the Consulate who should receive great credit for saving many lives.

This morning I toured the facility with our Consul General. While our gates were breached, the Consulate stands and is in working order. It should reopen for business within a few days. The column of smoke that was noticed in all the press reports was from a single structure on the compound, a temporary marine house which caught fire. The building stands next to the Chancery that came under attack and the cause of the fire is unknown. No marines were in the house. Instead, the marines were performing heroically just as you would expect them to do, protecting the Chancery and the citizens who were inside. Most of the American staff was located inside the chancery building, which is the main building on the compound. The chancery building was not breached but it was attacked. There are many other stories of heroism about the events of yesterday. Heroism by our locally employed staff. Heroism by the marines, and by other American citizens, and heroism by the Saudis who were guarding our gates and took casualties in doing so. Our investigation is now under way. As President Bush said in comments yesterday, “The war on terrorism goes on. It will take time but the efforts are succeeding. It will take time.” That concludes my opening statement.

Question: Are the Saudis doing a sufficient job in providing security for U.S. diplomats in Saudi Arabia?

Ambassador Oberwetter: I think that the Saudi government is doing all that it can. At a time like this when there are terrorists on the loose, you are always looking for additional security from any direction you can get it; whether it is from our security teams or Diplomatic Security teams, or from the local host country. But when we have asked for help we have received it. In my view the Saudis are doing a good job at protecting us in spite of the occurrence at the Consulate yesterday.

Question: After the recent attacks on U.S. interests in Saudi Arabia, I want to know if you are going to ask the Saudi government for more security for Americans? Are you planning to move the Consulate?

Ambassador Oberwetter: We have no plans to move the Consulate from its present location. This afternoon, Prince Mitab of the Saudi Arabian National Guard called on the Consul General and me at the Consulate, and in the Chancery building. At that time we thanked him for the work that was done, in terms of freeing the Consulate. We have also asked him for some additional security for a temporary period of time. I will not go into details of what that involves, but I am confident that he will provide that security. We will also be taking other steps to protect the Consulate and the compound and those steps are under way at this time. When we talk about security matters we do not go into details about what we are doing.

Question: A question to the Consul General, can you give us an account of what happened to you personally? And a question for both of you, how long were all the American diplomats held in the facility?

Consul Gina General Abercrombie-Winstanley: For me it went very well in that the security defenses that we have in place were successful as they should have been. I heard gunfire outside my office. Our regional security officers did what they were supposed to do: went on alert. All American staff, myself included, were lead to what we consider a safe area within the Consulate, within the Chancery building. At that time we were in touch with our Embassy in Riyadh and others, as we helped make arrangements for getting control, and for getting the terrorists off the compound.

Question: How worried were you?

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: How worried? Well, it is not good to hear gunfire outside your office. But I did have complete faith in the security of the building. The defenses that we have in place are very impressive indeed and did exactly what they were supposed to do. I was certainly worried — it’s not a good thing — but I did not ever doubt that it would be resolved in a manner that would guarantee the safety of most of the people in the Consulate. Of course we are devastated at the loss of our colleagues, completely devastated, but sometimes such things do happen.

Ambassador Oberwetter: And I’ll respond to that as well. Obviously the events of yesterday show a need for improvement. The U.S. Consulate here has undergone improvement over the past several months in terms of its security. We’ll be examining in the course of our investigation what additional steps need to be taken to secure the compound. The State Department has an ongoing program identifying Consulate buildings, Embassy buildings and other American facilities around the world that need additional security measures. I am sure we’ll be engaged with them to talk about additional needs here in the Kingdom. And finally, we have a very good relationship with the government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, when it comes to matters such as security. We work with them constantly to improve that relationship. I believe that over the time that I have been here I have seen a great improvement in the ability of the Saudis with respect to security matters. But, as so many in the United States have said before, we have to be right all the time, 24 hours a day, without fail. It’s very difficult to do. But we are constantly upgrading our security at our facilities.

Question: Radical websites said on the Internet yesterday that some terrorist organizations had sent the United States a message and there is intention by these organizations to continue attacking U.S. interests in the Kingdom. Has the Embassy in the Kingdom received anything to corroborate these threats? Other websites also mentioned yesterday that this incident will have an effect on the Americans in the Kingdom and push them to leave. Is there any truth to this? And will Washington respond to these threats, that events similar to what happened at the American Consulate here may take place elsewhere?

Ambassador Oberwetter: I think that in answer to the last part of the question, President Bush has spoken very well on this matter: the relationship between the United Sates and the Kingdom is secure. We will be working together in our fight against terrorism. The war continues. We intend to remain here and continue to do our work with the government. We have many Americans who are in this country doing important work for this Kingdom in a variety of fields, whether it be the oil and gas ventures that are ongoing, or whether it be taking care of the airplanes that are flying the public. There are many ways and many Americans that are helping to keep this relationship very strong. It is worth noting that there are those who want to divide us from one another. They want to divide our two countries, and they’re working very hard to accomplish that, but we will not let them succeed.

Now, the Internet makes anybody capable of delivering threats. We monitor the Internet to see what kind of threats are there; the [Saudi] government does so, I’m sure, as well. And there are many threats that you find on the Internet. I don’t mean here, but anywhere around the world. So, we take notice of these things, we do our best to investigate to see whether or not these are serious threats. But the Internet is full of people threatening to do violence or harm to us or to our relationship and we mustn’t let them do that.

Question: There have been reports out of Manila that one of the maintenance men that was killed was a Filipino. There was no mention of this in your press statement. Does that agree with your understanding of events?

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: Yes. One of our staff was Filipino, and he has passed away.

Question: What are the benefits that will be provided to the families of those killed in this attack?

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: There are very specific benefits that are available to any employee of the U.S. Government. I am happy to say that I am not extremely familiar with all of them, because, I hope never to have this happen to anyone that works for me again. But the staff is working very hard right now to figure everything out. We’ve obviously done condolence calls to all the next of kin of all those who have passed, and we will be doing visits to those who are injured. So as I said, there’s a very specific set of benefits, but I cannot get into details right now.

Question: Ambassador, could you just clarify what the message is right now to the American community in Saudi Arabia. Does the embassy still strongly advise the American community to depart the Kingdom?

Ambassador Oberwetter: Yes, Americans do play a role. But it is worth noting that the State Department issued notice many months ago right now, urging Americans to leave the Kingdom. The warning remains in place. The events of the last day in effect reinforce the decision to issue that statement of warning. We look forward to a day when the situation in the Kingdom will allow us to pull down that notice and replace it. But this is clearly not the time.

Question: The Saudi press today reports that the personal driver of the Consul General was shot. Is that true? Is there any indication here that the attackers had previous knowledge of the identity of the personnel. And was the vehicle involved that used by the Consul General?

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: I can start by answering the second question, and the answer is no. As for the first part of the question, we have no way of knowing that. I think the answer is no. I think it was a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. As you know we lost five staff members from various sections of the Consulate, and others were wounded.

Question: During the heightened state of alert that the you’ve been on here because of the possibility of attack, how come Consulate security was able to be breached, and who is to blame?

Ambassador Oberwetter: Well, I think that using the word “blame” is the wrong way to go, and I think using the word “learn” is very appropriate here. Because it’s clear that some of these people have gone to school. By that I mean that they’re doing some work at looking at our procedures in terms of how cars enter that compound. There is a bit of news here that I think that people do not understand. They attempted to take a car into the compound. Our barrier gates worked. They exited the vehicle and were able to breach a gate that was closing behind the car that had preceded it. At least that is what it appears to us at this time. And so, we need to learn from that, and we need to take steps to correct any weaknesses in our fortifications.

Question: Can we just clarify the scenario. There was one consulate car pulling in, and they came up behind that?

Ambassador Oberwetter: Yes. That is correct. One car was pulling into the gate. Another car, a single car, in a far lane, slowly followed and quickly turned left to follow the car that had just entered the compound secure area. The terrorist car did not enter the compound. It was stopped by the barrier gate that had risen behind the vehicle that preceded it.

Question: (inaudible)

Ambassador Oberwetter: They exited the car. The terrorists exited the car and began to engage the local Saudi staff at the gate. They returned fire, and a great firefight broke out at the gate. Regrettably, the terrorists were not taken down there and were able to access the compound. Saudis took casualties there. In the firefight. And the terrorists proceeded into the compound. In the end, the terrorists, we believe, those that were killed, probably by our local guard staff, at least one, but it is unknown and subject to further investigation and the other two unknown, perhaps the Saudi forces were able to engage them and take them out. All of these are matters that will be investigated thoroughly so that we can find out exactly how that happened.

Question: But they were able to execute this through prior surveillance, that’s what you believe?

Ambassador Oberwetter: They clearly understood how our cars entered the compound and in my view had scoped it out.

Question: There were reports yesterday that two Americans, including one of the Vice Consuls at the Consulate, Monica Lemieux, were injured in this attack, and that she was seen on Palestine Street. Does your statement concur with this? And can you give us numbers about other American casualties.

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: Well, I can confirm to the extent that two American staff were lightly injured, and one of them is Monica. She’s lightly injured, and she’s up and around today.

Question: Is that right, the reports that her car got shot at?

Consul General Abercrombie-Winstanley: She was in the car, and she was not hit by gunfire. But they did indeed shoot at the car, and other passengers were shot, some time between exiting the car and finding someplace safer to be.

Source: U.S. Consulate, Jeddah

Letter from Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia to President Johnson – January 5, 1964

Editor — Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:36:32 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following history item is a letter of correspondence from Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia to President Johnson, which was written on January 5, 1964. The U.S. State Department’s translation moderates where necessary for clarity of some of the more flowery examples of Arabic style.

Letter from Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia to President Johnson
January 5, 1964

Your Excellency:

I have received with great pleasure Your Excellency’s letter dated 19 December 1963. I appreciate the heaviness of Your Excellency’s responsibilities at the present time following the tragic death of your great predecessor. I also fully appreciate the pleasant gesture represented by your personal interest in the relations between our two countries and your re-examination of the past and study of the future of these relations. I am firmly convinced that the strengthening of understanding between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United States of America is imperative and that frank exchanges of views between them is most desirable.

I in turn emphasize my sincere desire that the frank rapport which existed between the late President John F. Kennedy and myself still continue between Your Excellency and me. For such rapport would strengthen the friendly ties between us and be the means raising the relations between our two countries to new heights.

I share with Your Excellency the conviction that the relations between our two countries and peoples have not been confined to the mere utterance of words. These relations have often manifested themselves in deeds, facts and achievements which have filled the long history of relations between our countries–that history whose foundations were laid by his majesty, the late King ‘Abd al-Aziz and the late Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy; it is a history which continues to the present.

Your Excellency’s assurances that your only purpose in regard to Yemen is to protect Saudi Arabia’s integrity have given me great satisfaction. For my part I should like to explain very frankly that the guarantee of the safety of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is the single matter which dominates our thinking in these difficult circumstances. Without that safety we would not be able to devote all our efforts to attaining happiness for our people and to leading them in the path of progress that they might assume their place in the march of civilization and might attain the stature merited by their country’s time-honored significance as the recipient of divine inspiration and the fountain of light.

We fully realize that the present course followed by the UAR is benefiting no-one, and that the UAR is losing much after it caused, by its persistent acts of interference, numerous calamities and mishaps which have resulted in havoc being wrought upon thousands of the Yemeni people and in the devastation of their means of subsistence. It is our conviction that all these calamities have had no justification save the desire to satisfy deeply rooted arrogance and conceit.

I hope that Your Excellency will permit me to explain why I find it difficult to understand the viewpoint which holds that cutting off aid to the UAR would push it more dangerously in the direction of the Soviet Union. I have never been, nor will I at any time be, against the people of sister Egypt receiving aid from any quarter which wishes to offer it. But I am certain that Your Excellency discerns, as I do, the clear distinction between directing those aids towards their intended goal, namely the raising of the standard of living of the Egyptian people and directing it, indeed dedicating it, to the service of aggression and the imposing of calamities on others. As a country which loves peace and justice and always desires to spread them as widely as possible, we have exerted our maximum effort towards support of the United Nations. There is no greater proof of this than our favorable response to the mediation of your late predecessor manifested in our signing of the disengagement agreement. Your Excellency, of course, knows that I acceded to the agreement only after long discussions with your predecessor’s representative, Ambassador Bunker, and with your Ambassador, Mr. Hart. Those discussions embodied clear assurances that the United States of America would work for the implementation of this agreement in letter and spirit. It had never occurred to me that six months after the signing of the agreement, and eight months after we cut off aid to the Royalists, the situation in the Yemen would remain without any change worth mentioning. Neither did it occur to me to agree to the renewal of the agreement beyond the fourth of November last without there being conditions therein to terminate the Egyptian presence in the Yemen within a specific period or without its including the necessary guarantees for accomplishing that termination. The greater part of the people of sister Yemen are undergoing ordeals and great suffering while being denied even the means of subsistence. They are appealing to humanity at large to help remove aggression from their home. Indeed, they look up to Your Excellency’s efforts filled with prayer and hope that peace and safety will quickly return to their country.

We do not err when we consider that the only solution which is compatible with logic, justice and international law is to leave the Yemenis to decide for themselves the fate of their country in an atmosphere assuring them of all the necessary guarantees of their freedom to do so without external intrusions and in the absence from the country of any foreign forces.

Yet, in memory of your great predecessor and confident in Your Excellency’s efforts, and in order to prove our good intentions, we have agreed to extend the validity of the disengagement agreement for two months starting from the fifth of January. I have benefited greatly from the spirit of candor and friendship which Your Excellency has inaugurated. The sure confidence which I have in Your Excellency’s good intentions makes it incumbent upon me to cooperate with you truthfully and honorably, deeply believing in your personal friendship and support as well as the support of the friendly American people.

I express to Your Excellency my sincere good wishes and the good wishes of the Saudi people for your happiness and prosperity and that of the American people. I further wish Your Excellency every success.

Sincerely, Faysal

January 5, 1964

President Johnson’s letter is printed in Foreign Relations, 1961-1963, vol. XVIII, Document 389.

See Document 319ff.\[3] Not further identified.

Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964-66, POL SAUD-US. Secret; Priority; Limdis. No time of transmission is on the telegram. Repeated to Dhahran. Received on January 13 at 5:37 a.m. Passed to the White House at 10:15 a.m.

U.S. Department of State

A Conversation With Frances Meade, Author of Honey and Onions – A Life in Saudi Arabia

Editor — Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:33:59 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

Earlier this year the Saudi-American Forum, a companion Web site of the Saudi-US Relations Information Service, published a serialization of Honey and Onions by Frances Meade. It is a charming memoir of the early days of American expatriate life in the Kingdom. From the author’s forward:

There is an old Arabic proverb, yawm ‘asl wa yawm basl; “one day honey; one day onions,” that is to me the universal description of life. Certainly it characterizes my own and I can’t think of a more fitting title for a book that invites the reader to share my life in the Saudi Arabia of thirty years ago. That those years and the ones that have followed have been happy ones is self-evident; the honey has been very sweet and the onions surprisingly mild.
This is a personal memoir of the years before the economic boom that transformed the kingdom. My story is a preface to that period of tumultuous change, a backdrop against which the larger story of unprecedented development can be better appreciated. For those of us who lived through it, the metamorphosis of Arabia was a gradual evolution, but looking back over the years, we can see that it was a breathtaking leap into an unknown future.

We recently learned that a revised edition of Honey and Onions has been published and Mrs. Meade is working on a new book telling the complete story of her 33 years in Saudi Arabia. We were pleased to talk with her about her experiences in the kingdom and her observations on the state of US-Saudi relations.

This interview was conducted by telephone from her home in Arizona on November 30, 2004.

A Conversation With Frances Meade, Author of Honey and Onions – A Life in Saudi Arabia

SUSRIS: How did you come to be in Saudi Arabia?

Frances Meade: We went to Saudi Arabia in 1965 for 18 months and stayed for 33 years. It was to be an 18-month contract for my husband with an architectural and engineering company. They were designing and supervising the construction of the first highways. It sounded like a real adventure, and we were all very excited.

I wasn’t sure what I was going to be doing, but it was obvious from everything we had heard, women simply did not lead any kind of public life nor did they go to work. I made up my mind that I was going to spend the 18 months at home. Well, I found out what we heard was wrong. I wasn’t there a month before I was tapped to come to work at the international school that was opening that year. The international community numbered slightly over a hundred — the whole community, not the students. There were only 30 some students when the school opened.

SUSRIS: This was in Riyadh?

Frances Meade: Yes, in Riyadh. I soon heard about Queen Effat, one of the most dynamic Saudi women ever. Her efforts in education and in improving and enhancing the life of girls and women in Saudi Arabia were stunning examples. We discovered we could follow her example and do things that might not have been sanctioned by the Saudi government, but certainly permitted, like the school. It was not sanctioned at the time. Unfortunately, it had to be licensed some years later, and as a result, had to segregate the boys and girls into separate schools.

Incidentally, a few days ago, my daughter told me I was mentioned on my college’s list of “notable” alumnae. I thought, “How exciting, but what have I done?” So, I went online to look and discovered that I was there because I was the first woman to have become the principal of a boy’s school in Saudi Arabia. It made it sound as though the Saudi government had conferred this upon me, and of course, that was far from the truth. It just happened that when the school had to be divided, it was necessary for me to be the principal of both schools for financial reasons.

I have to say that I have never been treated more professionally in my life than by the Ministry of Education, which had never dealt with a woman principal before. I found it to be a rewarding experience — to know that in Saudi Arabia you are accepted for what your capabilities, your skills and your interests are. And, it was a good introduction that resulted in many long lasting relationships.

SUSRIS: Talk a little about the relationships between Americans and Saudi Arabians, not just professionally but socially as well, during those early years in the Kingdom.

Frances Meade: We were, of course, a very small foreign community, and everyone there was working for some branch of the Saudi government. They had Saudi colleagues with whom they were friendly, and when we were introduced to fellow foreigners, we were also introduced to their Saudi contacts. Suddenly, we had a circle of friends among Saudis that would be awfully hard to achieve now.

Present-day living, exclusive of the fact that there is a dreadful security situation now, doesn’t allow for such close contacts. After the boom began in mid-’70s, there were so many people coming into the country, who were essentially banding together in compounds, and they were walling themselves off from the rest of the city. There were people who literally spent a contract term of two or three years in the country and might never have met a Saudi, which is pretty sad. But, I think it’s inevitable when you have that kind of influx from a different culture.

When we arrived in 1965, we were a very small group. The Saudi world was open to us. The seclusion in later years among foreigners, among Americans, was self-imposed. I suppose from a purely financial point of view, it’s a lot cheaper when you bring in a lot of people to put them in one place and provide services for them than to do as we were all doing, living independently in various areas around the city. But, it does mean that you are withdrawn from everyday Saudi life and culture.

SUSRIS: What would you say were the most remarkable memories from those years before the boom of the 1970s?

Frances Meade: There’s no doubt that those of us who were there, and there were probably about 50 to 60 American families, actually total Americans, not families — we could sit down tomorrow, not having seen each other for the last 40 years and immediately pick up where we left off. There’s a bond in being a very small group of people in what was to us a completely alien culture.

You see, little was known about Saudi Arabia in the States in the 1960s. I didn’t even know, for example, when Dick said we were going to move to Jeddah — which was the original plan — where it was. He just said, “Jeddah,” and I automatically started to think, “Somewhere maybe in Yugoslavia?” It didn’t mean a thing, nor did it mean anything to the people we told about it.

There is a tremendous difference from then to now, since Saudi Arabia has become a global nexus. The period between was a dramatic change for the people we knew. It was not just the foreigners – ultimately, we were the only ones who remained of that original group — but also of the Saudis who were our friends.

In fact, their lives changed far more dramatically than ours did over the years. Many of them were young people, some recently graduated from universities in the States, who were coming back to work for the government in the various ministries. In a very short period of time, they became entrepreneurs — very, very successful entrepreneurs — in a climate that certainly encouraged entrepreneurship among the Saudis. So, their lives changed, their economic status changed, but it didn’t change our relationships, which I think is a very telling thing.

Other than the relationships, I think my fondest memories certainly are of the desert and the traveling that I was able to do because of my husband’s job.

SUSRIS: You mentioned in an early chapter of your book, Honey and Onions, that travel was relatively easy, as small as Riyadh was it didn’t take long to get out of town.

Frances Meade: Well, you just drove across country out into the desert. I enjoyed those drives, but we flew more often because the company had a small plane. So, I was able to go to places that were probably not otherwise accessible because before the roads, it would take days to travel by Land Rover on desert tracks.

It gave me an early opportunity to see, number one, what village life was like, and to have contact with some of the women, who were leading extraordinarily hard lives. They were literally going to the town well and carrying water back to their houses.

It was amazing to see the transformation during those early years. When I say early years, I mean 1965 to about 1970. In that short time, all those villages had been transformed, by the highways and by the thrust of the government’s investment in the villages and towns. They had clinics and schools. They began to get dependable electricity and running water before much of the development started in the cities themselves. It was remarkable to see the lives of these people so immensely improved.

SUSRIS: You eventually moved from Riyadh to Jeddah. Can you compare the two cities during that period?

Frances Meade: They were infinitely different. Jeddah was, after all, the diplomatic capital of the Kingdom at the time. You not only had the influx of foreign pilgrims during the Hajj season, but you also had an established international community of some size. Traditionally, Jeddah had always been, in terms of public life and social life, a far more open society. Of course, again, just the geographical location — there you are on the Red Sea. You’re living in a sub-tropical climate. All of those things made life there very different from life in Riyadh. Having said that, I’d also have to say that we were delighted three years later to go back to Riyadh. We preferred the desert climate anyway since we came from Arizona.

SUSRIS: How had Riyadh changed while you were away?

Frances Meade: It had improved. There was more housing available and more amenities. For me, it was a very exciting time because that’s when I became principal of the school. So, I had my own agenda in coming back to Riyadh.

In fact, I came back before my husband moved the company from Jeddah. I was by myself and had the experience of being a single woman living in Riyadh. Again, people were just wonderful to me. I started work immediately at the school on an emergency basis after the death of my predecessor. That was why I had come before the company moved.

I began to appreciate the kind of introspection that I think you need as a single person, regardless of gender, living in isolation in a restricted society. You have to make your own entertainment. Well, we did then. Remember, we didn’t have television and, obviously, no public entertainment of any kind. People were good about sharing books. You did a lot of reading. That was an interesting time for me, but it only lasted for about six weeks.

SUSRIS: What were the attitudes in Saudi Arabia toward America and Americans? It was a period of turmoil in the region — after the 1967 war. The relationships among the United States, Israel and the Arab world must have been on people’s minds. Was that reflected in anyway people were treated?

Frances Meade: Not at all. Of course, the 1967 war was a pretty sad event. But, it was amazing, in fact, how quickly the initial feelings of antipathy turned around. I found the Saudis to be a pragmatic people. They were really on the cusp of doing something dramatic in terms of the development of their own country and their own society. That is what really drove their attitude. They recognized what kind of assistance they needed to implement their plans and if the Americans were providing it — great. They appreciated what was needed, and it was a matter of self-interest and self-sufficiency that dictated their attitude towards Americans.

SUSRIS: When you say “Saudi Arabia” to many Americans, they may think of the oil embargo around the time of the 1973 war. Was the pragmatic Saudi outlook still there?

Frances Meade: The 1973 war was a very peculiar time. It did not in any way arouse the kind of interest and excitement that the 1967 war did. I remember sitting in my office at the school, when the secretary said that there was a Saudi man there to see me. I thought we might be having a little bit of a problem. He came in and sat down. But, it turned out he wanted a job for his wife at the school. There was no discussion about the war that was going on. It rather startled me because I expected at least a reference. It was an interesting little cameo.

SUSRIS: Was the nature of relationships changing as the expatriate community was growing?

Frances Meade: Not in the early ’70s. The period of the great build-up was from 1975 on, when you had a tremendous inundation not only of American companies but also of other foreigners as well. Toward the end of the 1970s, you began to sense a division between the Saudis and everybody else not in terms of liking or disliking one another but in purely social terms. In a sense, the Saudis put the wagons in a circle because they preferred their own society and their own culture. They could perceive that there was a certain threat to it with the number of foreigners coming in, and I think that was not an unreasonable perception. In any case, there was a certain reciprocity with the foreigners isolating themselves in compounds.

Interestingly, for those of us who were able to maintain our relationships with Saudis, it was really quite a dynamic time. I was always struck by the fact that the Saudis are so outspoken. I heard for years the conventional wisdom of what a repressive regime theirs was. I never found it to be so. You could be sitting at a dinner table next to someone you had never met before, and he could very well be expounding very freely on what he liked and disliked about his government.

I think that has always characterized my relationships with Saudis. They have always been extremely candid, especially with people they know. People I met there never appeared to feel that they were being oppressed by their government. “Oppressed” is probably not the best word, but I think that in the West, that is how it is portrayed — that you have a regime with everybody under their thumb. Saudis are very individualistic people. They are not easily kept under anybody’s thumb.

SUSRIS: Can you share some of your experiences in Saudi Arabia after the boom period began in the 1970s?

Frances Meade: Well, my perspective changed in the late 1970s when I left the school and went to work for the U.S. Information Service, which had established a very small office in Riyadh in addition to its school for English as a second language. It was a forerunner to the eventual move of the embassy to Riyadh from Jeddah. The ambassador began to spend time in Riyadh, although not in residence until 1984. In 1986, the diplomatic quarter was completed, and the current embassy building opened. But, before that, it was housed in a building downtown.

Being in Riyadh is was much like living in mini-Washington where everyone was somehow connected to the host government. My husband’s company, for example, operated on a contract with the Ministry of Communications, and his first job was as the company liaison to the government since the company headquarters were originally located in Jeddah. The government had a direct impact on all our lives as foreigners, so it was a constant topic of discussion, and we became very knowledgeable about its operations.

Now, working for the U.S. government, after having been part of the Saudi community for so long, made me turn around and look back, if you will, at the life I had been leading and the context in which I had been leading it with a slightly different eye. What I accepted as normal I was now seeing through a new American filter, and I began to realize how fast things were changing. First of all, there were, through my job, meetings with and access to people in the Saudi government at a level, which I had not enjoyed before. That was, of course, extremely interesting.

Eventually, I moved into protocol at the embassy, and we were flooded with visitors from the United States. There were congressional delegations everywhere you looked — back-to-back sometimes. It was an exciting kind of life. It gave me an exposure to an entirely different level of Saudi activity that I certainly had never had before and an opportunity to share my own experience with official visitors.

SUSRIS: Any stories from those visits?

Frances Meade: Yes. I made some discoveries. One was that when escorting the female half of a delegation, to the university or the museum, there would be a singular lack of ladies’ facilities in these exclusively male venues. I finally solved that problem by making a sign in English and Arabic that read, “Ladies.” In an emergency, I would just stick it on a door and then stand in front of it trying to look forbidding. It worked. There were mishaps too. The wife of one of the most distinguished members of the House of Representatives insisted on a close-up visit to a camel and was bitten in an extremely embarrassing area, much to her chagrin. And, wonderful events like the visit of the Challenger crew with whom Prince Sultan bin Salman had flown. I escorted Dr. Shannon Lucid to the magnificent party given in her honor by the prince’s mother at which we were entertained by women wearing the traditional costumes and performing the dances indigenous to the different areas of the Kingdom. It was a night when I was particularly proud to be an American watching the enthusiasm with which Dr. Lucid was greeted. The Saudi ladies obviously saw in her the possibilities for all women. We had some very interesting visitors including the Carters and the Bushes. I can’t say too much about Rosalyn Carter, who was one of the most professional and adaptable women I’ve escorted. I always found that the higher the status of the visitor, the easier they were to be kept to a schedule.

SUSRIS: How did Americans in these delegations react to the culture and life in the Kingdom?

Frances Meade: I remember very well the visit of Congressman Wilson of Texas who brought with him a group of Jewish businessmen, community leaders and their wives. They were people who really had their eyes opened I think. They knew little about Saudi Arabia before their trip, but having the opportunity to visit the country and talk to Saudis affected them. I had several letters after they left saying “Thank you,” and that it really gave them a different view of the Kingdom. This was rewarding because I think we are such slaves to the media that anything they want to hand us, we lap right up, but a firsthand encounter is the real thing.

SUSRIS: Official visitors were probably able to attend briefings and meetings that most media wouldn’t have been covering or that most Americans wouldn’t have been exposed to. Were there any other reactions you can tell us about?

Frances Meade: Yes, I think that is true. But, I used to make a particular effort to get visitors into the schools, for example, to see what was going on, and to meet the women I was talking about. And, I wanted to get them into social settings, not with the wives of the top-level people but with women who were doing interesting things or were housewives who were educated or educating themselves. There were many of those.

I can’t say enough about the capability of Saudi women. They’ve done some really remarkable things. They do it in a very low-key way because that is the way it is done, but they have achieved a great deal individually and as a group. The business about the election coming up and that women are going to be excluded from voting actually surprised me. Maybe I’m just out of touch, but when I was in Arabia last year, there was so much talk about it among women who were convinced that this was actually something that was coming to them that this edict is a little bit surprising. But, I don’t think it is the last word. I think ultimately, the vote will come for women.

This week, we got an annual report from the U.S.-Saudi Arabian Business Council. I thought it was very interesting that, listed among the Saudi Chambers of Commerce, the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce was the only one that now has a women’s division and lists the women who run it. So, again, these are incremental steps, but I think we ought to stand back a bit and accept a society that moves incrementally. After all, it did take a very long time in the United States. I think our expectations are a little high about a relatively young country, and I have great hopes for the things that women will ultimately achieve in Saudi Arabia.

Unfortunately, we in the West only see the picture of a veiled woman. I remember back in the ’60s, a Saudi friend, who was one of the first women to work for the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs saying, “Why are we talking about the veil? What do I care what I’m wearing when I am talking to the minister, and he’s listening to my advice.” Of course, that is it in a nutshell. We, I think, emphasize the wrong thing.

SUSRIS: What can be done to challenge these stereotypes, especially about women’s issues?

Frances Meade: One of the things I have been doing, in connection with the exhibitions of my Bedouin jewelry collection, is to speak to various groups. The exhibit is called “A Woman’s Treasure,” and the women I talk to are absolutely stunned to discover that the jewelry represents portable capital. It is something that belongs to women and represents what they own. Bedouins were traveling people. But, this belongs to a woman. Nobody else, not her husband, has a right to it. She is strictly in control. They are so shocked to imagine that this is possible. We go on from there to the kind of independence that women value and how it is reflected in their lives, particularly those who are very hardworking. Certainly, the nomadic tribes are hardworking.

SUSRIS: A significant amount of media attention has been focused on Saudi Arabia, especially after 9/11, and much of it has been negative. Are there any perceptions of Saudi Arabia that may be circulating that strike you as erroneous based on your experience in the Kingdom?

Frances Meade: The first thing that occurs to me is the prevalent notion that Saudi Arabians are an enemy or that they are out to get us. Now, this is based obviously on the participants in 9/11. We probably would not say the same thing about the Italians if there had been 15 Italians on the planes. We wouldn’t lump them altogether as evil people. We would say these are 15 terrible people who happen to be Italian. But, somehow, the entire Kingdom and its people have become the objects of our antipathy.

I can only judge by my own experience, and I was there about this time last year. We met not only with officials but also with friends and with people in public places like the souk. What I saw was that people are simply leading their lives. The only real difference that I sensed in this atmosphere — other than the physical presence of checkpoints throughout the city — is a pervasive thread that runs through everybody’s conversations of wondering what is going to happen next. I don’t think you find this in people who are going to do the bad deed. These are the people who are worried about what’s going to be done to them again and who is going to do it — the week after we left, terrorists blew up a major compound in Riyadh. Meanwhile, Americans here are making enemies out of people who are victims in much the same way that we are. You just don’t know when the other shoe is going to drop.

SUSRIS: In a recent interview, Wyche Fowler, who served as Ambassador to Saudi Arabia from 1996 to 2001, told us many Arabs are frustrated and resentful about the U.S. government’s policies in the region and that he was worried that those feelings might be transferred from the American government to the American people. Do you see that happening in Saudi Arabia?

Frances Meade: I think the Saudis have always — certainly in my experience — recognized the value of individual foreigners rather than their governments. I particularly remember when during the 1967 war when tempers were pretty high in general, there was no problem for us as individuals with our Saudi friends.

I think that for this present generation, it’s quite possible that we are going to maintain the kind of relationship that we have seen over the years, but I worry a great deal about the coming generation. For one thing, they are not going to experience living and studying in the United States. Their predecessors came here in droves for education. Since the Saudi university system burgeoned during the 1980s, many stopped coming for undergraduate work, but they still came to study in American graduate schools. Sadly, those who still come for graduate work are gradually being turned away because it is so difficult to get visas.

What are we going to see when this generation takes over with a very narrow vision of life because they have gone from kindergarten through advanced degrees in their own country and within their own culture? They may only have seen the Western world firsthand on holiday, which is probably not the best way. They know that even if they wish to come here for higher education, they can’t do it. This does not augur well for the American-Saudi relationship, individually or governmentally — it can’t possibly. It’s a major concern.

SUSRIS: What’s your read on business-to-business ties? Are American businesses still enthusiastic about Saudi Arabia or are they concerned about the security situation?

Frances Meade: It’s hard to say. Obviously, American companies are continuing to work there. I think they are finding it harder to get people to go. I was doing consulting work for Lucent, cross-cultural training for their employees going to Saudi Arabia. Well, that has completely dried up.

I just don’t think people are encouraged at all by American companies to go to Saudi Arabia. I can understand why. The present climate is pretty difficult to deal with. Americans who are living there and who have been living there, of course, adapt. This is life as it is lived. Externals may change, but your life goes on just the same. But, that is a hard sell for an American family. Now, you may be getting American men on bachelor status. I am sure there are fewer and fewer American families that are going.

Certainly, the American school is a barometer with a student population predominantly of Asian and Middle Eastern students. So, you can tell in what direction things are going. It doesn’t speak very well for our future there.

SUSRIS: Are you still in touch with the school?

Frances Meade: Yes. In fact, the school celebrated its 40th anniversary this year. I was asked to send a video describing what the school was like in its early days. They sent me some wonderful videos in return. It was a delightful exchange.

Its name has changed again. It was originally the Riyadh International Community School, then the Saudi Arabia International School-Riyadh, and now it is the American International School – Riyadh.

SUSRIS: In summing up, where we are in the people-to-people relationship?

Frances Meade: My biggest concern is the younger generation. I think there is no question that there is going to be a division. There has to be.

As I mentioned earlier, when I went to Saudi Arabia in 1965, I didn’t even know the names of the cities. It was just a remote place that had no connection to me. If you transpose that, you have young Saudis who know all about the United States from television, but it’s a remote country that means nothing to them if they have never been there. There’s going to be this whole new generation without the kind of experiences and relationships we’ve had in the past.

In a sense, it is the human face of America that they are missing. This is what many of the leaders in the present-day government enjoyed. They understand that there are real people not just a country and a government on the other side. It’s exactly the same as we felt in Arabia — the people connection. It’s very sad to contemplate really, because Saudi Arabia is a country that has come so far in such a short time. To see it isolated from us means that a great deal of time, energy and enthusiasm on the part of many Americans who helped in bringing about that development is being lost and forgotten. It’s sad to see it slip away.

SUSRIS: Your book, Honey and Onions, when was it written? Tell us about it.

Frances Meade: It was written in 1996 and published in Arabia. There were a number of things that I did not put in the book because — not that they were scandalous — they could possibly offend some sensibilities. One must take that into consideration.

In the revision, I have added some anecdotes that might be humorous and some that might be rather revealing of the context of the society. It’s nothing dramatic, I assure you, but I had so many requests for it that I figured, “Okay, why not?”

I’m bogged down as I have been for the past six years in trying to finish the other book, and in the meantime, I thought that this one might probably fill a gap.

SUSRIS: What’s the other book?

Frances Meade: The other book will attempt to cover the whole period of our time in Saudi Arabia. Interestingly enough, it was 33 years, which is the cycle of the Islamic calendar. I hadn’t quite realized it until we were getting ready to leave, and I suddenly thought, “Good heavens! It’s Ramadan again. That’s where it was when we came here.” I think there is something to be said for that particular cycle, which of course was so dramatic in terms of development, and I feel very lucky to have lived through it.

SUSRIS: Well, that sounds like a wonderful project. So, the Honey and Onions that is available now is a revision with new material?

Frances Meade: Yes.

SUSRIS: Earlier, you talked about exhibits. Can you tell us more about the “Arab Americans in Arizona” exhibit?

Frances Meade: It’s fascinating. It traces the arrival and the blossoming of some very prominent Arab American families, who have been highly successful here. It’s basically divided into the different phases of their experience. Starting with the arrival phase, there is wonderful documentation about people’s visas, the papers that were needed to get here and how they arrived.

Then, there is the development period when they went into various business ventures and what they accomplished. They even have a shopping cart from the first supermarket owned by an Arab American. It is now one of the largest supermarket chains in Arizona.

There is a section on tradition and culture, and religion is folded into that. My contribution to this is the Bedouin jewelry, costumes and various artifacts. I’ve been delighted to be part of this because I think it is such a worthwhile thing to do, especially now. Let’s hear it for the Arab-Americans who really made it here and enriched our community with what they brought with them from the Middle East.

The exhibit runs until April at the Mesa Southwest Museum in Mesa, Arizona.

SUSRIS: This has been a wonderful conversation. These are the hard to come by insights that Americans need to hear more about. Do you have any final thoughts on the U.S.-Saudi relationship?

Frances Meade: When you think about it, the relationship almost follows the curve of development, which peaked and started falling off with the decline in oil prices in the 1990s. At the same time, this new curve of hate and bigotry seemed to ascend.

It’s just a very sad thing because certainly the Kingdom is more than oil. It’s got some awfully bright people and some people with good instincts in terms of what they would like the country to be. We are almost at an impasse now wondering which way it is going to go. Clearly, the economy is on an upswing with the higher oil prices, but I don’t think that is going to reverse the other trend.

It’s hard to know how it all will work out. I am still willing to place a bet on the royal family’s sustaining their position and influence. Their downfall has been predicted for so long that I think it has become the automatic response of the media to any Saudi problem.

I don’t place any bets at all on the long-range attitudes of “us” and “them” toward one other. That’s a little bit pessimistic perhaps, but it may be realistic too.

The greatest contribution that anybody can make to improving the relationship is to bring people over there, sit them down and let them see Saudi Arabia as the National Council [on US-Arab Relations] has been doing for so many years. For myself — and my only expertise is my 33 years in the Kingdom — I don’t believe it will slide into being the enemy’s camp. People are people, and the ones that I know and appreciate are still doing constructive things that enhance their own society. I guess that’s about as much as anyone can say at this stage of the game. It’s a difficult world.

As trading partners, we really don’t wish to lose them. We share a whole range of interests — security, energy and their influence in the Islamic world. It’s mind-boggling how people can continue to focus on things that should be below the radar but are brought to the forefront to tear the relationship apart.

We should also recognize that a country can be its own worst enemy in its public pronouncements. This goes for us as well. If there were a foot-in-mouth contest, I think it might be a draw.

Related Links:

A Woman’s Treasure: Bedouin Jewelry of the Arabian Peninsula — The Bead Museum

A Woman’s Treasure: Bedouin Jewelry and Artifacts of the Arabian Peninsula — Exhibits USA

Experience Saudi Arabia with Fran Meade

“Glendale exhibit mines meaning of beads” — East Valley Tribune

Biography of Richard Meade – Scottsdale, Arizona — Aramco Expats

Upcoming Exhibits: “Arab Americans in Arizona” — Mesa Southwest Museum [PDF]

About Frances Meade

Frances Meade is an American who has lived in Saudi Arabia from 1965 to 1998. Born in New York, she and her family moved to Arizona in the ’50s and still call it home. She has a degree from Mount Holyoke College and has written and edited educational texts as well as a monthly magazine column.

Honey and Onions: A Life in Saudi Arabia

Editor — Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:31:36 +0000

Honey and Onions: A Life in Saudi Arabia
Publisher’s Book Summary

Frances Meade lived in Saudi Arabia from 1965 to 1998. She and her husband and two daughters exchanged their desert life in Arizona for another desert land when they had the opportunity to transplant themselves to Arabia for an eighteen-month adventure that was to last thirty-three years. This was not the Arabia of the oil companies nor the high tech country of today.

Hers was the experience of Riyadh, the capital, in the days before paved roads, telephones, and dependable electricity and water. Her story opens a window onto a culture much misunderstood by westerners.

How the family adjusted to an alien way of life and became a part of it is told with humor and an intimate understanding of a people and a country that are constantly in the news today. Originally published in 1996 in Saudi Arabia, this revised edition is even more timely in 2004.

Click here for ordering information.

Book Reviews for Honey and Onions: A Life in Saudi Arabia

“A charming and humorous book that will awaken nostalgia among those who have lived or traveled in the Middle East .. But it may make even livelier and more informative reading for new generations of people living as guests in someone else’s land.” — Richard H. Curtiss, The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs

“The book’s title, Honey and Onions originated from a popular Arabic proverb, ‘One day honey, one day onions’ .. ‘That is to me the universal description of life,’ [the author] explains .. So many books have been written about the boom years and the country’s gigantic leap into the 21st century as if the past has no value .. The book brims with interesting descriptions and humorous anecdotes .. Frances Meade has the ability to bring back the warmth, the liveliness, the tempo of those years of the Riyadh of the sixties.” — Lisa Kaaki, Arab News

Additional Links:

Click here to see photos of Frances Meade’s Bedouin jewelry collection on display in the “Arab Americans in Arizona” exhibit at the Mesa Southwest Museum.

Experience Saudi Arabia with Fran Meade — Frances Meade’s personal Web site

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Frances Meade is an American who has lived in Saudi Arabia since 1965. Born in New York, she and her family moved to Arizona in the ’50s and still call it home. She has a degree from Mount Holyoke College and has written and edited educational texts as well as a monthly magazine column.

Arab Americans in Arizona

Editor — Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:29:31 +0000

Arab Americans in Arizona: Stories, Traditions, Experiences

This exhibition explores the migrations of Arabic-speaking peoples to Arizona since the latter part of the 19th century, and examines why different nationalities from the Middle East chose to come to Arizona, whether they were seeking new opportunities or escaping hardships in their native lands.

Click here for more information about this exhibit.

Program schedule of events.

Below are pictures from the “Arab Americans in Arizona” exhibit. Some of these pictures feature pieces from Frances Meade’s Bedouin jewelry collection, which is currently on display at the Mesa Southwest Museum as part of the exhibit. Click on the thumbnail images below to view the full-size pictures.

ABOUT THE MESA SOUTHWEST MUSEUM
Beginning as a 3,000-square-foot room full of Arizona artifacts in May, 1977, the Mesa Southwest Museum is now an 80,000-square-foot facility with a budget of just under $2 million. The museum features a multitude of exhibits representing southwestern natural and cultural history.

Click here for more information about the museum.

A Strong Relationship is the Only Path Interview with Usamah Al-Kurdi Part 1

Editor — Thu, 09 Dec 2004 18:43:38 +0000

Editor’s Note:

Engineer al-Kurdi’s interview with SUSRIS is provided in two parts. Today we feature his comments on the relationship. Next week we will conclude with his interview on the progress of reforms in Saudi Arabia.

A Strong Relationship is the Only Path
Interview with Usamah Al-Kurdi
Part 1

Washington, DC
September 16, 2004

SUSRIS: We’re talking today with Usamah Al-Kurdi. We thank you for taking time to share your views with our readers. Can we start with your general appraisal of the current state of the U.S.-Saudi relationship?

Usamah Al-Kurdi

Usamah Al-Kurdi: The relations between Saudi Arabia and United States over the many decades have served the interests of the United States and the interests of Saudi Arabia as well as the interests of the Middle East in general. The two countries cooperated in critical areas — on political issues, energy market stability and many other areas — that needed to be addressed in the Middle East and the world.

There is no doubt that the relationship is going through some phase of re definition and needs to be evaluated even further, especially in light of the events in the past few years after the 11th of September. What this phase needs I think is an understanding from both sides as to the importance of this relationship again in regards to the interests of the world and the interests of the Middle East in particular. But also, we need to keep in mind that the two countries do not have an alternative but to have an excellent relationship. Whatever voices on the two sides that try and say otherwise — we need to recognize that these people do not address the interests of both countries and are not acting on the facts.

SUSRIS: The 9/11 attacks and the events that followed have all resulted in an intensive examination of the relationship, and a backlash that continues through today. Did 9/11 permanently damage the relationship?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Well, I see the damage that occurred as a result of the 11th of September, but it is not permanent. There is no alternative for both countries to continuing this important relationship on a solid footing. It is in the interests of the world. The events of the 11th of September, in my view, did require that this relationship be examined to make sure it actually serves the interests of the two countries.

Part of the damage to the relationship has come from erroneous and misleading claims. I would especially note the results of more than one committee in the United States and elsewhere regarding Saudi Arabia’s link to terrorism and terrorism financing. The independent commission of 9/11 and the Congress commission on the same subject and the OECD committee on financial dealings have all confirmed that Saudi Arabia was not connected to supporting the terrorists that committed the 11th of September or any other terrorist acts. Despite these findings people continue to be mislead otherwise. That worsens the damage.

SUSRIS: There continue to be critics in the United States who feel that Saudi Arabia is not doing enough in the war on terror. How do Saudis react to the continued criticism?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Well, it actually makes many Saudis, such as myself, worry about the agenda of these people who want to see bad relations between Saudi Arabia and the United States. We still see accusations linking of Saudi Arabia to terrorism, despite tangible conclusions of the committees I mentioned, despite repeated statements from President Bush and members of his Administration, that Saudi Arabia is a solid partner in the war on terrorism.

What I have noticed is that the negative reviews typically come through media coverage of Saudi Arabia. But, I believe the Congress and the government of the United States understand the true facts of Saudi Arabia’s commitment to a safe world and its condemnation of all terrorist acts.

SUSRIS: You travel often to the United States, and you meet many Americans. What do you think is the area of greatest misunderstanding by Americans of the relationship, and of Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I have noticed that events in Saudi Arabia, like the latest reform steps are not recognized and sufficiently understood in the United States. I blame ourselves for that.

We need to be more transparent and more forthcoming with these changes to let the American people, the American government and the Congress know about these reforms that are taking place in Saudi Arabia. Having a better understanding of what Saudi Arabia is really all about is important to the relationship.

SUSRIS: Since 9/11 travel between the US and Saudi Arabia has become more difficult. Americans are told by the State Department that Saudi Arabia is not a safe place to go, and Saudis are having difficulty getting visas to come to the United States. How has that impacted the relationship and the understanding on both sides?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Well, on my side, I appreciate the traumatic events that took place in the United States on the 11th of September. I appreciate the need of the Americans to take some of the steps they have taken. I remember when the first terrorist attack took place in Saudi Arabia years ago and how I felt about the loss of life and the fact that terrorists succeeded in exploding bombs in my country, committing terrorist acts.

So, I appreciate the American response to the 11th of September. This is one of the reasons why I said earlier that I don’t think there will be a permanent impact. Eventually, there will be more understanding as to what has happened in the United States and more recognition of the relationship.

The single, most important issue that I think might have a long-term impact on our relations is the issue of visas for students. I have heard comforting words from American officials as to the fact that they don’t see this continuing for a long time. One of the most important reasons why Saudi Arabia and the United States had a good understanding over the past few decades was the fact that we had quite a few students going to universities in the United States. If that interruption continues, and I doubt it would, then we will have problems. But again, I believe that these restrictions will not continue for a long time, and I think we will get back to normal on that issue pretty soon.

SUSRIS: The military-to-military ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia have always been an important component of the bilateral relationship. Can you comment on the current military-to-military relationship, and how Saudis view the U.S. military forces in the region?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: The fact is that the level of the military presence of the United States in Saudi Arabia has always been minimal, restricted to training and need for maintenance and operations of some of the equipment and facilities built by the Americans or brought by Saudi Arabia.

When one talks about the American presence in Saudi Arabia, it’s not like we have 100,000 soldiers on Saudi soil. The presence has always been, as I said, in terms of maintenance and training.

The reason that is so is because we have placed a lot of emphasis on training and educating our own staff and military personnel, which meant that we can depend more on ourselves. So, the increase or decrease of a minimal presence doesn’t really pose any major difference or change in the relationship.

Operation Southern Watch [deployment to Prince Sultan Air Base] was a decision by the United Nations, and Saudi Arabia obliged. Officials in both countries are satisfied with the level of cooperation. Then we have other individuals and institutions who thrive on being skeptical about the cooperation between the two countries. I am of the opinion that maybe they should be looking at what we are actually doing together.

SUSRIS: What concerns do people have in Saudi Arabia about the current U.S. military deployments in the region, in Iraq, and the potential for conflict with Iran, and other areas that remain unstable?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Like all nations around the world, not only nations in the Middle East, there is concern about the military movements of the United States — the invasion of Iraq and the invasion of Afghanistan and the military position that they see the United States taking.

Traveling around the world in the last few months, it was easy for me to realize that the United States is losing a lot of friends, again, not only in the Middle East but also around the world. In my view, the United States needs to pay more attention to something like that.

SUSRIS: How do Saudi Arabians react to negative comments made about the Kingdom in connection with our presidential campaign season?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: In my view, this is campaign rhetoric. I actually expected something like this to happen. I’m not surprised by the fact that it is happening.

I think the dust will settle. The true nature of the need for these two countries to cooperate will emerge. Of course, Saudis follow the election campaigns in the States, and there is quite a bit of coverage in the Saudi media. But, there is also a high level of understanding of what is going on in the United States. When Senator Kerry refers to dependence on Saudi oil, the response is, “What alternative does he have?”

The reason the United States needs to reduce its dependence on Middle Eastern oil is that there are problems that, to a large extent, may be resolved by the United States. If the United States resolves the issue of Iraq and the Israeli issue, then there will be no problems for the United States as far as dependence on Middle Eastern oil, especially when one knows that not Russia, not Western Africa, not Central Asia, not the North Sea are going to provide sufficient resources for not only the United States but also for the world as far as oil is concerned.

This is one of the most important reasons why I say that the two countries have no alternative but to have good relations and cooperate well.

SUSRIS: You mentioned Israel as well as Iraq. How do Saudi Arabians currently view the relationship between the United States and Israel and its relationship to the Arab world?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: There is no doubt in the mind of Saudis that Israel enjoys the unlimited support of the United States. All Saudis feel that this is a true statement and that the United States needs to play a more balanced role in the Middle East if it wants to resolve this issue. But, again, resolving this issue, in my opinion, is dependent on the political environment here in Washington. Of course, as far as Iraq is concerned, there are a lot of ill feelings about the fact that the United States had to invade Iraq, which is the same way many Americans are thinking.

SUSRIS: Shifting gears a little bit — business-to-business relationships between the United States and Saudi Arabia — given your background as a businessman, you have special insight as to how the trends have gone up and down in the relationship and the business connections between our two countries. How would you describe the atmosphere for business relationships between our countries?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: Well, it hasn’t been doing too good in the past three years since the 11th of September, again as a result of, particularly, the visa situation.

The overall general environment between the two countries — I don’t think again, as I said earlier, that this will continue or be a permanent fact — has been affected by the developments between the two countries and actually the development in the world in general.

For example, we have seen the trade between Saudi Arabia and the United States go up in 2003 less than the level of growth of trade between Saudi Arabia and Europe, Saudi Arabia and China, and Saudi Arabia and Japan. Despite the overall growth in Saudi trade, the growth of the trade between Saudi Arabia and the United States has been less than the growth with other countries, but not by big numbers. Maybe, it has been affected by the fact that in earlier years, there were huge contracts that needed to be fulfilled. I do not think this is a trend that will continue.

SUSRIS: With the current revenues and a budget surplus resulting from the high price of crude oil, do you see that the business environment will improve for American business people looking for opportunities in Saudi Arabia?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I think I would leave that to the American business people to recognize the opportunity. In that regard, let me tell you that a [in September 2004], the government has announced that they will use about 60 percent of the budget surplus to pay the public debt, which is by the way all domestic debt.

About 40 percent is going to be used for development projects in the education, health, roads, the building of schools and universities, and also in the area of housing. We have a large sum of money for this purpose, something like $3 billion will be going to the issue of housing. There will be money going to stimulate job creation. About $1 billion is being allocated for the use by the Credit Bank. The Credit Bank basically, in its new law recently approved by the Consultative Council, would address the issue of small and medium-side enterprises and so hopefully will create many jobs in the next few years.

SUSRIS: Finally, talking about the future of the U.S.-Saudi relationship, what do you see as ways that the relationship can be strengthened by both sides?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I think we should extend the scope of the contact between the two countries, definitely but not limited to governments, but also civil societies, to educational institutions, academic institutions, Congress and the Consultative Council, and the public in general.

The contacts between the two countries, I think, should be expanded to include all different walks of life so that we can create more understanding of the United States in Saudi Arabia and of Saudi Arabia in the United States.

The other area I believe can be strengthened is more attention to the issue of business. I would like to see more American businessmen visiting Saudi Arabia and more Saudi businessmen visiting the United States to try and come up with more business dealings.

In the light of the fact that economic growth in Saudi Arabia last year was 6.4 percent and is expected to be between seven and eight percent in 2004; in light of the fact that there has been a dramatic increase in the funds available for investment in Saudi Arabia because of the increased oil sales; in light of the fact that the government of Saudi Arabia opened up many different new areas of investments for Saudi and foreign investors; I say that this is perfect timing for the business communities in these two countries to recognize the opportunities posed in Saudi Arabia and to benefit from them.

SUSRIS: Are there any ways that the people-to-people ties can be improved? Are there steps underway on either side that you see that are showing positive results?

Usamah Al-Kurdi: I haven’t seen any steps actually taken place. If we resolve the visa issue as soon as possible, I’m talking about tourist visas and others in this case, I think that will be a major step forward.

SUSRIS: Thank you Usamah Al-Kurdi for speaking with us today. You’ve given us a lot to think about regarding the nature and the current situation in U.S.-Saudi relations.

Usamah Al-Kurdi: You’re welcome.

***

About Usamah Al-Kurdi

***

By and About Usamah Al-Kurdi on SUSRIS:

Keeping Cool about Jeddah By Anthony H. Cordesman

Editor — Thu, 09 Dec 2004 17:41:23 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The terrorist strike against the US Consulate in Jeddah on December 6, 2004 fed into a 24 hour-plus news cycle of reporting that examined the event itself — was it a success, a failure, or both at once?; the commitment and performance of Saudi Arabia in the war on terrorism; the vulnerability of the world’s energy market to terrorism in the Arabian Peninsula; and so on. Ignored by the media for many months has been the continued dedication of Saudi security forces in capturing and killing terror cell members and the continuous, quiet exemplary performance of US Marines and diplomatic security personnel charged with protecting American embassies and consulates around the world.

In such a media environment, Dr. Anthony Cordesman’s call for “careful perspective” in evaluating this incident is appreciated. We are pleased to share his “Keeping Cool about Jeddah” with you today.

Keeping Cool about Jeddah
By Anthony H. Cordesman

The attack on the U.S. consulate in Jeddah needs to be kept in careful perspective. It is a tragic event. Innocent foreign employees died, caught up in an attack on Americans. Saudi security forces died protecting the consulate, and some were wounded. It also, however, is the kind of attack that the world is going to have to get used to. No country that is relatively open, where people move freely into public buildings, and where terrorists can make easy gains by attacking such targets is going to be able to stop all such attacks nor prevent some from being successful.

All anyone has to do in the United States, the rest of the West, and most of the Middle East is look out of a window. Even protected public buildings are not fortresses. They are not designed to halt frontal assaults with explosives and automatic weapons. Only a few are far enough from public streets to stop a large car or truck bomb. Most are vulnerable to infiltration and sabotage.

The U.S. consulate in Jeddah was no exception. It was well protected by public facility standards, and had three layers of protection consisting of the Saudi police, Saudi National Guard and security, and U.S. Embassy security forces and Marine Guards. It had security barriers and they kept the consulate properly secured, though they could not stop suicidal attackers from having some success and from entering the Marine residency.

At the same time, the consulate had to serve a population of some 9,000 expatriate Americans, carry out public diplomacy, and serve foreign nationals looking for visas. It had to be in a location people could reach, and it could not make security its only priority. Like virtually every such facility, it had the vulnerabilities that are inevitable in a facility that serves the public, and it could not be shut down or turned into an armed camp with every new warning of a very real terrorist threat. The choice had to be made between being paralyzed by the threat of terrorism and fighting terrorism by not letting it win.

No one knows how many thousands of additional such targets exist in Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Gulf. Every public facility, every government building, every energy facility, every airport and port, every building associated with Americans and other expatriates, every hotel and travel facility, are all potential targets. Some are defended and some have physical protection, but all are vulnerable to the levels of attack that even small, dedicated cells of terrorists and extremists can mount.

As a result, almost any such facility can be used as what Gen. John Abizaid calls a “weapon of mass media.” Any attack becomes a victory, no matter how badly organized or how much it fails, if it produces casualties. The attackers know that every attack will be followed by a series of new articles challenging the stability of the Saudi or local regime; saying the country involved did not do enough to defend the facility, and claiming the local counter-terrorism effort has failed. More expatriates will leave the country; foreign investment will be affected, and the terrorists will seem stronger than they are.

Al-Qaida and its affiliates know this all too well. They know the weaknesses in the Gulf, and they know that Saudi Arabia is a particularly good target as is the United States. Any such attack hits the most important energy exporter in the world, and triggers yet another round of rumor and rubbish about divisions in the royal family and Saudi instability. Hitting a U.S. target is an attack on a country that Arabs see as a co-belligerent with Israel in the Israeli struggle with the Palestinians and gets more Arab sympathy than any other kind of target — regardless of the fact that such attacks, like the one in Jeddah, kill fellow Muslims.

A successful attack that killed large numbers of Americans would also have exploited the tensions and fault lines in the United States and Saudi relationship that developed after Sept. 11, 2001, and which have yet to heal. Saudi Arabia is a natural “weapon of mass media,” both in terms of actual news coverage and the certainty of triggering yet another set of irresponsible think tank and commercial risk analysis, and hostile op-eds.

The fact remains, however, that similar terrorist elements are now active in Iraq, and there are al-Qaida and violent Salafi Islamist extremist groups in every other Gulf country. What happened in Saudi Arabia can happen tomorrow in Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

Fortunately, the Saudi and Gulf response is neither passive nor weak. Every Southern Gulf country is steadily improving its security and counter-terrorism capabilities. Most are working closely with the United States, including with the FBI, CIA, and U.S. military, as well as with other Western countries.

In Saudi Arabia’s case, major improvements have been made since the kingdom had its own equivalent of Sept. 11 in May 2003 in Saudi intelligence, counter-terrorist capabilities, and security forces, and in the physical protection of virtually every kind of facility. It has and is cracking down on every aspect of terrorist financing; it is actively carrying out a national dialogue and moving toward educational reform and the other reforms necessary to end public support for terrorists. It is also expanding international cooperation and will host a major international conference on counter-terrorism in February.

As is the case in the United States, some of the measures Saudi Arabia has under way will take years to fully complete, but major progress has already been made in hunting down the cells, key leaders, and cadres inside the kingdom.

It will be years and perhaps decades before the problem of terrorism can be solved in Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere in the Gulf, just as is the case in the rest of the Middle East and the West. There will always be vulnerable facilities and small cadres of suicidal attackers. There will always be new ways of grabbing media attention, feeding fear, and making terrorist movements seem stronger than they are. The most Saudi Arabia, the United States, and other nations can hope to do is to reduce such terrorist movements and levels of attack to levels that the nations involved, and the world, can live with — just as we live with so many other low-level actuarial risks from accidents to storms.

This is no argument for not making every effort to fight terrorism that does not hand terrorists a victory by paralyzing normal life, dividing friends and allies, making citizens live in fear. It is no excuse for Saudi Arabia to not continue moving forward toward reform, nor for the United States to ignore other causes of terrorism like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The fact such attacks and risk are “inevitable” does not make them “acceptable.”

It should also be clear that one of the key ways of fighting these attacks is to keep them in perspective. “Weapons of mass media” only work if the media, analysts, and others panic or exaggerate the importance of such attacks, and/or respond by blaming the defenders rather than the attackers. They only work if they can be used to create the kind of fears and recriminations that isolate friendly regimes or the United States, and divide friends and allies.

They can only continue to gather momentum or go on at unacceptable levels if the United States, Saudi Arabia and the many countries that face day-to-day threats do not cooperate, do not strengthen each other’s counter-terrorism efforts, and do not make common efforts to address the causes of terrorism through reform and by ending the conflicts and tensions that terrorists exploit.

We have more to fear than fear itself, but Islamic extremism and terrorism are still supported by only a small minority and must ultimately fail because they do not offer a single practical answer to any political, economic, and social problem. In the interim, fear is the key weapon behind terrorist efforts to continue exploiting “weapons of mass media,” and the proper answer is to keep each attack in proportion, report on improvements in counter-terrorism and reform as accurately as possible, and blame the terrorists and not those who are attacked.

Reprinted with permission of the author.

Related Links:

Special Report #1 — U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attack

Special Report #2 — U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attack

Terrorism Timeline

About the Author

Dr. Anthony H. Cordesman holds the Arleigh Burke Chair in Strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and is Co-Director of the Center’s Middle East Program. He is also a military analyst for ABC and a Professor of National Security Studies at Georgetown. He directs the assessment of global military balance, strategic energy developments, and CSIS’ Dynamic Net Assessment of the Middle East. He is the author of books on the military lessons of the Iran-Iraq war as well as the Arab-Israeli military balance and the peace process, a six-volume net assessment of the Gulf, transnational threats, and military developments in Iran and Iraq. He analyzes U.S. strategy and force plans, counter-proliferation issues, arms transfers, Middle Eastern security, economic, and energy issues.

Dr. Cordesman served as a national security analyst for ABC News for the 1990-91 Gulf War, Bosnia, Somalia, Operation Desert Fox, and Kosovo. He was the Assistant for National Security to Senator John McCain and a Wilson Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars at the Smithsonian. He has served in senior positions in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Department of State, the Department of Energy, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. His posts include acting as the Civilian Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Director of Defense Intelligence Assessment, Director of Policy, Programming, and Analysis in the Department of Energy, Director of Project ISMILAID, and as the Secretary of Defense’s representative on the Middle East Working Group.

Dr. Cordesman has also served in numerous overseas posts. He was a member of the U.S. Delegation to NATO and a Director on the NATO International Staff, working on Middle Eastern security issues. He served in Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, Turkey, the UK, and West Germany. He has been an advisor to the Commander-in-Chief of U.S. Forces in Europe, and has traveled extensively in the Gulf and North Africa.

Essays by Dr. Cordesman

“The Prospects for Stability in 2004 — The Issue of Political, Economic and Social Reform,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, Saudi US Relations Information Service Item of Interest, Feb. 23, 2004

The 9/11 Commission Report: Strengths and Weaknesses,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, Saudi US Relations Information Service Item of Interest, Jul. 29, 2004

Developments in Iraq at the End of 2003: Adapting U.S. Policy to Stay the Course,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, January 7, 2004

“Four Wars and Counting: Rethinking the Strategic Meaning of the Iraq War,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, December 5, 2003

“Iraq: Too Uncertain to Call,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, November 18, 2003

“Saudi Redeployment of the F-15 to Tabuk,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, Saudi-US Relations Information Service Item of Interest, November 1, 2003

“Iranian Security Threats and US Policy: Finding the Proper Response,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, October 28, 2003

“What is Next in Iraq? Military Developments, Military Requirements and Armed Nation Building,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, August 22, 2003

“Saudi Government Counterterrorism – Counter Extremism Actions,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, Saudi-US Relations Information Service Item of Interest, August 4, 2003

“Saudi Arabia: Don’t Let Bin Laden Win!”, by Anthony H. Cordesman, Saudi-American Forum Item of Interest, May 16, 2003

“Postwar Iraq: The New Old Middle East,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, April 16, 2003

“Iraq’s Warfighting Strategy,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, March 11, 2003

“Reforming the Middle East: President Bush’s Neo-Con Logic Versus Regional Reality,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, February 27, 2003

“The Great Iraq Missile Mystery,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, February 26, 2003

“Iraq Security Roundtable at CSFS: A Discussion With Dr. Anthony Cordesman,” Center for Strategic and Future Studies, GulfWire Perspectives, January 28, 2003

“A Coalition of the Unwilling: Arms Control as an Extension of War By Other Means,” By Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, January 25, 2003

“Is Iraq In Material Breach? What Hans Blix, Colin Powell, And Jack Straw Actually Said,” By Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, December 20, 2002

“Saudi Arabia: Opposition, Islamic Extremism And Terrorism,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, December 1, 2002

“Planning For A Self-Inflicted Wound: U.S. Policy To Reshape A Post-Saddam Iraq,” by Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, November 24, 2002

“The West And The Arab World – Partnership Or A ‘Clash Of Civilizations?’” By Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, November 12, 2002

“Strategy In The Middle East: The Gap Between Strategic Theory And Operational Reality,” by Dr. Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, October 22, 2002

“A Firsthand Look At Saudi Arabia Since 9-11,” GulfWire’s Interview With Dr. Anthony Cordesman In Saudi Arabia, GulfWire Perspectives October 10, 2002

“Escalating To Nowhere: The Israeli And Palestinian Strategic Failure,” By Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, April 8, 2002

“Reforging The U.S. And Saudi Strategic Partnership,” by Dr. Anthony H. Cordesman, GulfWire Perspectives, January 28, 2002

Controversial Libel Suit Won

Editor — Wed, 08 Dec 2004 18:26:47 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

This Item of Interest provides a summary of reporting on the recent resolution of a libel suit brought by Saudi Ambassador to the United Kingdom Prince Turki al-Faisal. He was falsely accused of complicity in terrorist acts by a French magazine and Laurent Murawiec, who gained notoriety through a widely discredited briefing to a Pentagon policy board.

Controversial Libel Suit Won

On Monday, Prince Turki Al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Britain, won a libel suit against the French magazine, Paris Match, and its publisher Hachette Filipacchi Associes. An October 2003 article in the magazine alleged that Prince Turki Al-Faisal had set up Al Qaeda and was responsible for the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

“These allegations were outrageous,” said Prince Turki Al-Faisal, following the court decision in his favor. “On behalf of my government, I spent a number of years trying to track down Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice at a time when other governments were less convinced of the threat he posed.

“Al Qaeda and all terrorist groups go against everything I believe in and hold most sacred. They are an evil cult, which we must all, as an international community, fight to destroy. The killing of innocent life goes totally against Islamic beliefs.”

In its October 9-15, 2003 issue, Paris Match published an article that included an interview with Laurent Murawiec and extracts from his book, La Guerre D’Apres. The article gave Murawiec’s account of the dangers Saudi Arabia posed for the United States and specifically cited Prince Turki Al-Faisal as having set up Al Qaeda as his own “military organization.” The article further placed direct responsibility of the September 11th attacks on Prince Turki Al-Faisal.

In response to Murawiec’s allegations in the October 2003 Paris Match article, Prince Turki Al-Faisal denied all links to the 9/11 attacks and Al Qaeda. In a statement read in open court on December 6, 2004, Hachette Filipacchi Associes, publishers of Paris Match, accepted “Prince Turki’s assurances that there is no truth in the allegations” and that “Mr. Murawiec’s views have been rejected at the highest level in the United States government, as well as by the 9/11 Commission.”

“Substantial” damages were awarded to Prince Turki Al-Faisal and are to paid by the publishers of Paris Match. The damages are to be donated for relief work in Afghanistan. The publishers will also pay for the prince’s legal costs. The magazine has released a public apology and has accepted that the allegations put forth in the October 2003 article were incorrect and without foundation.

Prince Turki Al-Faisal was formerly the head of Saudi Arabia’s External Intelligence Service from 1977 until his retirement from that position in August 2001. In that capacity during the 1980s, Prince Turki had contact with Osama bin Laden, who had gone to Afghanistan to support the Afghan mujahideen in their resistance to Soviet occupation of their country. After the Soviet withdrawal, bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia, but after the first Gulf War, he adopted a confrontational stance against the Kingdom and the United States. He was stripped of his Saudi citizenship in 1994.

Related Links:

Prince Turki Al-Faisal’s Views on Terrorist Attacks and Bin Laden

“Saudi Prince Gets Libel Damages” — BBC

“Turki Al-Faisal Accepts Damages in Libel Case” — Arab News

“Saudi Prince Wins Libel Case” — Reuters

Laurent Murawiec

In July 2002, Laurent Murawiec, a former Rand Corp. analyst, prepared and delivered a controversial briefing on Saudi Arabia to the Defense Policy Board in the United States. This board consists of a group of prominent intellectuals and former senior officials who advise the Pentagon on defense policy. According to an August 6, 2002 article in the Washington Post, in this briefing, Murawiec described Saudi Arabia as an enemy of the United States and went further by stating that Saudi Arabia is “the kernel of evil, the prime mover, the most dangerous opponent” in the Middle East. The Department of Defense quickly distanced itself from Murawiec’s briefing making clear it “did not represent the views of the board or official government policy, and in fact runs counter to the present stance of the U.S. government that Saudi Arabia is a major ally in the region.”

Related Links:

Laurent Murawiec — Disinfopedia, a project of the Center for Media & Democracy

“The PowerPoint that Rocked the Pentagon” — Slate

“Briefing Depicted Saudis as Enemies: Ultimatum Urged to Pentagon Board” — Washington Post

“Pentagon Blasts Saudi Arabia Report” — CBS News

Prince Turki Al-Faisal’s Views on Terrorist Attacks and Bin Laden

Editor — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 19:03:55 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following is a transcript of the Prince Turki Al-Faisal interview on CNN with Wolf Blitzer on December 6, 2004.

Prince Turki Al-Faisal’s Views on Terrorist Attacks and Bin Laden

Wolf Blitzer: More now on that bloody attack on the U.S. Consulate earlier today in the Saudi port city of Jeddah. Earlier, I spoke with the former Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Turki Al-Faisal, who is now that nation’s ambassador to Britain. He joined me from London.

Prince Turki, once again thanks very much for joining us. What’s the latest information you’re getting from your government now on this attack at the U.S. Consulate in Jeddah?

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: The latest information I have is that eight people were killed, five of them employees of the consulate and three of them were the terrorists. My information is that there were two wounded officers, one slightly more seriously wounded than the other. This is as far as casualties are concerned. I know there is a lot of confusion now as to whether there was penetration of the consulate or not. You have to remember, Wolf, that the consulate in Jeddah is a compound with not only a wall around the compound but another security barrier outside the wall surrounding the compound. What these people did is that they blew themselves into the first barrier wall outside the compound. As they tried to enter the compound itself, that’s where they were engaged by Saudi security forces, and three of them were killed. Unfortunately, five of the employees of the consulate were killed as well.

Wolf Blitzer: Prince Turki, who are these people who did this?

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: I cannot give you a definitive answer. I have not received anything from my government yet, but it has all the hallmarks of people we’ve been tracking and dealing with over the last year and a half in the Kingdom — people with Al Qaeda or connected to it in one way or another.

Wolf Blitzer: We heard that videotape from Ayman Al-Zawahiri, the number two Al Qaeda leader, in which he seemed to make a suggestion that they were going to attack in the coming weeks, maybe around Christmas, which is celebrated by Christians of course all over the world. What’s your reading of the level of anxiety that should be placed right now, given this threat?

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: I believe the threat is present. These people have managed to inflict destruction and devastation in many countries of the world — in Spain, in Saudi Arabia, in Morroco, in Indonesia, in Turkey, let alone the September 11th attack on the United States. So, one should be on guard about the capabilities of these people and never underestimate them because they have managed to score some fantastic and very devilish and bloody attacks worldwide.

Wolf Blitzer: What’s your latest information on Osama bin Laden? Where do you believe he is hiding out?

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: I believe he is still hiding on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Wolf Blitzer: Do you believe the U.S. and its allies, the Pakistani allies and the Afghan allies, are any closer to finding him today than they were a year to three years ago?

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: I don’t have to speculate on that. I’ve been reading statements by President Perez Musharraf of Pakistan in which he says that unfortunately, bin Laden’s trail has been lost, but that in his belief, bin Laden is still on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. So, from a year and a half ago or a year ago, unfortunately, according to President Musharraf, his trail has been lost.

Wolf Blitzer: Prince Turki, it’s always good to speak with you. Thanks very much for joining us.

Prince Turki Al-Faisal: Thank you.

[Interviewed by Wolf Blitzer (CNN) on December 6, 2004. Aired at 5pm (ET).]

U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attacked Special Report #2

Editor — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 18:30:07 +0000

Information as of: 12:00pm ET, Tuesday, December 7, 2004.

Summary

Five terrorists attacked the US Consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on December 6, 2004

Initial reports of 12 fatalities have been downgraded to three attackers and five consulate employees killed in the three hour gun battle at the compound.

An Al Qaeda group claimed responsibility for the attack in a Web site post.
U.S. State Department Report

Jeddah Attack Will Not Deter Fight Against Terror, Powell Says
(Eight killed in terrorist attack at U.S. Consulate in Jeddah) (490)

Washington — Secretary of State Colin Powell says the December 6 attack
against U.S. government interests in Saudi Arabia “will not deter us in our
fight against terrorism.”

Powell, asked by a reporter for his reaction to the attack against the U.S.
Consulate in Jeddah during a visit to Sofia, Bulgaria, responded by saying:
“We deplore this kind of terrorist activity, and my condolences go to the
families of those who lost their lives.”

Eight persons were killed in a December 6 terrorist assault on the U.S.
consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, according to State Department deputy
spokesman Adam Ereli.

The dead included three of the five gunmen who breached the compound’s
security gate and attempted to enter the office building of the U.S. Consul
General. Saudi security forces apprehended the other two attackers.

President Bush also reacted to news of the attack December 6, saying it is
a reminder that “terrorists are on the move.” During a joint appearance in
Washington with Iraqi President Ghazi al-Yawer, Bush said these terrorists
want the U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia and Iraq to end. “They want us to
grow timid and weary,” he said, through random killing of innocents. “And
that’s why,” he said, “these elections in Iraq are very important.”

Ereli said four local consulate employees and a guard were also killed, and
another four local consulate employees were injured. All of them were
assigned to transportation, housekeeping and maintenance services, he said.
No Americans were seriously injured and, contrary to earlier reports, no
hostages were taken, he added.

President Bush and Ereli both expressed American gratitude for the quick
action by Saudi authorities, and Ereli said that the attack is a reminder
that “we all have common cause in working against terror.”

Although authorities are still gathering details, Ereli said the men
attempted to drive a vehicle onto the compound grounds and, when stopped,
abandoned the vehicle and fought their way in using guns and grenades.
They never entered the Consulate General building, he said, but did inflict
significant damage to Marine Guard residential quarters.

The Marines and regional security guards took defensive measures to protect
those in the compound and moved personnel to a reinforced, safe area,
according to Ereli, who also noted that Consul General Gina
Abercrombie-Winstanley was “in the front lines” of the quick response.

Press reports indicate some Saudi security forces were also wounded in the
gun battle. Ereli said more detailed accounts would be forthcoming as the
United States works with Saudi Arabia to investigate the incident and
determine security vulnerabilities.

The Jeddah and Dhahran consulates and the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh will be
closed to the public December 7, although Ereli said emergency aid would
still be offered to Americans.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov )

Additional Reporting

Special Report #1 U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attacked

Saudi Attackers Monitored U.S. Consulate Before Attack

“..Saudi gunmen who stormed the United States consulate in Jeddah had “scoped out” the building ahead of their carefully planned attack, the U.S. envoy to Saudi Arabia said Tuesday. Ambassador James Oberwetter also described a firefight at the gate before the militants slipped in on foot behind a diplomatic car entering the heavily fortified complex Monday..” Complete report..

Al-Qaeda claims Jeddah attack

“..The Saudi branch of Al-Qaeda used an Islamist website to claim Monday’s attack on the US consulate in the Saudi port of Jeddah, stating that some assailants had managed to flee after the operation. “Your brothers of the squadron of the martyr Abu Annas al-Shami stormed one of the bastions of the American crusaders in the Arabian peninsula, in Jeddah,” the statement said..” Complete report..

US remains at risk even under top guard

“..The attack fell exactly a year after the Interior Ministry took the exceptional step of listing the 26 most-wanted terrorists linked to Al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. In the ensuing year, about 17 of them have been captured or killed in numerous skirmishes throughout the desert kingdom..” Complete report..

Prince Turki al-Faisal comments on terrorist attacks

“..The latest information I have is that eight people were killed, five of them employees of the consulate and three of them were the terrorists. My information is that there were two wounded officers, one slightly more difficult to wound than the other. This is as far as casualties are concerned. I know there is a lot of confusion now as to whether there was penetration of the consulate or not. You have to remember, Wolf [Blitzer, CNN], that the consulate in Jeddah is a compound with not only a wall around the compound but another security wall outside the wall surrounding the compound. What these people did is that they blew themselves into the first barrier wall outside the compound. As they tried to enter the compound itself, that’s where they were engaged by Saudi security forces, and three of them were killed. Unfortunately, five of the employees of the consulate were killed as well..” Complete report..

Saudi names slain gunmen in Al-Qaeda strike on US mission

“..The ministry identified three of the slain gunmen as Fayez bin Awwad al-Jeheni, Eid bin Dakhilallah al-Jeheni and Hassan bin Hamed al-Hazmi, none of whom was on a most-wanted list of suspected Al-Qaeda sympathizers issued by authorities a year ago. “The identity of the fourth, who is wounded, must be not be divulged for the sake of the (public) interest, and procedures are under way to establish the identity of the fifth person, who died in the incident,” it said in a statement said, adding that all four identified were Saudis. The interior ministry said a Yemeni, a Sudanese, a Palestinian, a Pakistani and a Sri Lankan were killed, although the government in the Philippines said one of its nationals was killed and another wounded..” Complete report..

Saudi Arabia vows to eradicate terrorism

“..Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal assured the US ambassador in Riyadh that the kingdom is determined to uproot terrorism and eradicate terrorists.. ..al-Faisal contacted ambassador James Oberwetter “to express sympathy with the employees of the US Consulate in Jeddah following the terrorist attack..” Complete report..

President Bush comments on attack

“..on the incident in Saudi Arabia, I want to thank the Saudi government for responding as quickly as they did. We send our heartfelt condolences to the Saudi National Guard that died in the defense of our consulate. I want to thank the Marines for doing their job so splendidly. And we will find out more about who caused the attacks. As I understand it, several of the attackers died, but several were captured by the Saudi government, and I’m confident they will share the information with us. The attacks in Saudi Arabia remind us that the terrorists are still on the move. They’re interested in affecting the will of free countries. They want us to leave Saudi Arabia. They want us to leave Iraq. They want us to grow timid and weary in the face of their willingness to kill randomly and kill innocent people. And that’s why these elections in Iraq are very important..” Complete report..

Related Reporting:

Press Denounces Jeddah Attack (BBC)

Saudis Probe Daring Al Qaeda Attack on US Mission (Reuters)

Al-Qaeda claims Jeddah attack as fears among foreigners grow (AFP)

Al-Qaeda group claims to have carried out Jeddah attack (CBC)

Saudis, expats stunned at US consulate assault (Reuters)

Resources:

Terrorism Timeline – Saudi Arabia and the Global War on Terrorism – SUSRIS Web Site

Saudi Arabia: Economic, Oil And Mineral Restructuring And Reforms By Ali Naimi

Editor — Mon, 06 Dec 2004 19:07:28 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

This article originally appeared in the Middle East Economic Survey on December 6, 2004 and is reprinted here with permission.

Saudi Arabia: Economic, Oil And Mineral Restructuring And Reforms
By Ali Naimi

The following is the text of the speech delivered by Mr. Naimi, the Saudi Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), London, 29 November.

Now is an especially opportune time to focus our attention on such issues as the economy of the Middle East, the roads to growth, and the role that hydrocarbons and the national oil companies play in the overall outlook for prosperity and growth in our region. And I can’t think of a better venue than here at Chatham House to give these matters the thoughtful analysis and discussion they deserve.

Even though our conference considers the entire region, I want to talk mainly about my country, Saudi Arabia, a preeminent economic power in the region, with an economy that ranks among the top 25 largest economies in the world. Saudi Arabia accounts for fully one fifth of the GDP of the entire Middle East, including Turkey. Whatever takes place in Saudi Arabia has an enormous effect on the region and, to some extent, the global economy as well. Equally important for the future of the region, Saudi Arabia has seen a remarkable resurgence of investors confidence in the last five years, a fact which has not been sufficiently noted outside the region.

Currently the Saudi economy is charging ahead with robust GDP growth of more than 7% this year and a stock market that has increased almost three-fold on both share prices and volume traded over the last two years. In fact, with share-price growing steadily, the Saudi stock market now ranks 11th in the world by share trading value. These gains, it should be noted, are attributed to corporate fundamentals rather than speculation. Both national and international investments have been rapidly increasing in all sectors of the economy, especially the industrial and services sectors.

Besides oil, gas, petrochemical and mineral industries, other sectors such as electricity, real estate, water desalination, communication, transportation, and the banking, insurance and financial services are all experiencing vigorous growth. At the same time exports are increasing rapidly. For example, the value of non-oil exports increased by more than 25% last year and the increase this year is expected to be higher.

This robust growth is based on two important factors. First, the oil-price increases and higher Saudi oil production during this year and last year. Second, and of even more strategic importance, are the economic reforms launched by HRH Crown Prince ‘Abd Allah which started five years ago.

In addition to restructuring some government agencies such as water, electricity, labor, trade and industries, there have been many other steps already taken to advance the reform process. These include, for example, the establishment of the Supreme Economic Council in August 1999, the establishment of the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority in April 2000 to facilitate foreign direct investment, the creation of the Saudi Telecommunication and Information Technology Authority in 2000 and the establishment of the Capital Market Authority in June 2003. Reform initiatives also include a host of new investor-friendly laws and strategies such as the Foreign Investment Act of April 2000, the Telecommunication Law of May 2000 which paved the way for the privatization and opening up of this important sector, the Capital Market Law of June 2003 which provides the legislative, institutional and regulatory framework for capital markets, the Insurance Law of July 2003, the Corporate Tax Law of January 2004, and the Privatizations Strategy of June 2002.

These reforms have created an atmosphere of improved efficiency, greater transparency, reduced governmental regulation, more opportunities for foreign investment, and significant emphasis on the highest ethical and business standards. This has resulted in major strides along our path toward stronger economic performance and enhanced our ability to increase domestic and international investments.

To illustrate the scope of investment activity, allow me to mention some of the recent projects and reforms in our hydrocarbon and mineral sectors. The Kingdom allocated new feedstock for 24 additional petrochemical and utility projects with a total investment of $30bn. These additional projects will produce 20mn metric tons of petrochemicals yearly, 3,600 mw of power, 250mn gallons of desalinated water per day plus 2.6mn t/y of steel with startups by 2006 through 2010. By the year 2010, Saudi Arabia’s total petrochemical production will be about 70mn metric tons.

As you know, we have opened the upstream gas sector to international investors last year. The government is restructuring its investment sector to encourage the inflow of foreign capital. To accomplish this objective the gas supply and pricing regulations together with the Rules for Implementations were issued. The goal is to regulate all the various stages of this vital sector and to guarantee investor’s and producer’s rights. A dedicated tax code was also issued which applied exclusively to natural gas investors with the objective of encouraging investments. The tax code allows the investor to make attractive returns and bring equitable revenue to the Kingdom. As part of that initiative, four major exploration areas have been awarded to international companies in a highly transparent manner. These companies have already commenced their exploration activities. The opening of the upstream natural gas business to international investment is also expected to lead to further expansion of petrochemical industries in Saudi Arabia. Total natural gas processing capacity had doubled in recent years and now amounts to about 7.5bn cfd of processed sales gas. The demand for natural gas in power generation, as industrial fuel and feedstock, and for water desalination projects is expected to grow at around 4% annually. By the year 2025 Saudi Arabia will need between 12 to 14bn cfd of gas to meet the growing demand.

On the oil side, this year we developed the Qatif and Abu Sa’fah fields, which brought on-stream production of some 800,000 b/d. These mega-projects were completed ahead of schedule and increased our total production capacity from 10.5 to 11.0mn b/d, net of natural decline elsewhere.

We have also recently developed plants to increase gradually Saudi Arabia’s sustainable production capacity to 12.5mn b/d. These plans call for a substantial amount of work in both new and old oilfields over the next few years. Fields and reservoirs for the expansion program have already been identified. The decision to invest in added production capacity on this scale reflects our belief that demand for Saudi oil will continue to increase through the coming years. It also demonstrates our desire, at the same time, to maintain a reasonable spare capacity of no less than 1.5mn b/d. As in the past, the spare capacity helps assure the continuity of stable oil markets by making more oil available in times of supply dislocations or any unusual surge in demand.

For the longer term, scenarios to raise the capacity to 15mn b/d have also been studied and can be set in motion if the global demand requires it.

Looking beyond upstream oil activities, Saudi Arabia is placing greater emphasis on utilizing its hydrocarbon resources to create higher value products and to help accelerate industrial growth and create more jobs. Consistent with this policy, a world class downstream project is being undertaken at Rabigh Refinery on the Kingdom’s Red Sea Coast. A memorandum of understanding (MOU) was recently signed between Sumitomo of Japan and Saudi Aramco to transform this basic refinery into an integrated refinery and massive petrochemical complex producing both high-end refined products and petrochemicals. Investments in this project will total more than $4bn and we expect this project to be completed before the end of the decade.

We are also encouraging downstream conversion as well as service industries to cluster around these mega projects, thus adding even more value and creating jobs. Such industrial clusters could be repeated at other major refining centers across the Kingdom.

Along with growing the petrochemical industries, which utilize Saudi Arabia’s hydrocarbon resources, we are also welcoming new national and international investments in the Kingdom’s refining business. We encourage investors to build new refineries on either the East or West coast and offer any needed assistance, including full access to steady oil supply at international market prices.

On the mineral side, much is being done by the Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Ma’aden), which has been taking the leading role in the development of Saudi Arabia’s mineral resources. Its paid-up capital amounts to over $1bn, and it is involved in mining precious metals, basic metals, and industrial minerals such as phosphate and bauxite. Furthermore, and as part of our economic reform, we established the Saudi Geological Survey four years ago to provide detailed information about the mineral wealth in Saudi Arabia and just three months ago the Saudi Council of Ministers passed the new Mining Code, which is based on comprehensive studies of the experience of other countries and their mining codes. Besides being comprehensive, the new code provides for transparency and will encourage investment in minerals with clear and specific rules and regulations. We expect nothing less than a big boom in this area as national and international investment flows into the sector, where the expected growth rate will be between 8% to 10% annually.

Early next year we will open the bidding for construction of a new railroad linking the far North of Saudi Arabia to Riyadh and the Gulf area, a 1,500 km project to cost about $1.5bn. This project and other related projects will make major contributions to Saudi Arabia’s economy. They will utilize the massive phosphate and bauxite deposits in the North of the country along with our abundant resources of oil, gas and sulfur to create new industries. The expected investments in these mineral projects will total some $7bn. To support these projects we have already started construction work on a brand-new industrial zone at Ras Al-Zawr located north of Jubail on the Arabian Gulf. By the end of the decade, Saudi Arabia will become one of the world’s leading producers of phosphate fertilizers, alumina and aluminum.

I would like now to discuss the role of national oil companies and their contributions to both the hydrocarbon industry and the national economies at large. Today one-half of the world’s top 50 oil companies are fully or majority-owned government enterprises, and together they hold more than 70% of the world’s proven oil reserves. Moreover, their combined oil production provides about 50% of the total global oil consumption.

Saudi Aramco, the national oil company of Saudi Arabia, is a true example of the capability of national oil companies to provide the world with the needed oil. Its performance during the last two decades speaks volumes. Saudi Aramco was able to increase production after the Iraq invasion in Kuwait in August 1990, from 5.4mn b/d to 8.6mn b/d within three months. It was able to advance its production capacity on a sustainable basis from 7 to 10mn b/d during the first half of the 1990s, a permanent increase of some 3mn b/d, all the while finding new reserves to replace its production.

The company regularly develops and brings onstream major new crude oil increments such as the Arabian Super Light crude from fields south of Riyadh and the massive Shaybah field in the Kingdom’s Empty Quarter with its 500,000 b/d production increments. As mentioned before, the Qatif and Abu Sa’fah development brought 800,000 b/d onstream and allowed Saudi Arabia to advance its production capacity to 11mn b/d level.

Saudi Aramco’s success goes beyond adding oil reserves and increasing production. The national oil company of Saudi Arabia is also deep into refining joint ventures all over the world — North America, Europe and Asia — and with more to come. It has built a major tanker fleet able to carry a large portion of our crude and products to markets around the globe.

I will try to be brief with just this additional note on the company’s gas program which has added 54 tcf to our non-associated gas reserves in the past decade alone, more than doubling proven non-associated gas reserves to 97 tcf and bringing the total gas resource base to 235 tcf. These gas reserves are the fourth largest in the world. We have also more than doubled our marketed gas capacity to 7.5bn cfd within the past five years, with our per capita gas consumption among the highest in the world.

I have said all this to give you the necessary comfort that our oil and gas resources are in good hands and to make a point about the role that oil and gas plays in the economy of Saudi Arabia. The story goes well beyond generating a revenue stream from the Kingdom’s hydrocarbon resources to benefit the nation. I have already cited examples of mega-projects to grow the industries which will drive economic development in all parts of the Kingdom. The comparative advantage we have is abundant, low-cost hydrocarbon resources to drive other energy-intensive businesses such as metals smelting, steel-rolling and many others.

In sum, national oil companies such as Saudi Aramco are major sources of revenue for the national economy and for the government. They are providers of all types of energy for local and international markets — energy which, in turn, is one of the main engines of economic growth. They are also making major contributions to national economies through increasing industrialization and diversification of the economy. National oil companies are also taking a leading role in human development and the transfer of technologies.

Before I conclude, I would like to mention that today some people are wondering if the current high oil-price situation will cause us to slow down the pace of reform and diversification of our economy and simply enjoy the extra income. I must say that the answer to this is a resounding. NO! We have had considerable experience riding the oil-price rollercoaster for many years and know fully well the importance of expanding and diversifying the economy.

The outlook for economic reform and restructuring is more promising than at any time in the past. In this context, I would be remiss if I did not highlight a related area which is receiving special attention: it involves the nurturing of our human resources through intensive programs of education and training. We intend to grow the Saudi professional workforce which we will need for the future. Therefore, we will increase the capacity by more than 250% vocational centers and colleges during the next seven years.

Another indication of the structural reform underway is the ongoing privatization of government-owned enterprises and equity investments through public share offerings. The total number of such offerings through the Saudi stock market will show a continuous increase over the coming years.

Certainly we intend to make maximum use of additional revenues coming our way to make major improvements in infrastructure, particularly transportation, and to promote the widespread growth of small and medium size businesses in all parts of the Kingdom. The government has already allocated about $11bn this year to projects such as healthcare, education and housing.

Let me conclude my remarks now by restating that Saudi Arabia and its economy are vastly more dynamic than is generally known or appreciated. We live in a very competitive world and have consistently worked on keeping both our country and our economy healthy and fit. There is no better example of this fitness than our petroleum policy and the industries which carry it out.

U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attacked Special Report #1

Editor — Mon, 06 Dec 2004 19:05:54 +0000

Information as of: 12:00pm ET, Monday, December 6, 2004.

Summary

The U.S. Consulate in the western port city of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia was attacked by terrorists at about 11: a.m. local (0800 GMT) Monday, December 6, 2004. (Arab News)

Five attackers used explosives to breach the outer wall of the compound and entered the building.

Three attackers were killed and two were captured. (News24)

Four security guards were killed and at least two wounded. (AP)

Five non-American consular staff members were killed. American diplomatic staff members were unharmed and accounted for. (AFP / BBC)

President Bush thanked Saudi Arabia for quick response to the attack during a televised appearance with the President of Iraq.

Check the SUSRIS Terrorism Timeline for additional background material.

Attack on US Consulate
Arab News

JEDDAH, 6 December 2004 — Three gunmen with suspected Al-Qaeda links who attacked the U.S. consulate in Jeddah today were killed by security forces, the Interior Ministry said. These three were among the five who stormed the consulate building in the morning. The remaining two were arrested following a gun battle.

At least four members of the Saudi security detail were also killed and several wounded when they clashed with the gunmen who attacked the compound, police said.

“A gang affiliated to the deviant group hurled explosives on the gate of the U.S. consulate in Jeddah at 11 a.m. (0800 GMT) today and then entered the area surrounding the consulate,” an Interior Ministry statement said.

“Security forces dealt with them immediately and brought the situation under control. Three of the attackers were killed and two were arrested after they were wounded. The authorities concerned are following up the incident,” said the ministry statement, quoted by the official SPA news agency.

The ministry did not mention casualties among the security forces, but said it would issue a more detailed account later.
“At least four security people were killed when they clashed with the gunmen who stormed the consulate. Several others were wounded,” a police officer at the scene said.

U.S. officials said all Americans at the consulate were safe and accounted for, although one source said two non-American staff members were wounded.

“I can confirm that two locally-engaged staff members have been injured,” Carol Kalin, spokewoman at the U.S. Embassy in the capital Riyadh, said.

The embassy was still in the process of confirming the status of the rest of local staff members, she added, while reiterating that all American diplomats were accounted for.

Meanwhile, security in the Eastern Province was dramatically heightened. Students at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) were forced to enter the university campus from the gate near Saudi Aramco. The campus’ main gate near the American consulate was inaccessible due to roads surrounding the consulate being blocked by security forces. Even within the KFUPM campus, roads adjacent to the consulate were closed. Saudi Aramco security was also increased with congestion reported at main access points to Aramco.

Traffic was diverted away from highway exits leading to Dhahran Road near the U.S. Consulate. The U.S. Consulate was cordoned off completely and while operations within the facility continued, no one was allowed in or out. There was relief on the part of hundreds of parents when a decision was eventually made to bring in school buses to transport students home from schools. (Inputs from Agencies)

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1&section=0&article=55662&d=6&m=12&y=2004

[Reprinted with permission]

Related Reporting

Special Report #2 U.S. Consulate, Jeddah Attacked

Gun Battle at US mission (BBC)

U.S. Consulate in Saudi Arabia Attacked (Washington Post)

Gunmen Raid U.S. Consulate in Saudi Arabia (New York Times)

US consulate stormed in Jeddah (AP, AFP, Reuters)

Gun battle at US’ Jeddah mission (World News)

Gunmen killed in attack on US consulate in Jeddah (Xinhua)

Q&A: Jeddah and the US consulate attack (The Times)

Eyewitness: Attack in Jeddah (BBC)

Resources

Terrorism Timeline – Saudi Arabia and the Global War on Terrorism – SUSRIS Web Site

Meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia September 27, 1962

Editor — Sat, 04 Dec 2004 19:09:27 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following history item is #58 Memorandum of Conversation from a meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia on September 27, 1962.

This conversation took place during the Secretary’s delegation to the 17th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September 1962. The subjects that were discussed include Middle East problems, U.S.-U.A.R. relations and Crown Prince Faysal’s Visit at the White House.*

Participants of the September 27, 1962 meeting:

U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk

NEA–Phillips Talbot

NE–Talcott W. Seelye

Crown Prince Faysal, Saudi Arabia

Isa Sabbagh, Public Affairs Officer, Jidda

Dr. Rashad Pharoun

*Ambassador Hart forwarded suggested talking points for use by the President and/or Secretary of State in their conversations with Faysal in telegram 191 from Jidda, September 22. (Ibid., 786A.11/9-2262)

Meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia
September 27, 1962

#58 Memorandum of Conversation from the meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Crown Prince Faysal of Saudi Arabia on September 27, 1962. The following is a list of topic areas that were discussed in the meeting.

(The following discourse took place before and during dinner.)

Yemen

The Secretary mentioned that Prince Hassan had been in touch with his colleagues that day and asked Prince Faysal to give his views on the situation in Yemen.* Prince Faysal stated that Prince Hassan had seen him before departing from New York that evening. He thought Prince Hassan was the only leader left who could command support in Yemen and criticized Imam Muhammed for having leaned on elements who had betrayed him. The Secretary commented that Prince Hassan had also seen Lord Home. Prince Faysal stated that Hassan would decide whether to return by way of Aden or Saudi Arabia once he had reached Khartoum. The Secretary asked Prince Faysal if he had any late news of Yemen. Faysal replied that the situation is still unclear, but evidently the Yemen military had taken over. It was also unclear as to whether Imam Muhammed had been assassinated or had fled. He wondered whether we had more information. The Secretary commented we had as yet received no communications from our Legation in Taiz. Mr. Talbot recalled that when Imam Ahmad had died 10 days earlier, we had heard nothing for two days. Prince Faysal noted that at that time the new regime of Imam Muhammed had postponed the release of the news of the death for a couple of days.

*On September 26, the Yemeni Army High Command overthrew Imam al-Badr and killed numerous members of the Royal family, abolished the monarchy, and announced the establishment of a “free republic.”

Arab League and Arab Unity

The Secretary asked whether the pact recently signed between Jordan and Saudi Arabia would lead to a larger Arab grouping, perhaps eventually including Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. He wondered whether such a grouping would not be conducive to Arab solidarity. Prince Faysal replied that the joint Saudi-Jordanian announcement left the way open for any other Arab country to join. At the moment, however, circumstances precluded the entry of the three countries the Secretary had mentioned: Lebanon maintains its traditional position of neutrality; Syria is preoccupied with its own internal political problems; and Iraq is in too precarious a state. The Secretary said that while his lack of full background information prevented him from speaking authoritatively, he had gained the impression that the formation of the Arab League was a step in the direction of Arab unity. Prince Faysal stated that one must look at the League’s history in order to evaluate it properly. He noted that the League had been conceived by Great Britain and that, because of this, Saudi Arabia had opposed it from the beginning. Nevertheless, the late King Abdul Aziz was eventually prevailed upon to join the League, and until about 1952 it did achieve some results. The League was weakened, continued the Crown Prince, by the advent of the Egyptian Revolution and Nasser’s attitude of condescension toward and “trusteeship” over other Arab states. Egypt, unable to control the League at that time, endeavored to paralyze it. By 1955 Egypt had reversed its posture toward the League, and instead sought to dominate it. The League’s end came at Chtaura this year where the U.A.R., in an attempt to crush the League, “destroyed itself.” The Secretary expressed the view that two factors had impaired the League’s success: the U.A.R.’s masterminding of the operation and the offsetting pull of the North African countries. Prince Faysal noted that if the League could operate in the normal fashion–each League member having equal status and influence–the organization could be successful despite North African polarity.

Baghdad Pact

The Secretary said that he did not intend to cast aspersions on his predecessors but wished to inquire if in retrospect Prince Faysal thought it had been wise to bring Iraq into the Baghdad Pact. Prince Faysal recalled that at the time of the Pact’s inception, he had advised the Turkish Foreign Minister against singling out only one Arab state for inclusion in the Pact. He said he had emphasized the importance of having several Arab states join a defense pact of this nature and the necessity that such an organization be fostered from within rather than from without. He recalled how “Nahas Pasha” of Egypt and Prime Minister Nuri Said of Iraq had discussed the possibility of a military pact composed of most of the Arab states. However, other Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, had refused to acquiesce because of British inspiration. Faysal went on to state that the Baghdad Pact had been poorly timed.

Kuwait

The Secretary commented that Mr. Gromyko had said to him a few days before that the Soviet Union was reviewing its stand on Kuwait’s membership in the UN. Prince Faysal noted the difference between “reviewing” a position and “changing” a position and wondered how the Secretary interpreted this remark. The Secretary said his experience with the Soviets led him to conclude that when the Soviets speak of reviewing a position, they usually end up making modifications. Accordingly, he was optimistic that the Soviets would not veto Kuwait’s application the next time it is proposed.

Syria

Mr. Talbot recalled his visit to Riyadh several months ago when Prince Faysal had mentioned the importance of U.S. aid to Syria. He hoped the Prince was pleased that the U.S. had since provided Syria with a stabilization loan. Prince Faysal said he welcomed this because of the importance of Syria’s stability to the area. He hoped the U.S. would contribute more assistance, especially now that Syria had established a constitutional government.

(The following discourse took place after dinner.)

U.S.-U.A.R. Relations

The Secretary reiterated his admiration for the wisdom, quiet approach and clarity of expression which had been demonstrated by the Crown Prince during his appearances at the United Nations in 1948 when the Secretary had been a member of the U.S. delegation. For this reason particularly he welcomed this opportunity for a frank exchange of views with the Crown Prince. U.S. friendship with Saudi Arabia, as well as the mutuality of interests between our two countries, requires close and frank consultation. The Secretary noted that U.S. attitudes are often misunderstood by contending parties in the area (such as Pakistan and India) and we do not want Saudi Arabia to misunderstand our posture toward the U.A.R. Basically, the U.S. supports the independence and integrity of all states. In the case of the U.A.R., we are fully aware that the U.A.R. is doing things vis-a-vis Saudi Arabia which we do not approve and we would like to have the benefit of Crown Prince Faysal’s thinking on the U.A.R. The Secretary mentioned three possible alternatives in the conduct of U.S. policy toward Egypt: (1) we could have nothing to do with the U.A.R.; (2) we could place our full support behind the U.A.R. and prop up the regime; or (3) we can maintain a form of American presence in the U.A.R. as an alternative to the Soviets. He noted that we had elected the latter course, so that the U.A.R. would not be abandoned to the Soviet Union and in order that we can be in a position of exercising moderate influence. On the latter, he said, we are not always successful.

Prince Faysal noted that his frankness has often been his weakness. He said it pained him to discuss inter-Arab problems with an outside power. (Note: A further exchange between the Secretary and Prince Faysal clarified the fact that the Prince was pained not at the Secretary having introduced the subject but by the fact that the state of Arab relations had reached such a turn.) Prince Faysal stated that there is no problem at issue between Saudi Arabia and Egypt–unlike the relationship between India and Pakistan. It is only that the U.A.R. has chosen to attack Saudi Arabia with the evident sole aim of destroying it. Prince Faysal stated that no Arab would wish to deny any Arab people the kind of support the U.A.R. is receiving from the United States. With regard to the three alternatives cited by the Secretary, he, too, would dismiss the first two alternatives. He favored the U.S. conducting normal relations with the U.A.R., including economic aid, providing the U.S. uses its influence to deter the U.A.R. from a policy of intransigence and subversion of other Arab countries. Prince Faysal stated of all Arab countries, only Saudi Arabia has been consistent in its policy toward the United States. In spite of occasional differences of opinion between our two countries, he said, Saudi Arabia has always considered friendship with the U.S. a cornerstone of its policy.

The Secretary expressed concern at the development of an arms race in the Middle East, and expressed the view that Nasser’s arms program seemed beyond his defensive needs. He feared that Nasser would one day use the arms against other Arabs in the area. Prince Faysal stated that Saudi Arabia is not afraid of the U.A.R.’s military strength since he found it inconceivable that Nasser would attack with military force. (The Secretary interjected a note of personal satisfaction with this assurance from Prince Faysal.) Nevertheless, Saudi Arabia was concerned with U.A.R. infiltration tactics as employed in Yemen. In response to the Secretary’s question, however, he expressed confidence in the loyalty of the Saudi Army and in the absence in Saudi Arabia of effective U.A.R. subversive groups. Prince Faysal emphasized that he had not come to the U.S. to advocate any severance of relations with the U.A.R. nor did he wish harm to the Egyptian people. He stated that while he was speaking personally, he wished to emphasize that the directives from King Saud did not differ from the views he was expressing.

U.S. Global Responsibilities

The Secretary expounded on U.S. responsibilities in the world: the confrontation with the Soviet Union (Communism) on every continent and in different ways, e.g. militarily in Europe where we are forced to keep 400,000 soldiers, guerrilla type of Communist tactics in Viet Nam and more subtle tactics in Africa. In certain places, such as Ghana, we have with difficulty not “given up” and kept our pride; but the overall consideration has made it imperative that we maintain our presence until, hopefully, the situation changes and Ghanians look for an alternative. The Secretary stated that throughout the globe our policy has had one thread of consistency; namely, our concern for the welfare, independence and security of people. The Secretary expressed optimism that if the countries outside the Communist World managed to live through the danger, we would see more and more people turning away from Communism. The greatest danger lies in the Communists’ resorting to violence at moments when, and at places where, they felt they are losing, e.g. their failure in East Germany caused their intransigence on East Berlin. He noted that it was no accident that the North Vietnamese who were witnessing the contrast of prosperity in South Viet Nam chose to attack the latter.

Prince Faysal expressed gratitude for this obvious mark of personal confidence in making the Prince privy to U.S. policy considerations. He assured the Secretary that Saudi Arabia stands against Communism for traditional and religious reasons. He stated that Saudi Arabia is doing everything possible for its people. Education and health are free and, recently, social security regulations have been promulgated in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is not afraid of Communism as an ideology. This, however, does not mean that Saudi Arabia might not establish diplomatic relations with the USSR at some point. He expressed the hope that Saudi Arabia will not be compelled to do so in the near future.

Arrangements for Luncheon with the President

The Secretary informed Prince Faysal of the President’s invitation to him to lunch at the White House on Thursday, October 4, and of the informal briefing session which the President’s confidential advisors would give him at the Department. Faysal expressed gratitude and said he looked forward to both events.

Source: Department of State, Central Files, 320/9-2762. Confidential. Drafted by Seelye and Sabbagh on October 5 and approved in S on October 12. The conversation was held in the Secretary’s suite at the Waldorf Towers.

Saudi Arabia’s Plan for Changing Its Workforce

Editor — Thu, 02 Dec 2004 19:11:55 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

This article originally appeared in Migration Information Source on November 1, 2004 and is reprinted here with permission.

Saudi Arabia’s Plan for Changing Its Workforce
By Divya Pakkiasamy
Migration Policy Institute

Foreign workers compose a large portion of the Saudi workforce, a reality the Saudi government is seriously addressing. The Saudi Ministry of Labor estimated there were approximately seven million foreigners in the kingdom in 2003, making up a little less than one-third of the kingdom’s total population of 23 million. Expatriate labor across all occupations and skills levels constituted around two-thirds of the total workforce and 95 percent of labor in the private sector.

Over the last decade, the government has prioritized “Saudization,” an initiative aiming to increase employment of Saudi nationals across all sectors of the domestic economy, reduce dependence on foreign workers, and recapture and reinvest income that would have otherwise flowed overseas as remittances.

All states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) – Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) – are addressing the concern of foreign labor dependence. At present, some 10 million foreigners live in GCC states, constituting a significant portion of the region’s population. The presence of expatriates in these states range from 25 percent of the population in Oman to 80 percent of the population in the UAE. As the largest state in the GCC with the largest expatriate population, Saudi Arabia’s efforts to indigenize its workforce will have the most visible impact on the region’s economy and demographics.

While efforts at promoting Saudi workforce participation started as early as 1932, previous attempts at this program were not effectively enforced, and a large foreign worker population was maintained in the kingdom. The recent enforcement of Saudization legislation across all jobs sectors is a new phenomenon. Much of the Saudi business community has been shifting the composition of their workforces to comply with Saudization legislation.

More recently, small- and medium-sized business owners, with whom enforcement of Saudization was not as strictly applied, have started to protest that these measures place unfair pressure on them to hire more expensive local workers. Some expatriate communities have asked the government to recognize the value of their work and to continue to allow them access to the Saudi labor market.

Foreign Workers in Saudi Arabia

While foreign workers have manned the Saudi workforce since the inception of the kingdom’s oil industry in the 1930s, it was not until the oil price boom of 1973 that the country started to receive large inflows of workers. New projects to develop physical infrastructure, such as roads and buildings, dramatically increased the demand for labor.

As the local population was not meeting the manpower needs necessary for these projects, employers began to recruit skilled and low-skilled workers from abroad. Many South Asians and Southeast Asians migrated to Saudi Arabia in this period. Migration of Asian workers was especially encouraged as it was thought that, compared to Arab foreign workers, they would be less likely to settle, less likely to organize, and hence more easy to control. Despite the decrease in the pace of construction projects in the 1980s, South Asians and Southeast Asians have continued to constitute the largest portion of the expatriate population in the kingdom, indicating demand for foreign workers has shifted to other sectors of the economy.

Typically, foreign workers enter the kingdom on a service visa sponsored by a Saudi company or individual. The company is responsible for the initial renewal of this visa and the employee’s residence permit after two years, and, subsequently, the renewal of the employee’s documents every four years.

Only 15 percent of foreign workers in Saudi Arabia are engaged in skilled labor industries (oil, healthcare, finance, and trading), while the majority are employed in industries with a need for low-skilled labor (agriculture, cleaning, and domestic service). Expatriates from Europe and North America dominate high-skilled positions; low-skilled workers originate primarily from South and Southeast Asia.

Recent figures indicate that Saudi Arabia has between 1 and 1.5 million expatriates each from Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan, and around 900,000 workers from the Philippines. Together, these communities account for over half of Saudi Arabia’s expatriate population. Migrants from nearby and neighboring countries, especially Yemen and Egypt, also constitute a large part of the kingdom’s expatriate community. Western expatriates number around 100,000. According to respective embassy estimates, about 40,000 are from the United States, and about 30,000 are from the United Kingdom.

Western foreign workers are usually employed in skilled labor occupations. The total number of Western expatriates in the kingdom has been decreasing due to increased Saudization in the oil sector after it was absorbed into the public sector in 1988. Recent terrorist attacks targeting Westerners have also prompted many to leave the country.

Why Saudization Now?

The drop in world oil prices, which started in the mid 1980s and lasted until the late 1990s, strongly decreased the strength of the Saudi economy. Additionally, Saudi Arabia incurred huge expenses with its participation in the 1991 Gulf War, further aggravating the kingdom’s financial situation.

The current average unemployment rate reported by the government stands at 10 percent of the country’s workforce, but the unemployment rate for youth stands at around 32 percent. This high rate of youth unemployment could be dangerous for the kingdom, as young people make up the majority of the Saudi population. In 2004, one in every two Saudis was less than 15 years old, and an estimated 60 percent of the population was under the age of 20. The kingdom has also experienced tremendous growth in population size, growing from roughly 6 million in 1970 to 23 million in 2003.

The changing demographics have made generous social programs increasingly expensive and unfeasible. Unrest over the unemployment problem, coupled with terrorism concerns, has highlighted the importance of long-standing social issues. Since the 1990s, the Saudi government has sought to rectify some of these problems by more rigorously enforcing Saudization measures and other economic reforms.

This latest effort is a large undertaking for the kingdom, as its successful implementation will require more than simply replacing foreigners with Saudi nationals. Many skilled and low-skilled foreign workers are willing to accept much lower salaries, making some employers unwilling to hire Saudi nationals. Furthermore, many Saudi nationals do not find low-skilled occupations attractive.

Recent events have also increased the perception of foreigners as a potential security threat. The government’s caution especially increased after the September 11 attacks. This caution has continued because recent terrorist attacks have started targeting Saudi nationals, not just expatriates.

In response to security threats, many expatriates are voluntarily leaving the kingdom. Some companies have increased incentives to keep valuable workers, as there is a shortage of Saudis who are willing or have the professional qualifications to be employed in certain professions.

Another reason that has been suggested for the current enforcement of Saudization is the substantial financial losses incurred by remittance outflows. Between 1993 and 2002 expatriates remitted 585.4 billion Saudi riyals ($156.1 billion), averaging roughly 60 billion riyals ($15 billion) a year. The estimated gross domestic product reported for Saudi Arabia in 2003 was $287.8 billion.

Reforms

In 2003 the Saudi Manpower Council mandated that the number of foreign workers and their families should not exceed 20 percent of the total population by 2013, and that the number of persons from any single nationality should not exceed 10 percent of the total expatriate population. There is some doubt over the feasibility of this goal; the kingdom only achieved five percent total Saudization between 1998 and 2003, whereas meeting the Council’s goals will require a five percent increase in Saudization annually.

Working towards this goal will take a severe toll on the expatriate population. Asians from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and the Philippines, as well as Arabs from Egypt, Sudan and Syria, all have populations that make up more than 10 percent of the total expatriate population. Furthermore, if projected population growth statistics hold, more than 3 million expatriates will have to leave Saudi Arabia to achieve 80 percent Saudization by 2013.

The successful indigenization efforts of the airline, oil and banking sectors – all of which have workforces that are 70 to 100 percent Saudi – show that reforms can be enforced. The notion of being “surplused” – when foreign workers are told their services are no longer needed – is quite familiar within the expatriate community. However, foreign workers who are released due to Saudization-related business restructuring receive end-of-service benefits from the government.

Past Saudization measures have included a ban on hiring foreign workers in 22, mostly administrative, professions, and an increase in recruitment fees for employers hiring foreign workers. More recently, the Ministry of Labor has increased pressure on small- and medium-sized businesses to employ more Saudis, a measure that will be especially difficult to enforce as these business are much more difficult to regulate and less able to shoulder the increased expense of employing Saudis.

The government is also involving the efforts of large Saudi corporations. In 2001, the Shoura Council, the 120-member consultative council to the Council of Ministers, began applying Saudization metrics to those companies directly owned by or implementing projects for the state-owned oil conglomerate, Saudi Aramco.

While the Saudization program will decrease prospects for foreign workers, the Saudi government recognizes the continued need for foreign labor in particular sectors. For instance, Saudi hospitals need 100,000 nurses, but there are currently only 1,000 Saudi nurses and around 53,000 expatriate nurses recruited from Asia, Africa, and the West. Though there is a pronounced demand for nurses, complete Saudization of this profession will not be accomplished for many years due to the specialized training it requires. One limitation in indigenizing this field is the necessity for English-speaking candidates, which is now being addressed in targeted training programs for Saudi nurses.

The kingdom has also had difficulty with the travel industry. In a more controversial move, the government raided many travel agencies in early 2004. Several foreign employees from these agencies were taken into police custody and were then held for deportation. They were released after the government suspended the crackdown on travel agencies employing foreigners and issued a grace period for these agencies to bring their workforce into compliance with Saudization laws. The Ministry of Labor still plans to increase the present level of Saudization in the travel industry from 18 to 81 percent in three years, with noncompliant agencies facing the more serious threat of closure.

Protection and Rights for Foreign Workers

Saudization initiatives have also been coupled with reform to better the position of foreign workers in the kingdom. The first piece of legislation to grant rights to expatriates, the Basic Law issued in 1992, included a clause allowing foreigners the right to litigation. More recently, in 2003, the Shoura Council approved the formation of the Saudi Human Rights Committee (recently merged with the Shoura Islamic Affairs Committee) and the National Human Rights Association, an independent human rights monitor.

One function of the Human Rights Commission is to investigate human rights violations against foreign workers. Foreign workers, especially low-skilled foreign workers, are vulnerable to abuse in part due to language and cultural barriers. Many foreign workers have recruitment fees illegally deducted from their salaries.

A particularly notorious practice is the sale of “free” visas. Saudis are allowed to sponsor a certain number of work visas with the intention that they employ the foreigners they sponsor. In some cases, the Saudi will sponsor the foreigner’s work visa but leave the foreigner responsible for finding employment once he has entered the kingdom. The original sponsor profits from selling his sponsorship rights to another employer, who also pays him the fees charged for the original visa.

Foreigners who enter the kingdom through this channel usually pay a high recruitment fee to a middleman who is in contact with the Saudi sponsor. Many are unable to find work, and, when found, they are deported to their country of origin without having reduced any of the debt accrued in acquiring their original visas. The Ministry of Labor is currently taking a strong stand against this practice, having already banned the transfer of sponsorships for low-skilled workers.

In another development, the Shoura Council announced that foreigners would be allowed to apply for Saudi citizenship in 2004. This new legislation would allow foreigners meeting strict language and residency requirements to be eligible for Saudi citizenship. These include fluency in written and spoken Arabic, adherence to the Islamic faith, and a residency requirement of 10 years. For foreigners who qualify, the chance to become a naturalized citizen would greatly improve their situation and increase their rights. As foreigners’ opportunities for property ownership and investment are limited or non-existent, becoming a naturalized citizen would also give these workers the chance to participate more fully in the Saudi economy.

Conclusion

Despite Saudization efforts, the country continues to depend on foreign labor to fill both high- and low-skilled jobs. The ambitious goals set in some sectors are unlikely to be met in the short-term. Nonetheless, the government’s early initiatives ensure that the indigenization of the workforce will continue, if not on the fast-track schedule envisioned. Such changes in the Saudi economy stand to have a significant impact on labor-exporting countries, especially in Asia, which depend heavily on remittances from Saudi Arabia. It is too early to know, however, what the downstream effects of the Saudization policy will be on the economies of these countries.

Sources:

Abdelkarim, A. (1999). Change and Development in the Gulf. St. Martin’s Press, Inc.: New York.

Al-Dosari, S. (2003). “An Independent HR Body” Arab News. May 5.

Chaudhry, K. (1994). “Economic Liberalization and the Lineages of the Rentier State” Comparative Politics, Vol. 27, No. 1. pp. 1-25. October.

CIA World Factbook, “Saudi Arabia.” Available online.

Gardezi, H. (1995). The Political Economy of International Labour Migration. Black Rose Books: Montreal.

Ghafour, P.K. (2004). “First Independent Human Rights Organization Established” Arab News. March 3.

Hassan, J. (2004). “Expats Rethink Contract Renewal Because of Security Concerns” Arab News. June 13.

Looney, Robert. “Saudization and Sound Economic Reforms: Are the Two Compatible?” Strategic Insights. Volume III, Issue 2. February. Available online.

Middle East Information Network. “Saudi Arabia: Basic Law of Government.” Available online.

Ramkumar, K.S. (2004). “Expats in Travel Trade Feel the Heat of Saudiization” Arab News. April 8.

“Saudi Arabia’s foreign workforce” (2003) BBC News. May 13.

Sherry, Virginia. (2004). Bad Dreams: Exploitation and Abuse of Migrant Workers in Saudi Arabia. Human Rights Watch: Washington, D.C. July.

Tattolo, Giovanna. “Arab Labor Migration to the GCC States” Working paper. Jean Monnet Observatory on trans-Mediterranean relations. Available online.

World Development Indicators. Available online.

“Never Hate in Plurals”: US-Saudi People-to-People Relationships

Editor — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 19:14:28 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The Saudi-US Relations Information Service is pleased to share this presentation by Khaled Al-Maeena, Editor of Arab News. Mr. Al-Maeena appeared as a guest speaker at a dinner hosted by the Greater Hampton Roads (Virginia) World Affairs Council on September 16, 2004. We hope you will take time to read his observations on the state of people-to-people relationships between Americans and Saudis and his thoughts on how to move forward.

WORLD AFFAIRS COUNCIL OF GREATER HAMPTON ROADS
KHALED A. AL MAEENA
September 16, 2004

William Butler, President and CEO of SunTrust Bank, Hampton Roads: This is a real honor for me to be here tonight with our guests, and to extend a warm Hampton Roads welcome to all of them.

I spent four summers in Dhahran in Saudi Arabia in the early ’60s, back when oil was very much cheaper than it is today. I think it cost us ten to fifteen cents a gallon at the pumps just outside Dhahran. Unfortunately, I wasn’t old enough to drive back then. I also had the opportunity to spend four years in Iran, in Abadan, Iran. My father was an engineer with an oil company. And that experience, coupled with my experience in Saudi Arabia has given me a deep appreciation for the Middle East culture, the Arab culture. And I really enjoyed tonight catching up with what’s taking place in the Kingdom, how Dhahran where I lived for four summers has transformed. And, again, it’s a real honor for me to introduce Dr. Khaled Al Maeena and his wife Samar Fatany. Welcome.

As you’ve read, Dr. Maeena is a well-known PR consultant, media personality, editor and journalist in Saudi Arabia. He was CEO of Saudi Public Relations Company for eight years. His many media and diplomatic achievements include representing the Saudi media at several very important summit meetings in the Arab world, including Arab summits of Baghdad and Morocco. He was a member of the Saudi Diplomatic Delegation to the People’s Republic of China and Russia, after relations between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and those countries were established. He has extensive knowledge of Western media, and throughout his professional life he has made frequent visits to the United States, Europe, Asia, and Gulf countries. And his children have studied here in this country. He has consequently been involved as a guest lecturer at many internationally renowned colleges and universities and institutions. And while he’s been here in Hampton Roads this week, he has spent a lot of time with high school students and college students in this region and also with the League of Women Voters. And we really appreciate what both Khaled and Samar have done to gain a more balanced perspective or a perhaps a different perspective than what we hear from much of the American press.

Dr. Al Maeena has been the Editor-in-Chief of Arab News which is the largest English daily in the Middle East. And he’s been in that capacity for over fifteen years. He first joined the newspaper in June of 1982 and served as Editor-in-Chief until February of 1993. He rejoined Arab News in March of ’99, has been Editor since then. He’s also been an anchor on Saudi television and hosted many popular talk shows. He’s worked as a radio announcer on a TV program. He’s very interested in sports and has been a sports promoter in Saudi Arabia, promoting both squash and tennis tournaments. He has been educated extensively abroad, studied in the United States, Britain, Pakistan, and India.

It’s a real honor having someone of his stature here to give us his perspective.

His wife is equally accomplished. Mrs. Samar Fatany is a senior announcer, journalist, and radio talk show host for Radio Jeddah. She has a masters.. a BA from Cairo University in Egypt and has studied with the BBC on a number of occasions and she, in many respects, is the best-known female radio personality in the Kingdom, and has covered just about all of the major affairs in her country. She has accompanied Khaled on numerous trips abroad and has been involved in many high-level interviews of foreign and local officials and opinion leaders.

So, please join me in welcoming Dr. Al Maeena and his wife here to Hampton Roads.

Dr. Khaled Al Maeena

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. It is indeed a pleasure and a privilege to be here and I’m very happy to be in your fair city. But I am sad at the same time, sad because I lived in Virginia all these years and never discovered Norfolk.. it’s my loss. But anyway, Virginia has always been a second home to us, to my children.

Before I was born, America was a second home to many Saudis for many reasons: first, because the discovery of oil in Saudi Arabia after it was formed in 1932, thanks to these young American drillers who came in from California and Texas and Arizona and other parts of the United States, in those days just before the Second World War, and braved inclement weather, extreme heat and extreme cold, scorpions, snakes, and hostile terrain and dug, drilled for oil, fueled the economic engine of Saudi Arabia, which was a small country, and really helped us to get on the map. And so, for that, we owe Americans a great deal of thanks. As a result of the discovery of oil by the American companies, our trend was that we started looking at America. And this was done not only through government directives, but also through people.

In 1946, you had Saudi students studying at the University of Southern California. And one of them ended up marrying an American lady from Pasadena and brought her home. And she wrote a book called At the Drop of a Veil. The second edition is coming out now. She’s a sprightly old 84 year-old lady who still lives in Pasadena. Thus, you see the relationship that the United States and Saudi Arabia and especially the people had was a special relationship. It was a cordial relationship, and things were moving smoothly.

The Second World War ended and oil was needed again to fuel economic growth in Europe. It was Saudi oil which also helped the Marshall Plan, which the United States very generously implemented so that those countries in Europe that were devastated by the war would progress. And at that phase, I think, of world history, there was the ominous danger that was the Cold War. And as the Cold War started to become colder, what happened was that the Saudis decided to join the Americans in their fight and containment of Communism, and they did so. We were very happy to sign several treaties, including defense training, including social and economic development programs. And as such, I think that the United States’ President Eisenhower became almost a household name in the Arab World. And even in Iran, there was a big.. the biggest boulevard in Tehran was called Eisenhower Boulevard. And there were others, like Truman Boulevard. And so the relations not only of the governments but of the peoples in the Arab world and the United States were very strong. We were together in the fight together against communism, in its containment.

At the same time, we looked at America as a beacon of freedom to help us and help our governments progress and move ahead. Thousands and thousands of students came, not because they had to but because of choice. America offered in many ways many things that were similar to our way of life. Yes, we differed in many ways culturally. Yes, there were different attitudes and social mores, but in the basic essence — the belief in God, the family values, the upward mobility — these were similar, these were the similarities in our mode of thinking. And people started to come here.

In the 70′s and the 80′s, too, with the oil prices going up, the development program started in Saudi Arabia. And thousands, literally, of Americans came and settled there. In addition to the people that were working there for Saudi Arabian Oil Company — ARAMCO — we had others who took part. TWA started managing Saudi Airlines, other companies — Parsons, Bechtel and all — these names became very familiar. It was not just an import from American culture; it was know-how. It was a relationship based on equality. We were not just a client state. Yet, even in those days, we were accused of pandering to the Americans. But we said, ‘no.’ The Americans are partners who we look up to, who have helped us also develop so many of our initiatives and bring them into reality. And things went on, despite the various political bickering from leaders of both sides. There was a cordial relationship and atmosphere.

I remember coming here all the time, and for Saudis coming here it was a natural destination, not only for education but for tourism. At one time, there were 27 flights from Saudi Arabia, weekly flights, to the United States and Washington. Now, there are only two.

And I think what happened was that ‘good things don’t last’, as they say. And then came September 11th, a great day of shock and horror to people. To many of us, it was something unbelievable. It was like watching a horror movie. And I say this, the two countries that were most effected by September 11th were the United States — because 3,000 people were murdered on a fine morning, innocent people — and Saudi Arabia second. because the perpetrators of this evil act had come from there or belonged to that area. In fact, the first thing that the Saudi leadership did was to immediately condemn these attacks.

I remember that I was in Boston, and I had traveled by road to Washington when I saw the first statement, and it was a genuine statement by the Crown Prince who is deeply committed to US-Saudi relations, and by the people, the clergy. But the shock was there. And America was really hurt, and they asked why. And they had every right and reason to ask why. And we asked why. Why did these people do it? Who are these people? Because we couldn’t identify them at that time. There was that denial. And people accused us of being in denial. I said yes, the shock was that in a country which prided itself that there are no crimes — for those who have lived there literally no armed robberies, no rapes, no kidnappings — there was certainly denial. To have people from our country commit such horror really put us in a state of shock.

In America, people were in shock and grief. And we did feel America’s grief, and we did feel upset. And there was soul-searching, despite what one read in the newspaper — and I’ve got a foot in both camps. I was here at that time. The grief was significant. As events unfolded we came to know the ‘why’ and the ‘who’ — that this was a band of thugs and murderers who in no way represented our society or our religion. But what happened then — and I pleaded with many of my American friends to start a joint action and to search and probe and find out — on our part we felt aggrieved because suddenly the avalanche of hate which followed the grief.. and I do not blame people for getting upset.. and it pained me that the same friends and people had suddenly changed.

The majority of the people in the United States, like the majority of people elsewhere, do not have an idea of the nitty-gritty of what governments do, what are the relations between certain Saudis and the Americans, of how many Saudis were there. We were condemned, and that was something that we had to live with. The application of the principle of collective guilt: every one of us was a terrorist, a crook, a criminal, a murderer. And this pained me.

So, I decided to take the rest into my own hand. And you have a saying here: ‘when the going gets tough, the tough get going.” So, we decided to look into what was happening. As a newspaper, as private individuals, the first month post-September 11th, we received 600,000 emails full of hate and venom. But we were not upset. We knew America was angry, and we knew why they were angry. And we started replying. And this is no exaggeration. I had a task force of volunteers, Saudi men and women who were very concerned about this link, this 70-year link between us and the United States which is based on more than oil.

Many people in America view us as a gas station, as a big gas station. We offered more to America. In times of need we stood by them, whether it was Afghanistan, whether it was Nicaragua, whether it was other things that were happening in the Middle East. And especially in stopping the tide of Communism. People don’t realize that we were surrounded, and had it not been for Saudi-American cooperation, half of that part of the world would have fallen to the Reds.

We wanted the Americans to know this, but the Americans were in grief. And I remember among the hateful things that came, people sort of thought of us as the reincarnation of the devil, and they made Islam the religion of the devil. Some people are ignorant of our Judeo-Christian roots.

I’ll illustrate one example which again shows of how the American people, once they know the truth and once they have an idea, they can change their minds. So, on the 16th of December of 2001, just three months after the horror attacks on New York and Washington, I received an email from a gentleman in Montana. Usually we divided the letters that came in into three categories: one with the four-letter words — and I led a very sheltered life, so I kept those on the side. Another was for intellectuals who wrote and sent things in impeccable English, keeping those on the side, knowing that this person, no matter how offensive the message was to us, must be a graduate or working in academia or maybe a businessman. The third category was our answer to them. But anyway, this gentleman said, and I quote, and I remember that email-he said, “I hope that you pigs and swines and murderers..” (he didn’t use the ‘f word’) “..will be decimated by the armies of Christ. The armies of Lord Jesus Christ will come and kill you..” And he went on. Knowing he was from Montana.. [AUDIENCE LAUGHS]

..and knowing a little bit about America, I decided to send him an email using an American adage that ‘you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar’. At first, I said that I was going to sock it to this guy, but I said no. I feel his pain. So, I decided to write to him.

I said, “Please do not apply..” — that was the first time I used that expression in my dealings with Americans — “do not apply the principle of collective guilt. I am not Mr. Bin Laden’s agent, nor do I subscribe to his theories.” And I did explain my condolences, and I wrote “Peace.”

Two hours later he replies back and says, ‘What do you animals know about peace? You swine, you pigs!’ And he went on.. tough nut to crack, but I am a tougher nut.

So, I decided to send another email to the guy, and I said, ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t know why you use this venom against me. I am as innocent as you are.’

Anyway, on the 25th of December which was just five days later, and this was the first Christmas after this sad incident, I decided to send him a gift. You can send gifts through email, so I went to the Qur’an and took out from the words of Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, the story of the nativity of Jesus Christ, the birth of Jesus Christ. And I sent it to him, and I said, ‘This is my Christmas gift to you.’

One hour later he sends me an email and says, “And now you steal our Bible?!”

And it sort of made me think about it, and then I sent another email on the 28th. I said, ‘This is not the Bible. You have been accusing us of being anti-Christ, but I think that Muslims more firmly believe in Christ maybe more than you.” And I explained to him why, that you cannot be a Muslim if you do not believe in Jesus Christ. You cannot be a Muslim if you do not believe in Moses and Abraham, and especially I focused on the Lord Jesus Christ. And I explained to him and gave him other notes from other transliterations from the Holy Qur’an. I’m not in the preaching business, nor do I want to convert people. As it is, there are many preachers around. So, I again wrote “Peace.”

Three days later he sends me an email — I think three days was respite for me — he sent me an email, and it was the most profound email I had ever received in my life. He said, “Dear Mr. Al Maeena, thank you for your last email.” And I was waiting and bracing myself for what was coming up next.. and he said, “If my father was alive today, he would have hit me on the knuckles for being so rude to you and for being nasty to you and for applying this principle of collective guilt that you said. And I’m sorry. I never knew that Muslims believed in Jesus Christ.” And he said, “I apologize, and I’m going to my church tomorrow, and I’m going to speak, and I’m going to apologize to you in front of the congregation.”

I felt very touched. And it was indeed an example of the greatness of the American people, that if they know the truth, if they seek the truth, if they come to that conclusion, then they can change their minds.

We corresponded for quite some time. Three months later an email came from the same family name but a different first name and said, “My father who corresponds with you is ill, terminally ill. I hope that you will pray for him.” So, I posted it on the “net.” And there were maybe about five hundred Muslims from Indonesia to Morocco who sent emails to him, saying that we were praying for you in our Friday prayers in our mosques.

So, there were these guys from Montana who thought, these Muslims, we are abusing them, and they are praying for us — and indeed they were genuine. There were people who wrote letters to this man in Montana. Anyway, the gentleman died in April, but we still maintain good relations with his family. Not only his family but even the barber in that community started writing to us.

It shows that basically people are the same. There is no hatred among people. Hatred is caused by ignorance. It’s caused by the media — I’m also responsible for that because I’m in the media. It’s also caused by suspicion, when we paint pictures, when we tell about it, when we demonize Islam — and forgetting and conveniently obliterating the fact that we are an extension of Judaism and Christianity. True, there are problems. I’m not being idealistic. There are many problems that this world has. Otherwise it would be heaven, without problems. There are political differences. There are social differences. But basically, I think we have a common enemy, that of ignorance and hunger and disease, AIDS, other health issues, global warming, now, that are confronting humanity, confronting all of us. I think that we have to focus on points of convergence rather than divergence.

Anyway, after that, we decided to talk openly to the American people and tell them that we are also victims of terror, as you are victims of terror, not on that large of a scale, but on a scale that frightens us. People do not hate America. The Muslim is not your enemy. And they started believing that. We are not a PR company, and I’m just an ordinary man, but I saw among the Saudis, among the Muslims, the idea that we have to maintain that link.

We wanted friends in this part of the world. We wanted partners in this part of the world. We are not a banana republic, and God has blessed us, as is known, with wealth. And we were doing things, not to appease America, but we believed in the American people and the goodness of the American people. And we wanted to destroy the terrorists, those who want to create a wedge between religions and between peoples. Our victory would have been if we would all have said ‘no’ to them instead of being accused of shaming each other. Unfortunately, it didn’t subside on this part. Many things are.. you know, one of the generals spoke about ‘your God’, and one person said the Muslims worship the moon god. We worship the same God as you do. We have the same prophets as you do. I was discussing Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John with somebody, and they said, “Did you read the Bible? And do you know Noah’s Ark?” I said, ‘This is in the Qur’an.”

So, I would always.. I’m not being overly optimistic. Things can be better. I think if we all try, and if we all seek the truth, because we read in the newspaper.. sometimes I read things here in the newspaper that really make me upset and pain me, when people write and they still make fun of our Prophet. As I said, we believe in Jesus Christ and that he will come back, but we also believe that there was a prophet after him, which was our Prophet Muhammad. And when you read someone like Ann Coulter saying blasphemous things, and when you read other things, how do you expect people who live in that part of the world, who also listen –”They hate us,” “Us against them,” “Either with us or against us” — they get suspicious. And this fuels the tempers of young people who then tend to be enticed by these devils who want them to come.

So, there’s no organic problem between the United States and the Arab world. As I’ve said, the Muslim world was the natural ally of the United States for a long time. And we want it to remain that way. I believe that somebody asked me, “What should we do?” I said, “It takes people-to-people connections.” And I said that people should try and clamp down on those who incite people against each other and against other religions because all of us are the children of God, all of us have the same concerns — the concerns of bringing up our children, the concerns of seeing that they get a better position in life, upward mobility, taking care of ourselves. You ask a Saudi mother, “What would you like your son or daughter to have?” And she will say, “I would like them to have a laptop in their hands.” No mother would want their daughter or son to have a grenade, to have a dagger to go on killing. Yes, there are the realities of the world. There are people who espouse violence. This is on both sides, and both sides are to blame.

So, I think those who are in business, those who are intellectuals, those who are in academia should get together, talk frankly. We have differences. People talk about violence, people talk about things. Yes, we disagree with US foreign policy in the Middle East. We disagree with US foreign policy elsewhere. But that doesn’t mean that we hate the American people. We would like to iron out these differences. The United States is a harbinger of peace and prosperity and justice. It should be viewed in the Middle East, it should be viewed in our part of the world, as an honest broker, as a country that can push through positive things. It should be able to create the image and the perception in the minds of people that, yes, this is a country that would stand with the weak and be righteous, not only in its capacity as people but also as leaders.

Unfortunately, there is no morality in politics in many places of the world. And it happens in our part of the world, it happens in this part of the world. There are politicians, people who look for short-term gains. But I think that we can impress upon our local leaders and upon others that whatever steps they take, whatever utterances come, and if you have people amongst us, whether they are church leaders, or whether they are business leaders, we should ask them to be calm and not come up with things that could hurt us.

We were talking a couple of minutes ago with some people about the Saudis coming from Saudi Arabia to here. The numbers have trickled down, and somebody asked me why. I said that it was racial profiling, not getting visas and all. I personally would be hurt if this link that has been there for 70 years was broken because of some bureaucrat not getting his papers in order. I would really like people in academia to push through and get students here.

I would like to make the point that these 15 of the 19 who did these acts were not students. None of them were studying in a graduate school. None of them were studying in a university. These were people who had already slipped in through these immigration laws, who had come in as temporary students or had come in to learn how to fly and all. The image of the Saudi student, or the Muslim student, is one who came here — and many of these people who came from the Muslim countries that were not rich worked hard in order to get a green card and to come and stay here.

And so again, I would like to humbly state that we shouldn’t apply this principle of collective guilt, that we should take each on a case-by-case basis. As I tell people, “America is not out to get you. It has its own problems. It has an election going on, and it’s enough. These guys are at each other, so take some respite.” The same thing I told the Americans: “Believe me, the natives don’t bite.”

So, I hope that I will be able to carry this message, that when I go back I can say that I was met in a very friendly manner, that people in America were, yes, upset and hurt. But we have to make something from this, to try and to utilize this horrific act, this evil day, to make something good that will be permanent and will be lasting. I’m not being idealistic.

I think it’s important that we walk that extra mile, to exert that extra ounce of strength, to see to it that this hate, ignorance, ill-feeling, and ill-will will be banished forever. And I think that will be the best legacy that we will have for our children. Thank you.

[APPLAUSE]

Moderator: I assume you’re prepared to take some questions. I think you may have provoked a few, my friend.

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, from such nice people, I don’t mind.

Host: Well, with the World Affairs Council certainly the question and answers session is one of the finest traditions.
Question: Hi. I’m sure you’re familiar with the Arab Human Development report that was written by Arabs throughout the Arab world, and I think there’s a second edition that’s come out now. It’s provided a very controversial but honest appraisal of the achievements as well as the shortcomings. And I was wondering what your personal reaction was to it as well as perhaps the official reaction inside Saudi Arabia to that report.

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, I was pleased with that report because it was done by the Arab people, for the Arab people. And it is high time that we, in the Arab world, call a spade a spade, that we realize and we point our fingers at whatever problem or whatever situation exists. You can only solve a problem by admitting that there’s a problem. And for years, call it social mores, or whatever it is, people didn’t want to think anything bad, that everything was alright. But this report opened peoples’ eyes because it focused on the need to focus on young people, education, bureaucracy, accountabilities. So, I think it is a good sign that people now are realizing that there is illness in our society and we have to take care of that.

Question: Is that your opinion, or is it official?

Khaled Al Maeena: I have no post. I am a man of the people.

Question: Dr. Al Maeena, a few years ago the Crown Prince spent considerable capital, I think, in bringing together all the Arab leaders, to agree on a concord, a way of approaching the Israelis, so that this issue could be settled. Unfortunately, it didn’t materialize, but his efforts were considerable and there was great hope throughout the world. Do you think there’s an opportunity again for the Kingdom to work with the Arab nations to moving this issue a little bit closer to resolution?

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, I was there on that great day in Beirut when the Crown Prince announced that there would be complete normalization, and all the Arab countries signed. But unfortunately, the next day the sad events happened on the West Bank. There were these killings, and Mr. Sharon blocked it. I really believe that if there was another government down there this wouldn’t have happened.

The Arab countries would like normalization, but at the same time would like to see implementation of UN resolutions 242 and 338, which the United States is a signatory of. And as I said, people want peace. At times we are told, “But these are the guys that said they want to throw Israel into the sea.” This is Cold War rhetoric. This is the same thing that Khrushchev did when he banged his shoe in the United Nations. Nobody does these things anymore. Young people on both sides want peace. To me, the problem is the interference with the Palestinians and Israelis by outsiders. And I think if both these people are allowed to talk to each other and allowed to deal and negotiate and have a new set of leaders, believe me, I’m sure the problems would be solved much sooner than we think. But outside interference by groups, by parties, by governments, by people from our area and outside the area have impeded any sort of travel on this road that will take us to a complete and normal peace in the Middle East.

Question: Sir, I admire your courage tonight. I’m intrigued. My question is, given your Qur’an and your sunna and, I guess, your hadith for the Wahhabi, which gives you the sharia for your everyday behavior, given your five times a day involvement in prayers, how do people like Osama Bin Laden and the other people who want to fight, break loose from your community because it’s such a superb, welded religious operation, and I don’t understand how they got loose?

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, it’s mind-boggling. Sometimes I try to wonder why did this guy travel this road, and I sort of researched.. and again, this is not a blame game. Most of these people, the extremists and the terrorists, were products of the Afghan war. It was very unfortunate.

When the Russians invaded Afghanistan — and not many people know this-in 1979 there were two countries that were really alarmed. The United States was alarmed, and then, of course, Pakistan was alarmed because the Soviets were coming up. And on the other side there was another country, India. And then, of course, Saudis were alarmed. But at that time, Saudi oil prices were going up. There was money. So the United States asked Saudi Arabia to help play a role in stemming and stopping this tide of the Russian onslaught that was coming in. And so the people were encouraged to go and fight.

Young people left school. It was exactly like the Spanish Civil War, the romantics and everyone. And then, of course, religion stepped in: “Go and fight the godless communists.” So, then it became an Islamic fight. But then, not only was it an Islamic fight — everybody came in. And I will remember in 1982 I was in Peshawar when I saw a hippie type of character walking, and I said, “Why are you here? Who are you?” He said, “I’m a bartender from Brussels, and I’ve come to fight the Soviets.” So, I said, “Are you a Muslim or an Asian or an Afghan?” And he said, “No. It’s a great thing for me to be here.” Now, this is a guy from Brussels who wanted adventure. But there were many others who were told to go and fight in the name of God, and fight in the name of religion, and they did so.

Now, when the Soviet forces were defeated or, as you say, vacated from the premises of Afghanistan, these people had nothing to do. The mistake that the United States did — and the other Arab countries — they did not use these young people. The United States just walked out. The Arab countries just left. Pakistan pulled its troops. And these people had no one. They were like the lost legion. 20,000 to 25,000 people from all over the Muslim world and even from Europe and Africa and Asia were there. And, for whatever reason, they had no one to guide them. They could not go back to school. People viewed them with suspicion. Many of them had come to the Arab countries and were put in jail by the same people who told them to go and fight.

Then, of course, a savior came in the form of Al Qaeda, Bin Laden and all, and those people took them under their wing and told them something else. They said, “You guys have defeated one of the superpowers and made them retreat to Moscow. There’s another superpower, so let’s go and hit it.” And that’s why September 11 happened. Because of the twisted logic of some people who took these young people — and I feel sorry for them. And I really feel sorry because we owe it to them. And we are responsible for the neglect of these young people, be we governments or parents or educators and all. And let them loose. They had no place to go. And when you have no hope, the first person who offers you aid, you gladly accept that, and that’s why this happened.

Question: I’d like to ask what advice you’d give to aspiring Muslim journalists who face slander?

Khaled Al Maeena: Who face slander? Well, I think journalists should be brave enough. You know, I believe that if you are in this field, whatever you write becomes public property, because the next day anyone who reads it can attack you. I believe that the Muslims of America — and I was very happy to note there were many Muslims I met in California. And the first thing they said was: “Please don’t bring your problems from the Middle East and Asia and Africa to us. We may be ethnically belonging to that part, but we are Americans first.” And that gave me hope. Because, if you are here, you are first an American, and your loyalty is to the flag and the Constitution. America is a secular society. And before 9/11, somebody wrote in a Saudi paper that it is the greatest place for religion. And he also wrote that America is a promised land because you can be a Bill Clinton, Bill Kristol, Bill Gates, anything in the United States. And this was true when I read it. In America, you can be anything.

Question: Dr. Al Maeena, first I’d like to say something. Your countryman, Dr. Abdullah Mohammed Basnabi, is a very good friend of mine. We were studying for our doctorate at the University of New Mexico. I’m talking about early ’80s. And we discussed many thing like you said here. And at that time was the Afghanistan invasion. And he was a staunch anti-Communist, like myself, because I suffered in my native Hungary. But my question to him was, “What can we do to change the Americans’ minds concerning Arabs or Muslims?” Still, today, the same problem. Even here I was talking to some people, you cannot change because they are “terrorists.” Now, because some are involved, how come everybody is like that? Something should be done concerning changing the minds of the Americans. Maybe we should call the White House? I doubt it. So, what is your opinion, sir? Thank you.

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, peoples’ opinions change. I think this media hype has made it in such a way and there is media in certain quarters with a vested interest in the United States to create a wedge. They’re trying to make it as if the Muslims are from Mars. We’re not. We’re from here, too. There are American Muslims, there are Anglo-Saxon Muslims and so forth. There are others who want us to placate them and sort of grovel. This happened in Europe and it has happened elsewhere. I think if we take everything in stride, work hard to produce results and get on with our lives, you know, nothing will happen. As they say, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but names won’t hurt me.” So, that’s the thing with Americans. There will be bigots. They’re a nation of 300 million people. There will still be people after I leave who will say that they aren’t convinced, that say this is a whitewash. And there are people in the Arab world who are still not convinced that the United States is not an enemy to the Arab states. They believe that the United States moved into Iraq to grab Iraqi oil. Now, I don’t know what the motives are — some of the planners don’t know themselves — but you cannot go around and sort of generalize. The danger, my friend, is generalization. I am not my brother’s keeper, so I would also want the Americans and for those who hear this, that do not generalize. If one person is bad, don’t claim that everyone is bad. And this is exactly what I would do. I would move on. Just wear that British stiff upper lip and get on with my life.

Moderator: I’d like to ask Samar a question. I think it would be a great loss of an opportunity if she didn’t speak. One of the questions addressed taking democracy to the Arab world and helping it take root. And we in the United States — 85 years ago, women didn’t have the right to vote. More than half of the population. The Voting Rights Act is not even 40 years old which cemented the right of African Americans to vote here. And we have expectations about how other countries should be more democratic. I would like your perception as a professional Saudi woman, about the progress in Saudi society in terms of democratization and in terms of opportunities for women. And perhaps would you come up to the podium if your husband will share it with you and talk to the group for a moment.

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, I can’t say no. In Saudi Arabia, we say that I am the boss of the house, and I have my wife’s permission to say so. [LAUGHTER]

Samar Fatany: Well, I think if I could give you an idea of what’s going on in Saudi Arabia today, you might get a picture of the lifestyle and what is happening in Saudi society today.

Saudi Arabia is going through a reform movement today that is unstoppable. Saudi women will be the first benefactors of this reform movement. A lot of Saudi women are integrated into the workforce. 50% are women, and 60% of the population are under 25. So, we are in the process of nation-building. And a lot of our young people are concerned, more concerned and occupied about finding a job and getting a better education and having better skills. The government is reforming the educational system because a lot of our graduates don’t have necessary skills. They need to have computer training. English has become obligatory in the primary schools, as it is an international language, and they need it in their work. Training centers are opened up. The Saudization program is being implemented to provide more jobs for our graduates because a lot of the expatriate community is holding up a lot of jobs that are available in the Kingdom. A center has also been set up for women to do business deals and encourage them into the business community. Women are also part of the political agenda, as well. They are in committees, economic committees that have been formed. Three women have been appointed to our consultative council. A lot of women participate in international conferences today. So, women are also involved in the international community, whereas in the past they were marginalized. A lot of our graduates, 44 percent, are women. There’s a lot that’s going on in Saudi Arabia. It’s exciting times, and it’s very challenging. Our younger population is very focused. And there’s more focus towards giving them better services, better education, and employment.

It pains me to hear that Saudi Arabia is a breeding ground for terrorism and that our youngsters are involved in terrorist acts. Saudi Arabia today is a victim of terrorism. Our security forces are working hard to combat terrorism. A lot of the terrorists have been arrested. A lot of the security forces have lost their lives in trying to protect our country. So, our security and our prosperity is our main concern. And it is important for us to have this reform movement being supported by a strong ally like the United States. I think it would be a great shame to lose the whole of the Middle East to terrorism and to fuel this hatred, to make the whole area into enemies of the United States. It’s as if people are saying, “Yes, you are the enemy. Yes, we want to make you the enemy.” And that would be a fatal mistake. It would be a lost opportunity not to create better friendships and good will amongst our people.

Question: A question for Mr. Al Maeena, please. A media question. What is the role of an English-language newspaper in the Middle East? And how much of your circulation is outside of Saudi Arabia?

Khaled Al Maeena: The role of an English-language newspaper is to cater to all the English-speaking people. In our case, the paper was formed to meet the needs of the growing number of people who were coming in, coming in to work. But now, we have also evolved, and now we are a newspaper that everyone reads. We also distribute in the Gulf, in Bahrain, the UAE. We have a strong Indian readership because the subcontinent is very close to us. Four and a half hours flying time. So, we do distribute outside, and we are also on the Internet.

Question: Dr. Al Maeena, nice to see you again. Actually, the question I’m going to ask came up this morning, but since that was a much smaller audience, I’m going to ask that question again for the benefit of the larger audience. In your presentation in the morning and again tonight, I draw the conclusion that you make a distinction between the hatred — if I’m able to use that word; it’s a very strong word — but the Arabs do not hate the American people, per se. What they do not like is American foreign policy. As a media person, since you share and seem to believe in that, what are you doing — and when I say you, I’m referring to the media — in convincing the average, ordinary Arab man on the street that you don’t need to hate Americans. What you need to do is change the system. If people do not hate Americans, I cannot understand for the life of me why they would blow up 3,000 people, many of whom may not have even agreed with the policies of the Administration. What is the Arab News and all other media in the Arab world doing to change the mindset of the average Arab on the street?

Khaled Al Maeena: Well, you have a very large media. That media that has any connection with the governments of that area are very moderate medias. Private medias, we cannot control.

I’ll tell you what I did. When this incident happened, my editorials said, “No to Terror.” And on the first anniversary of September 11 it was there, and I received thousands of emails, and they were genuine.. and we walked down the street and asked people for their reaction.

Now, I’ll tell you something else that was done. It was after the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal — that was something that really shocked everyone. I had an editorial meeting with my staff. And my staff said, “Let’s put the most offensive picture on page one.” And I said, “No, I’m not going to put that.” And they said, “Let’s have voting.” And I said, “Okay, but remember, I’m like the United States, and I have the veto, and I’m going to use it.” In the end, we decided to put the least offensive picture, the Iraqi prisoner standing on that stool with the hood that I’m sure many of you have seen. And not the one with the dogs and the woman because that was what was most offensive to the Arabs and the Muslims.

But I’m one newspaper and one outlet. Even in the other newspapers that I directly or indirectly have a say in, we decided not to put it. And I was very pleased to see that most Saudi papers did not put it in. Then came the second wave of pictures that were published in most of the Western media. I told my staff, just as I don’t want the actions of those who killed 3,000 people and murdered them in cold blood attributed to me, I do not want people in the Arab world to think that these bunch of sick people and crazies who carried out these prison atrocities represent the United States Army. Because I know people. I have met many US military people. I met many of them in the first Gulf War. They are good people, they are soldiers. But if we go on inciting.. the Arab world was inflamed by seeing that picture of the private and the dog — you have seen that. There were the other pictures of the naked prisoners. These were things that were alien to us. And so if we don’t want the actions of thugs and murderers be applied to us, it works both ways.

After the Second World War, Eisenhower was asked a question by a British paper, “Do you hate Germans?” He replied, “I never hate in plurals.” It was a great answer by a great man. And I would like America to also subscribe to that theory of Eisenhower. Never hate in plurals.

America’s Need to Personalize the Enemy Is a Tough Challenge for Saudis

Editor — Tue, 23 Nov 2004 19:16:55 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

This essay originally appeared on the Gulf Research Center Web site in October 2004.

America’s social character is marked by a panoply of distinct attributes which seem odd to many societies today. Even those societies sharing historical and civilization affinities with the American society find it hard to make sense of some features that make up the American mindset.

Ever since the U.S. chose to step out of its self-imposed isolationism during World War I, a rather strange streak has held America’s mind as much within official circles as in the midst of the wider populace. Surprisingly enough, this streak has gained momentum over time. It seems to be endowed with attributes that seek to relentlessly single out a foreign foe that could be held responsible for all U.S. tribulations and even all the world’s miseries.

This almost compulsive need to “personalize the enemy” will continue for some years, at least until an alternative emerges in lieu of the old — perhaps a new political leader or a new state would have to be identified to bear America’s official and popular inimical sentiments.

Throughout modern history, the evolution of this phenomenon has witnessed several individuals and countries promoted to the rank of “America’s No. 1 enemy.” Some have been political leaders of third world countries, whose interests either ran contrary to or sharply diverged from U.S. special interests. The roster of enemies started with Cuban leader Fidel Castro, passed through Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and Iranian cleric Ayatollah Khomeini, and will expectedly not stop at Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden.

Over the past three years, the government and the people of Saudi Arabia have topped the list of “personalized enemies” who allegedly pose a threat against Washington’s security and interests. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, a sustained smear campaign has been unraveling in the U.S. in a bid to project Saudi Arabia as the “key enemy” of the American state and society.

As soon as allegations began to float about 15 Saudi nationals being involved, Americans lost no time in pointing accusing fingers at the Saudi government and people, while the heinous torture at Abu Ghraib prison committed by U.S. troops on an officially endorsed mission in Iraq was sidelined as wayward acts committed by a few perverse individuals.

Americans wrongly assumed that the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 attacks represent a large chunk of the Saudi society. Worse, many Americans believed that the perpetrators and those supporting them enjoy the backing of the Saudi state and ruling family. The truth however, is that those elements espouse and champion principles and values that are diametrically opposite to the values that animate Saudi society.

In the meantime, a number of U.S. political and media pundits, reputed for their long-standing animosity to everything Arab or Islamic, scrambled to capitalize on Sept. 11 by turning it into an open political and media war against Saudi Arabia and its people. These hate-mongering forces — Zionist-Israeli lobbies and their Christian right-wing allies who nourish a range of interests with a common goal — have achieved their long-cherished goal in identifying Riyadh as America’s No. 1 enemy.

As such, Sept. 11 provided them with a unique occasion to try and enact a swift volte-face in front of the U.S. public by insinuating Saudi Arabia as a “terrorist state leading a terrorist society.”
The groups that set into motion the anti-Saudi campaign could not have achieved much were it not for the huge resources at their disposal and the overwhelming control they exert on the various media outlets in the U.S.

In fact, Saudi institutions that deal with such matters, notably the Saudi Embassy in Washington, have realized that countering the campaign against the kingdom and confronting its implications is a mammoth exercise that exceeds their capabilities. Even the political and media challenges facing Saudi Arabia in the post-Sept. 11 era lie beyond Riyadh’s limited powers. The Saudi establishment has found itself maneuvering within a constricted space against a raging and fathomless ocean agitated by boundless inimical sentiments, not just at the official level, but also at the popular level.

Saudi authorities have woken up to the reality that the voices of reason and rationality have been muted by the deafening squeaks and screams of a carefully devised plot which has managed to manipulate the emotions of ordinary Americans and transformed them into naked animosity against the Saudi government and people.

Surprisingly, it seems as though Saudi Arabia’s presumed friends, both within the U.S. administration and among Americans, have become volatile overnight. Perhaps some of them feel uncomfortably embarrassed, or their personal and partisan interests hold them back from speaking up for what is right, even though their inner voice certainly calls upon them to do just that. This might explain why the efforts deployed by the Saudi Embassy and other Saudi organizations have had no perceptible impact, while the anti-Saudi campaign has.

On the third anniversary of Sept. 11 – in spite of the diligent efforts by Saudi Arabia in the U.S.-led “war on terror,” in spite of the kingdom and the Saudi people becoming victims of deadly terrorist acts, and in spite of the publication in July 2004 of a report by the U.S. Congress investigations into the Sept. 11 attacks that clearly and conclusively confirmed that neither the Saudi government nor its people nor any member of the ruling family played a direct or indirect role in the attacks – the kingdom remains in the accused box, with its name in bold on the U.S. list of foreign enemies.

As the U.S. electoral campaign reaches a fever pitch, presidential hopefuls appear to find it necessary to portray a negative stand toward Saudi Arabia, lending a blind eye to the findings of the past three years. A U.S. friend commented on the situation by saying: “You need to understand the position of the presidential candidate, John Kerry. He certainly cannot swim against the tide of American public opinion, which continues to hold the Saudi state and society in negative light. Lashing out against the kingdom has become an electoral ‘must’ in order to boost the popularity of the presidential candidate and cast him in the image of a politician determined to fight terrorism.”

Given this increasing tendency to voice anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Saudi positions by any presidential candidate, one cannot help but ask: Who stands in the dock now?

[This item originally appeared in October 2004]

About the Author

Abdulaziz Sager, a Saudi national, is founder and chairman of the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center.

President Kennedy and King Saud Meeting

Editor — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 17:33:09 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following history item is #191 Memorandum of Conversation from a meeting between President Kennedy and King Saud of Saudi Arabia in Washington on February 13, 1962.

While staying at his residence in Palm Beach, Florida, President Kennedy on January 27, 1962 paid a 15-minute courtesy call on King Saud. The King was recuperating in Palm Beach after hospitalization in Boston. Following this meeting, King Saud formally accepted President Kennedy’s invitation to visit him in Washington (see Document 152). The memorandum of the January 27 conversation is in Department of State, Central Files, 786A.11/1-3162. See Supplement, the compilation on Saudi Arabia, for documentation relating to the two Kennedy-Saud meetings.

Participants of the February 13, 1962 meeting:

President Kennedy

NEA–Mr. Grant

U/PR–Mr. Duke

NE–Mr. Seelye

King Abdul Aziz al-Saud

Shaikh Abdulla al-Khayyal, Saudi Ambassador

Jemal Hussaini, Royal Counselor

Bakhir Yunis, Saudi Arabian Government Press and Publications Office*

* Bakhir Yunis had not been scheduled to attend the meeting and, although King Saud envinced displeasure at his presence, he did not evict him. [Footnote in the source text.]

#191 Memorandum of Conversation from the meeting between President Kennedy and King Saud of Saudi Arabia, February 13, 1962. The following is a list of topic areas that were discussed in the meeting.

Iraq-Kuwait

The President expressed pleasure at the opportunity to discuss with His Majesty some of our concerns in the Middle East. He asked the King for his views on the Kuwait-Iraqi relationship and whether Qassim would continue to exert pressure on Kuwait. The King expressed confidence that Kuwait would succeed in withstanding Iraqi pressures in view of the support Kuwait enjoys from “all of the Arabs” as well as Great Britain’s vital interest in Kuwait. The President wondered whether this was a sufficient enough deterrent against a possible Iraqi surprise attack on Kuwait which conceivably might be accomplished within the space of a few hours. The King expressed the view that the presence of Arab troops in Kuwait, together with back-up British military support, would be sufficient.

Syria

The President asked the King for his views on the new regime in Syria. The King expressed pleasure with the new regime although, contrary to U.A.R. [United Arab Republic] assertions, he said Saudi Arabia had had nothing to do with the Syrian secession from the U.A.R. The President asked whether the King saw any danger signals in the Syrian Government’s economic mission to the Soviet Union. The King expressed confidence that the Syrian Government would remain anti-Soviet and emphasized the importance of U.S. assistance to Syria as insurance. The President indicated that the U.S. is alert to Syria’s need for assistance and has already pledged a certain amount. He said our Ambassador to Syria has returned to Damascus from consultations in Washington with instructions to follow up closely Syria’s need for further U.S. assistance. In response to the President’s question as to the existence of pro-Nasser sentiment in Syria, the King replied that while many Syrian youth had once been enamored with Nasser, the U.A.R. President now commands virtually no following in the country.

U.A.R.

The President asked the King for his assessment of developments in the U.A.R. The King reported that at the time of the Suez campaign in 1956 he had pledged Nasser his full support and for a number of years Saudi Arabia had enjoyed excellent relations with the U.A.R. The recent nationalization and sequestration decrees, however, had revealed Nasser as a Communist who presents a real danger to the Arab World. (The King repeated this point several times during the meeting.) The President noted that the Communist Party is banned in the U.A.R. The King contended that this is merely a facade. In response to the President’s question as to how long the King thought Nasser would stay in power, the King commented that while only God knew, Nasser’s days appeared to be numbered. The President asked whether the military in the U.A.R. is disaffected with Nasser. The King replied that both military and civilians in the U.A.R. now oppose Nasser. The King called the President’s attention to the vehement attacks being leveled by the U.A.R. against both the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. He understood the reason Saudi Arabia was the object of these attacks but why the U.S. which continues to provide the U.A.R. with economic assistance? The President pointed out that our assistance to the U.A.R. has been mainly in the form of sales of agricultural surpluses for Egyptian currency for which humanitarian reasons exist. He said our economic assistance to the U.A.R. should not be misunderstood as supporting U.A.R. policies. Nevertheless, continued the President, we are watching Nasser’s policies carefully and are prepared to review our economic assistance to Nasser in the light of future developments.

Saudi Complaint Regarding U.S. Assistance to States with Leftist Tendencies

The King told the President he wished to speak to him in all candor on the following subject which had been bothering him: U.S. aid to states which have pronounced leftist tendencies and sympathize more with the Soviet Union than with the U.S. The President asked the King specifically what countries he had in mind but did not succeed in eliciting any definite response. The President told the King that the basis of our assistance to such countries as Indonesia, Ghana and Guinea is to reinforce anti-Communist elements in the hope that the latter will eventually assume a predominant role and, at the same time, in order to prevent a further drift to the leftist camp. When the King mentioned the U.A.R. in this category, the President said that the same principle applied. The President acknowledged the impossibility of predicting accurately the direction these countries will take. The King commented that there are some countries which are 100 percent Communist which receive U.S. assistance. The President replied that our aid to Yugoslavia, for example, has kept Yugoslavia out of the Warsaw Bloc and this, in turn, has protected the flanks of Greece and Turkey. The President called the King’s attention to the Soviet-Chinese split. The King asked what side the President thought the U.A.R. would take in the event of war. The President said this depended on the type of war. It would

Pakistan-Afghanistan Transit Dispute

The President informed the King of our concern over the impasse which has been reached in connection with the Pakistan-Afghanistan transit dispute. He reviewed briefly the current history of the problem and pointed out that if the matter is not soon resolved, we will be faced with the necessity of considering the construction of a road of ingress into Afghanistan through Iran. The Afghanistani action in reopening the border on a temporary basis has helped somewhat, he observed. The President recalled that the Saudi Government had been helpful in the preliminary stages of negotiating a settlement of the 1955 Pakistan- Afghanistan dispute and asked the King for his views on how the problem might now be ameliorated. The King replied that he, too, has been concerned at the existence of this dispute between these two neighboring Moslem countries. He expressed a desire to help again if this could be effective, and called attention to the Soviet pressures being placed upon Afghanistan. (Jemal Hussaini remarked that as a former member of the Saudi negotiation team in 1955 he believed that Afghanistan would resist Soviet domination to the last man.) The King stated that while in the hospital in Boston he had received letters from the chiefs-of-state of both Afghanistan and Pakistan independently seeking his support. He mentioned a long-standing invitation from the Afghanistan Government to visit the country and indicated the possibility that upon his return to Saudi Arabia he might take advantage of this invitation to offer his mediation services.

Saudi Concern with Algeria, Palestine and Southern Arabia

The King asked for the President’s forebearance while he raised three subjects uppermost on his mind: Algeria, Palestine and Southern Arabia. With regard to Algeria, the King expressed appreciation for the position the President had taken while a Senator and hoped the President’s views had not changed. The U.S. should use its influence to assure a “favorable” solution. With regard to Palestine, the King indicated the importance of implementing the 1947 UN resolutions and thus adhering to the UN charter. On the subject of Southern Arabia he referred to the British policy of “colonialism” in the southern part of the Arabian Peninsula, including that affecting Buraimi. The King expressed the hope that the U.S. would persuade the British to modify their policies in this area.

The President indicated optimism that the matter would be settled soon. He pointed out General de Gaulle is doing his very best under trying circumstances. On Palestine, the President recalled the correspondence last year he had exchanged with the King on the subject and said that he was fully aware how strongly Saudi Arabia feels on this issue. He acknowledged the “gap” in the respective U.S.-Saudi approaches to the problem, but pointed out that the United States wishes at the same time to maintain good relations with both Israel and with Saudi Arabia. With regard to the King’s comments on Southern Arabia, the President stated that he was not fully informed on the subject and following consultation, we would be in touch with His Majesty.

Request for U.S. Economic Assistance

The King reminded the President that Saudi Arabia is a relatively backward country whose native resources are inadequate to cover the growing needs and appetites of a population of some 10 million. (Note: An exaggeration of approximately 4 to 5 million.) He said Saudi Arabia is in dire need of hospitals, schools, ports, roads and artesian wells, and relies on the United States for required assistance. The President noted that the Saudi Arabian Government has hired a number of technicians including, in particular, Mr. Harold Folk, an American employed as the top planning advisor in the new Supreme Planning Board. He expressed his understanding that the World Bank had prepared a development plan for Saudi Arabia which was being executed under the aegis of these technicians. Nevertheless, he continued, the U.S. would be prepared to discuss the matter of possible economic assistance with the Saudi Government and suggested that the Ambassador might wish to raise the subject with Mr. Fowler Hamilton, among others in the State Department. The King wondered whether the United States might be able to send an economic mission to Saudi Arabia and whether, in any case, the U.S. could agree in principle at the outset to providing economic assistance. The President replied that we would first need information on specific projects and areas of need before making any decision. He said the U.S. would be delighted to receive a Saudi economic mission and would be willing to dispatch a mission to Saudi Arabia. He expressed certainty that U.S. lending institutions would be willing to consider projects which the Saudi Arabian Government might wish to submit on their merits.

Status of USMTM

The King called attention to the needs of his Government to develop a strong military force. His Government, he said, was requesting the U.S. to retain its Military Training Mission in Saudi Arabia but on a reduced scale of 80 officers and men. The President replied that we are prepared to be sympathetic to the proposal to retain the USMTM but the figure of 80 is too small. With the removal of the Second Air Division from Dhahran, the administrative requirements of the mission would increase and an adequate training job could not be accomplished with less than some 200 men. The King said that the reason for his desire to reduce the size of the mission was to economize. The King was then informed that the U.S. defrays the costs of the USMTM with the exception of housing and local transportation. The King commented that if the U.S. could pay for all the costs of the mission, it could be any size.

Credit Terms for Latest Saudi Arms Purchase Request

The King stated he would also like the U.S. to arrange credit terms for the most recent Saudi request for the purchase of about $16 million worth of arms and equipment in accordance with the 1957 arms sale agreement. The President asked for the status of existing credit payments and was told that several more payments are still due. The King expressed regret at Saudi delinquency in past payments and said he wished to correct this. The President informed the King we would look into the matter of further credits and would ask the Saudis to indicate the nature of the credit arrangements they had in mind.

Port of Damman Customs Difficulties

The President told the King that there were two irritants in U.S.-Saudi relations which he wished to draw to the King’s attention, the first of which was the matter of customs difficulties experienced by our Consulate General personnel at Dhahran. The President said he hesitated to bother the King about such an administrative matter, but this was causing us a serious operational problem. The King referred to the matter of reciprocity in privileges accorded Consular personnel. It was pointed out to the King that reciprocity already exists and yet equipment for our Consulate General in Dhahran continues to remain in customs. The King promised to look into the matter and pledged all possible assistance. He asked that in the future the American Ambassador in Saudi Arabia deal directly with the King on this matter.

Discrimination Against American Jews

Another irritant the President referred to was the inability of American citizens of Jewish faith to transit Dhahran airport and the refusal of the Saudi Government to issue visas to American Congressmen of Jewish faith. The King replied that the Saudi restrictions are only placed upon Zionists and that “many” non-Zionist American Jews have visited Saudi Arabia. The President commented that Congressmen of the Jewish faith, whether or not they are Zionists, are Americans who have pledged allegiance to the United States. The Saudi refusal to allow them to enter Saudi Arabia is grist for the propaganda mill and hurts the Saudi cause. The President surmised that some who claim a desire to visit Saudi Arabia would probably not go once they were issued visas. The President stated that Saudi policy in this regard is more extreme than that pursued by other Arab states. The King promised that he would give the matter consideration after his return to Saudi Arabia and expressed his intention to apply the policy followed by other Arab states.

Note: Telegram 983 to Cairo described key points raised during this meeting, primarily those not relating to direct U.S.-Saudi bilateral relations, and suggested that Bowles brief Nasser on it when they met. It also indicated that UAR Ambassador Kamel had been briefed on the Kennedy-Saud meeting. (Department of State, Central Files, 786A.11/2-1762)

Source: Department of State, Central Files, 786A.11/2-1362. Secret. Drafted by Seelye (NEA/NE) on February 16 and approved by the White House on February 27. The briefing book that the Department of State prepared for President Kennedy’s use prior to the February 13 meeting is ibid., Conference Files: Lot 65 D 533, CF 2054.

Rice Moving Up To State – Background on the News

Editor — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 17:29:20 +0000

Introduction

President Bush nominated Dr. Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday, November 16, 2004 to become the 66th U.S. Secretary of State. Rice, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs from 2001, will succeed Colin Powell, whose resignation was made public a day earlier.

This NID provides information about the announcement, Dr. Rice’s remarks concerning the US-Saudi relationship, reaction to the announcement in Arab media, Dr. Rice’s biographical data and a compilation of Dr. Rice’s public statements regarding US Middle East policy.

In the News

Dr. Rice, who must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate for the post, will be the first black woman and only the second woman to be chosen as America’s top diplomat. The first woman in U.S. history to serve as Secretary of State was Madeleine Albright who served during the second term of the Clinton Administration (1997-2001). The Secretary of State is fourth in line to succeed the president.

During the last four years I’ve relied on her counsel, benefited from her great experience and appreciated her sound and steady judgment,” said President Bush in making the announcement. “And now, I’m honored that she has agreed to serve in my Cabinet. The Secretary of State is America’s face to the world. And in Dr. Rice, the world will see the strength, the grace and the decency of our country.

“When confirmed by the Senate, Condoleezza Rice will take office at a critical time for our country. We’re a nation at war; we’re leading a large coalition against a determined enemy; we’re putting in place new structures and institutions to confront outlaw regimes, to oppose proliferation of dangerous weapons and materials, and to break up terror networks.

“The United States has undertaken a great calling of history to aid the forces of reform and freedom in the broader Middle East so that that region can grow in hope, instead of growing in anger. We’re pursuing a positive direction to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, an approach that honors the peaceful aspirations of the Palestinian people through a democratic state, and an approach that will ensure the security of our good friend, Israel.

“Meeting all of these objectives will require wise and skillful leadership at the Department of State, and Condi Rice is the right person for that challenge,” said President Bush.

Dr. Rice was tapped by the Bush campaign in 2000 to advise the candidate on national security issues and foreign policy. Rice joined the Bush Administration as National Security Adviser on January 22, 2001. In this position, Rice became one of President Bush’s closest confidantes and counselors during the U.S.-led war on terror and the invasion of Iraq. Rice’s deputy, Stephen Hadley, will replace her as the National Security Adviser when she moves to Foggy Bottom.

As Secretary of State, one of Rice’s challenges will be to bring renewed attention and focus to Middle East diplomacy. Rice will also be charged with maintaining the important existing relationships with Middle Eastern partners in the war on terror, especially Saudi Arabia.

Outlook on Saudi Arabia

Rice has been supportive of the Kingdom’s efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian issue. On March 11, 2002 on PBS’s Newshour with Jim Lehrer, Rice talked about Crown Price Abdullah’s peace initiative. She said, “First of all, even though the violence has worsened, we think there’s a little bit of an opening made possible by the initiative of Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, recognizing that out of a peace process there ought to be normalization of relations between the Arab world and the Israelis. We think that even though that is not a plan, per se, that it is an initiative that says that the moderate Arab states want to accept responsibility for being part of the solution and so we want to explore that opening.”

[Ed. Note: At the Beirut Summit in March 2002, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Abdullah put forth a proposal for the Arab-Israeli peace process. He proposed that Israel withdraw to pre-1967 borders and that it recognize an independent Palestinian state with a capital in East Jerusalem. The proposal also calls for a resolution of the Palestinian refugee problem through repatriation and/or compensation. In addition, Crown Prince Abdullah proposed the normalization of diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel as well as Arab recognition of Israel. This proposal was fully endorsed by the 22-memeber League of Arab States at the Beirut Summit.]

Dr. Rice has spoken positively on US-Saudi cooperation in the war on terror [see remarks below]. The Administration view on the relationship is often emphasized by President Bush. On May 16, 2003 he said, “Saudi Arabia is our friend, and we’re working closely with them to track down the killers of American citizens and British citizens and citizens from Saudi Arabia, as well as other countries.

“We’re doing everything we can to secure the homeland. The best way to secure the homeland is to work with countries like Saudi Arabia and to find the killers and get them before they get us. And that’s what this country will do,” continued President Bush.

Likewise, Rice has praised the Kingdom’s efforts to track down terrorists and stop the financing of terrorism. In an interview with wire and print journalists on March 24, 2002, Rice said, “We’ve got a worldwide coalition fighting this terrorism. We’ve liberated 50 million people. We have a good ally in Afghanistan. We’re building a good ally in Iraq. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are fighting in the war on terrorism like they never have before. I think that the American people understand that.”

More recently, in a speech given at the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference on October 25, 2004, Rice said, “Until recently, terrorists were well-established in Saudi Arabia and faced little scrutiny and even less opposition. But today, particularly after the May bombings in Riyadh, the Saudi government is shutting down the facilitators and financial supporters of terrorism.

“The result of these efforts is plain: the terrorists’ world is growing smaller. The places where they can operate with impunity are becoming fewer and fewer. And, we will not rest until there is no safe place for terrorists to hide,” said Rice.

Reactions

Comments from Middle East oriented press outlets, compiled in a BBC Monitoring report:

The US State Department has moved further to the right following Powell’s resignation and the appointment of Condoleezza Rice. The only common denominator between Powell and Condoleezza is the color of their skin. One sure thing on which analysts will agree is that Condoleezza Rice is an exceptionally powerful personality, yet weak due to her devotion to Bush.
–London-based Pan Arabic Al-Arab al-Alamiyah

She does not belong to the new conservatives, but is a pragmatic politician who is not blinded by ideology. However, she is a difficult interlocutor, and has unwavering convictions. Despite this she managed, nevertheless, to come to an understanding with her French interlocutors on more than one topic.
–London-based Pan Arabic Al-Hayat

In her capacity as national security adviser, Rice has expressed more than one extremist view and promoted hardline policies in Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine. Therefore, no one should expect her to change her views in her new post, rather one should expect her to adopt more hardline policies.
–Jordan’s Al-Dustur

Condoleezza Rice is midway between the doves and hawks, moving from one nest to the other. Her presence in the State Department might restore its importance after the hawks had clipped Powell’s wings.
–Palestinian Al-Hayat al-Jadidah

The appointment of Condoleezza Rice is a strong indication US policies in the Bush second term will be dominated by the military.
–United Arab Emirates’ Al-Khalij

Growing racism towards the Palestinians and Arabs in general in America is today a reality. It is appropriate that Condoleezza Rice should do something about it as she gets ready to move to her new post. Will she be willing to tackle it?
–Lebanon’s Al-Nahar

Yesterday officials in Israel had difficulty concealing their happiness at the appointment of Condoleezza Rice. For Israel, Rice’s appointment is great news primarily because for the first time there is a chance for change in the State Department’s traditional attitude to Israel: while White House officials have always tended to accommodate Israel for political or other considerations, State Department officials sought greater balance in their approach towards Israel and the Palestinians.
–Israel’s Yediot Aharonot

Also:

World press split over Rice
Newspapers around the world have mixed views on the nomination of Condoleezza Rice as the new US Secretary of State. While some commentators see the appointment as a positive move which will enhance US foreign policy in the years ahead, many fear it heralds a more hard-line approach to international affairs.. Complete report..

Editorial: Enter the She-Hawk
Arab News — November 18, 2004

Excerpt..

“Over the past four years Bush has developed a foreign policy strategy that is a far cry from the classical Cold War balance of power politics that nurtured Powell’s generation. He is the first US president since Ronald Reagan to be determined to use American power to reshape the world rather than maintain the status quo. In that sense, someone like Powell could not be regarded as other than an intruder. Condoleezza Rice, on the other hand, is a well-established member of the president’s political coterie. An expert in communism, Rice was among the first American scholars of her generation to assert what was at the time regarded as the supreme political heresy – that the Soviet empire could be brought down. Bush’s regime-change and exporting-democracy politics sounded out of place in Powell’s discourse but constitute a vital part of Rice’s political mother tongue.”
Source: Arab News

Bush Picks Rice for Top Job
Barbara Ferguson, Arab News — Nov. 17, 2004

Excerpt..

According to Republican officials, the selection of Rice reflects Bush’s determination to take personal control of the government in a second term.

But Rice, who is fiercely loyal to the president and his closest foreign policy adviser, is considered by many experts as being one of the weakest national security advisers in recent history in terms of managing interagency conflicts.

Rice not only had to manage two powerful Cabinet members with sharply different views – Powell and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld – but also had to deal with Vice President Dick Cheney, who is said to weigh in on every major foreign policy issue.

Not everyone was happy to learn of her nomination. “We, as a nation, will survive this crowd,” a former Foreign Service career officer anonymously told Arab News. “And at State, we will also survive.”

He said Rice “was an unfortunate choice.” Pausing, he added: “I’m still in shock from Nov. 2 (elections), so don’t look for objectivity from me.” The former diplomat cautioned: “You have to watch who she imposes on the bureaucracy (State Department): If there are some real Neanderthals she puts in key positions, then watch out. We may just maintain this implacable situation in the world.”

Source: Arab News

The Greater Middle East Initiative

As the Secretary of State in the second Bush Administration Dr. Rice will be responsible for a series of programs launched under Colin Powell to advance US policy in the Middle East. Among them is the Greater Middle East Initiative. The Saudi-US Relations Information Service provided a News In Depth feature titled, “Bush on the Middle East, Energy Independence and U.S.-Saudi Relations,” on November 1, 2004. It included a discussion of the administration’s “Greater Middle East Initiative,” the “Middle East Partnership Initiative” and the “Middle East Free Trade Initiative.” Click here to view that “NID.”

OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Condoleezza Rice became the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, commonly referred to as the National Security Advisor, on January 22, 2001.

In June 1999, she completed a six year tenure as Stanford University ‘s Provost, during which she was the institution’s chief budget and academic officer. As Provost she was responsible for a $1.5 billion annual budget and the academic program involving 1,400 faculty members and 14,000 students.

As professor of political science, Dr. Rice has been on the Stanford faculty since 1981 and has won two of the highest teaching honors — the 1984 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 1993 School of Humanities and Sciences Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching.

At Stanford, she has been a member of the Center for International Security and Arms Control, a Senior Fellow of the Institute for International Studies, and a Fellow (by courtesy) of the Hoover Institution. Her books include Germany Unified and Europe Transformed (1995) with Philip Zelikow, The Gorbachev Era (1986) with Alexander Dallin, and Uncertain Allegiance: The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army (1984). She also has written numerous articles on Soviet and East European foreign and defense policy, and has addressed audiences in settings ranging from the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence in Moscow to the Commonwealth Club to the 1992 and 2000 Republican National Conventions.

From 1989 through March 1991, the period of German reunification and the final days of the Soviet Union, she served in the Bush Administration as Director, and then Senior Director, of Soviet and East European Affairs in the National Security Council, and a Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. In 1986, while an international affairs fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations, she served as Special Assistant to the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In 1997, she served on the Federal Advisory Committee on Gender — Integrated Training in the Military.

She was a member of the boards of directors for the Chevron Corporation, the Charles Schwab Corporation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the University of Notre Dame, the International Advisory Council of J.P. Morgan and the San Francisco Symphony Board of Governors. She was a Founding Board member of the Center for a New Generation, an educational support fund for schools in East Palo Alto and East Menlo Park, California and was Vice President of the Boys and Girls Club of the Peninsula . In addition, her past board service has encompassed such organizations as Transamerica Corporation, Hewlett Packard, the Carnegie Corporation, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The Rand Corporation, the National Council for Soviet and East European Studies, the Mid-Peninsula Urban Coalition and KQED, public broadcasting for San Francisco.

Born November 14, 1954 in Birmingham, Alabama, she earned her bachelor’s degree in political science, cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Denver in 1974; her master’s from the University of Notre Dame in 1975; and her Ph.D. from the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver in 1981. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been awarded honorary doctorates from Morehouse College in 1991, the University of Alabama in 1994, the University of Notre Dame in 1995, the National Defense University in 2002, the Mississippi College School of Law in 2003, the University of Louisville and Michigan State University in 2004. She resides in Washington, D.C.

July 2004
Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/ricebio.html

DR. RICE ON THE RECORD

Dr. Condoleezza Rice’s Opening Remarks to Commission on Terrorist Attacks – April 8, 2004

Excerpt

..Under [President Bush's] leadership, the United States and our allies are disrupting terrorist operations, cutting off their funding, and hunting down terrorists one-by-one. Their world is getting smaller. The terrorists have lost a home-base and training camps in Afghanistan. The Governments of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia now pursue them with energy and force.

We are confronting the nexus between terror and weapons of mass destruction. We are working to stop the spread of deadly weapons and prevent then from getting into the hands of terrorists, seizing dangerous materials in transit, where necessary. Because we acted in Iraq, Saddam Hussein will never again use weapons of mass destruction against his people or his neighbors. And we have convinced Libya to give up all its WMD-related programs and materials.

And as we attack the threat at its sources, we are also addressing its roots. Thanks to the bravery and skill of our men and women in uniform, we removed from power two of the world’s most brutal regimes — sources of violence, and fear, and instability in the region. Today, along with many allies, we are helping the people of Iraq and Afghanistan to build free societies. And we are working with the people of the Middle East to spread the blessings of liberty and democracy as the alternatives to instability, hatred, and terror. This work is hard and dangerous, yet it is worthy of our effort and our sacrifice. The defeat of terror and the success of freedom in those nations will serve the interests of our Nation and inspire hope and encourage reform throughout the greater Middle East..

Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/04/20040408.html

Dr. Condoleezza Rice Discusses the War on Terror on “60 Minutes”
March 28, 2004

Excerpts

Q The Bush administration’s handling of the war on terror is the most talked about and controversial topic in the country these days; hearings are being held here in Washington; books are coming out criticizing the administration’s handling of the war. As the National Security Advisor to the President of the United States, how do you feel about all of this?

DR. RICE: I think it’s perfectly logical, Ed, that people want to know that their country, their government, is doing everything that it can to protect them from another event like September 11th. I think we have to say that it’s very difficult to do in an open society, and we cannot rule out that we might have another attack – indeed, we know that there are terrorists out there every day trying to pull off another spectacular attack.

But I think it’s perfectly logical that people want to know what we’re doing — and we’re doing a lot. Since September 11th, we have wrapped up two-thirds of the al Qaeda leadership. The President has liberated 50 million people in Afghanistan and in Iraq. We’ve taken away their forward-operating bases around the world. We have worldwide cooperation with places like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. We really have terrorism on the run. But this is going to be a long war against terrorism, as the President told the American people just a few days after September 11th.

[Also]

Q Al Qaeda has become a decentralized collection of regional networks, said to be working autonomously. Does that make them more dangerous today?

DR. RICE: They’re very dangerous. I still believe that we have done a lot to hurt this organization. We’ve been able, through our international partners, to cut off a lot of their support and their funding; we’ve killed two-thirds of their known leadership, and, of course, that takes the field generals out of business, which is very important.; we have managed to take away territory that they most want to use – territory like Afghanistan, they can’t function in Sudan, they obviously can’t function in places like Libya — they’re being pursued in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan with an aggressiveness that was not there prior to 9/11.

Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/03/20040328.html

Delivered June 12, 2003 Remarks by National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice at Town Hall Los Angeles Breakfast Dr. Rice

Excerpt

..President Bush has stated many times that the battle of Iraq was about moving a great danger, but also about building a better future for all of the people of the region. Iraq’s people, for sure, will be the first to benefit. But success in Iraq will also add to the momentum for reform that is already touching lives, from Morocco to Bahrain and beyond.

Last year, in an extraordinary United Nations report, leading Arab intellectuals called for greater political and economic freedom for the empowerment of women, and better and more modern education in the Arab world. In January of this year, Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia proposed an Arab Charter to spur economic and political reform. And the proposal speaks openly of the need for enhance political participation. In Afghanistan, people are rebuilding, writing a new constitution and moving beyond the culture of the warlord that has dominated their political life for a generation..

Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/06/20030613-5.html

Dr. Condoleezza Rice Discusses Iraq – Oct 8, 2004

Excerpt

..The building of a new Iraq provides a new opportunity for a different kind of Middle East. Today, the 22 countries of this vital region have a combined population of 300 million — but a combined GDP less than that of Spain. It is a region suffering from what leading Arab intellectuals call a political and economic “freedom deficit”. And it is a region where hopelessness provides a fertile ground for ideologies that convince promising youths to aspire not to a university education, a career, or a family, but to blowing themselves up — taking as many innocent lives with them as possible. These ingredients are a recipe for great instability and pose a direct threat to America’s security.
Working in full partnership with the peoples of the region who share our commitment to human freedom, the United States and our friends and allies can help build a Middle East where hope triumphs over bitterness … where greater political and economic freedom, and better, more modern education encourage people to reject the path of terror, and instead fully join in the progress of our times. A free, democratic, and successful Iraq can serve as a beacon, and a catalyst, in this effort..

Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/10/20031008-4.html

Dr. Rice Addresses War on Terror
Remarks by National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice Followed by Question and Answer to the U.S. Institute of Peace
Washington, D.C. — Aug 19, 2004

Excerpt

..This has been the President’s clear message and consistent practice. In his very first State of the Union speech, he said, “America will take the side of brave men and women who advocate values around the world, including the Islamic world, because we have a greater objective than eliminating threats and containing resentment. We seek a just and peaceful world beyond the war on terror.”

The President has put these words into action. Under his leadership, America has adopted a forward strategy for freedom for the Middle East. That strategy has many elements. We are supporting the people of Afghanistan and Iraq as they fight terrorists and extremism and work to build democratic governments. We have joined with our NATO and G8 allies to help the people of the broader Middle East and North Africa to create jobs, increase access to capital, improve literacy and education, protect human rights, and make progress toward democracy.

President Bush has launched the Middle East Partnership Initiative to link America with reformers in the Middle East through a concrete project. He is working to establish a U.S.-Middle East free trade area within a decade, to bring the people of the region into an expanding circle of opportunity. And just this week, he signed America’s newest free trade agreement in the area with Morocco. The latest administration budget doubles funding for the National Endowment for Democracy for its new work, focusing on bringing free elections, free markets, free press, free speech and free labor unions to the Middle East. And we are increasing our efforts to support broadcasting in the Middle East by one-third, from $30 million to $40 million. And early in the administration, we began the successful Arabic language Radio Sawa service, and the Persian language Radio Farda service. This year, we launched a new Middle East television network called “Alhurra,” Arabic for “the free one.” The network broadcasts news, movies, sports, entertainment and educational programming to millions of people across the region — fulfill a goal of getting to the truth.

We can and we must do more. Our future efforts should focus on two areas. First, we must work to dispel destructive myths about American society and about American policy. Second, we must expand dramatically our efforts to support and encourage the voices of moderation and tolerance and pluralism within the Muslim world.

In the immediate aftermath of September 11th, many Americans were asking, “Why do they hate us?” It was even the title of a celebrated Newsweek cover story by my friend, Fareed Zakaria. Then, as now, the answer to that question depends on what one means by “they.” There is a small minority of extremists in the Muslim world who, indeed, hate America and will always hate America. They hate our policies, our values, our freedoms, our very way of life. When that hatred is expressed through terrorist violence, there is only one proper response. And that response is that we must find them and defeat them, defeat those who seek to kill our people and to harm our country.

Yet, there are some 1 billion people in the world who profess the Islamic faith. And the evidence about their attitudes toward the United States is far from conclusive. A great many Muslims still come to this country every year in search of a better life. And surveys show that a great many more would do so if they could. Yet, surveys of Muslim populations also show that large majorities of Muslims fear American power, or mistrust American intentions, or misunderstand American values.

For instance, many in the Muslim world see the worst of American popular culture and assume that American-style democracy — or any democracy at all, for that matter — inevitably leads to crassness and immorality. Others believe that democracy is inherently hostile to faith, and corrosive of cherished traditions. And many more are federal a steady diet of hateful propaganda and conspiracy theories that twist American policy into grotesque caricatures.
These views pose a serious challenge for our country. At their worst and most intense, they create a climate of bitterness and grievance, in which extremism finds a sympathetic ear. And such views can hold entire societies captive to failed ideologies and prevent millions of people from joining in the progress and prosperity of our time. The consequences for much of the Muslim world are stagnation, persistent poverty and a lack of freedom.

Dispelling these myths and instilling trust is a difficult and long-term proposition. We must not lose sight of the fact that some of the mistrust and suspicion felt toward the West by many in the Middle East and in the Muslim world, in fact, have some basis in reality. Relations between the Islamic world and the West began in conflict, and for many centuries, bitter and bloody conflict — wars of religion and then colonial wars — defined the contact that each side had with each other. And for the last six decades, America and our allies excused and accommodated the lack of freedom in the Middle East, hoping, as President Bush said, “to purchase stability at the price of liberty.” Of course, we got neither.

Yet, this is far from the whole story. The story of America’s more recent relations with the Muslim world is a story of friendship and partnership. Turkey is a strong ally of the United States, and a full and proud member of the NATO alliance. America has built alliances with Muslim nations around the world, from Morocco to Indonesia. We have signed free trade agreements with two Muslim nations, and we are working on two more. We are a major provider of development assistance in the Muslim world.

And America has worked to find a lasting solution to the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians. No matter who is in office, no matter from what party, American Presidents have cared to try to find peace in the Holy Land.
In doing so, we stand these days with the Palestinian people who seek democracy and reform. After all, President Bush is the first American President to call, as a matter of policy, for a Palestinian state. Yet, because America supports Israel’s desire for security, many in the Muslim world seem to believe that America opposes the Palestinian desire for freedom. This is a misconception that we must take head-on and dispel. Because the truth is that our policy insists on freedom. The President believes that the Palestinian people deserve not merely their own state, but a just and democratic state that serves their interests and fulfills their decent aspirations.

For its part, Israel must meet its responsibility under the road map and help create conditions for a democratic Palestinian state to emerge. Israel must take steps to improve the lives of the Palestinian people and to remove the daily humiliations that harden the hearts of future generations. Along with the vast majority of people who dwell in the Holy Land, Americans want peace for this troubled region — but we realize that there can be no lasting peace for either side until there is freedom and security for both sides.

The story of America’s recent relations with the Muslim world is also one of help and, we can even say, perhaps, rescue. America — American soldiers gave their lives trying to provide food in Somalia. America has gone to war five times since the end of the Cold War, and how many in the Muslim world know that each time it was to help Muslims? Americans have fought in Kuwait and in Bosnia and in Kosovo and in Afghanistan and Iraq. Without exception, these were wars of liberation and of freedom. Kuwait’s sovereignty was restored and today that monarchy is pursuing reform. Kuwait has a directly elected national assembly.

America stopped the killing in Bosnia and reversed ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. Today, those two nations are making the tough reforms needed so that they can join a united Europe. Afghanistan is free of the brutal repression of the Taliban and building a democracy that recognizes the central role of Islam in Afghan life, and that sees that control as completely consistent with democracy.
Iraq is free of the terror and fear of Saddam Hussein. Iraqis are free to worship as they choose. Major religious shrines are open to pilgrims for the first time in decades, and the Iraqi people are taking the very hard steps toward the building of democracy.

These are stories that need to be told and that need to be heard. And so does the truth about American society. From a distance, I am certain that America can seem secular and commercial and hectic and hyper-modern and dismissive of tradition. Yet, Americans have a profound respect for tradition, a deeply felt sense of justice, and a strong attachment to our communities and families.
Survey after survey shows that Americans are the most religious people in the developed world. The American Constitution and the American way of life strike a successful balance between the imperatives of government and the demands of conscience. Since our founding we have separated church and state, but we do not exclude religion from our lives. In fact, among all the modern societies in the world, America is the one in which religion and religious people play the largest role. There is no conflict between being a good citizen and being a good Jew or Christian or Hindu or Buddhist or Muslim. Many Muslims born in other lands have learned this for themselves, as they pray in America’s 1,200 mosques and raise their American children in the Islamic faith.
Yet, we cannot take for granted that Muslims in the rest of the world know these simple truths. We need to get the truth of our values and our policies to the people of the Middle East, because truth serves the cause of freedom. We must also do everything that we can to support and encourage the voices of moderation and tolerance and pluralism within the Muslim world. There is a hunger for new ideas and fresh thinking in the broader Middle East, and that hunger cannot, ultimately, be satisfied by the work of outsiders. Just as freedom must always be chosen, lasting progress and reform in society must emerge from within.

Don’t worry, I can still see. (Laughter.)

We are fully aware that outside support can sometimes harm more than it helps. Some critics in the Muslim world will point to aid from the West as a way to de-legitimize reformist ideas. We are thinking hard about how moderate and democratic forces in the West can usefully help those in the Islamic world who are fighting against extremism — because they need our help. But, of course, democracy and freedom must be home-grown. Today, outside support for extremists is common, while moderates too often struggle with inadequate resources and too little solidarity. That has to change — and we have to help to change it.

Americans also need to hear the stories of the people of the Muslim world. We need to understand their challenges and their cultures and their hopes; to speak their languages and read their literature; to know their cultures in the deepest sense. Our interaction must be a conversation, not a monologue. We must reach out and explain, but we must also listen. Student exchanges and sister city programs and professional contacts helped forge lasting ties of friendship and understanding across the Atlantic and across the barriers of tyranny during the Cold War. Similar efforts today can achieve similar results between Americans and Muslim peoples throughout the world.

Source:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/08/20040819-5.html

Myths and Realities: Saudi Arabia Re-examined [Part 2]

Editor — Thu, 18 Nov 2004 17:45:21 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following is a portion of The New Republic’s symposium on public policy, entitled, “Myths and Realities: Saudi Arabia Re-examined.” This discussion was held on October 27, 2004. Introductory remarks were made by Martin Peretz, Editor-in-Chief, The New Republic. The panelists included: Robert Jordan, former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia; Jamie Gorelick, member of the 9/11 Commission; Adam Zagorin, Washington correspondent, Time Magazine; and Faye Bowers, intelligence and national security writer for The Christian Science Monitor.

This original transcript was produced by the Federal News Service, Inc. and is reprinted here with permission.

Due to the length of this item it has been divided into two parts. This is part two which contains the question and answer session. For the panel presentations, part one, click here.

[Part 2] Question and Answer Session

Martin Peretz: Can I ask Ambassador Jordan a question? When you would go to speak to certain officials urging them to look at the emerging evidence that terrorism was being supported from Saudi Arabia, would there be indifference, incredulity, or what?

Robert Jordan: No. The response was uniformly one of sincerity and cooperation. At the same time, they would say, give us names and give us information, and we’ll go round these people up. Part of the problem we had — and this is reflected in the 9/11 Commission Report as well — it is so incredibly difficult to get those names.

I dealt with our Treasury Department continually and would continually ask for names and intelligence information that could be shared with the Saudis so that we could nab these individuals, and rarely would we actually have names. When we did, we were able to freeze bank accounts — in some cases, detain these people. There were a number of people who were under surveillance by the Saudis, but it did not appear feasible to have a case that could be put together to round them up and bring them in. We got better at it.

Martin Peretz: Is the Saudi government so scrupulous about winning a conviction in court?

Robert Jordan: No, I don’t mean to imply it that way at all. What I’m saying is, even sufficient probable cause to round these people up was sorely lacking in many instances.

The general counsel of the Department of Treasury, David Aufhauser and I, spent a great deal of time trying to get enough information to give to the Saudis. We were able to get better information as time went on. But, there was not very much evidence on individuals.

By contrast, we did have some real successes on the charity front. For example, the Al Haramain charity finally has been closed. Some would say it has taken about a year too long for that to happen. But, we found that their branches were actually supporting al Qaeda operations in Bosnia, Albania, Chechnya, and East Africa. So, those branches were closed down, and the individual head of Al Haramain was finally removed from his position and is now under serious investigation.

But the individuals — I think this is an area where there needs to be more traction and more activity. The problem we’ve had is not having enough evidence shared with each other to identify them.

Martin Peretz: Was this a result of American intelligence not having information or not being willing to share information?

Robert Jordan: A little bit of both. In some cases, you don’t want to divulge sources and methods, and so we had, frankly, some difficulty in getting information out of our intelligence agencies from time to time. I think the Treasury found some frustrations in that regard. We also did not have — at least at the beginning — a sufficient working relationship with the Saudis. What information they had, they were reluctant to share with us. We were reluctant to share with them. So, it took us about a year after 9/11 before we were heading in the right direction in terms of this type of cooperation. It was extremely frustrating.

Martin Peretz: Jamie.

Jamie Gorelick: I would answer that question slightly differently. I think that puts way too much of a burden on the United States. The people with whom we would be asked to share the information were, in some instances, not reliable counterparties. It suggests that the Saudis themselves were blind to what was going on in their country. I don’t know what the ground truth is, but I don’t believe that because once they felt threatened themselves in 2003, there was a sea change in their activity, which when we were threatened and they felt they were not, they didn’t do. There was a long time between September 11, 2001 and the period in 2003 when the Saudis kicked into gear, and I don’t think the change was whether we could share bits of information about people on the ground.

The fact is that they were — and I think still are — coming to grips with the Faustian bargain that they have made, which is that they have ceded whole parts of their government to religious elements that have either acquiesced then, or worst, fomented the kind of activity, which produces an al Qaeda and which creates the conditions for people who agree with al Qaeda to function not only against ourselves but also against them.

What they need to do is address that bargain, because as Marty asked in — I thought his first question was terrific — how could it be that one arm of what they do can endanger the other? They have to come to grips. I think Bob is right in pointing to 2003 as the turning point, but they have to deal with the money that they put out in foreign assistance, the money that they put out in religious assistance, and the acquiescence at a minimum in the funding domestically of elements who are now turning around and destabilizing their own regime.

You know, I would note in this regard that there are real costs. If you talk to American companies who operate in Saudi Arabia — and Bob can speak to this better than I can — but just the ones that I talk to are redoubling their efforts in security, both for their personnel and their facilities. Well, if you do that, the costs of doing business and the willingness to do business is heavily affected.

There are real costs, and I think they have some hard decisions in front of them. I personally would not put the blame for this on the United States and our inability to share individual bits of information with them. I think where there is a will there will be a way.

Robert Jordan: Just for clarification, I’m not putting blame on anyone. I was trying to sort of explain historically what their interchange was, but I certainly agree that the Saudis have got to assume responsibility for identifying individuals. It shouldn’t just be up to the United States, of course.

Question & Answer Session Open to the Audience

Martin Peretz: Ladies and gentlemen, the man in the back. This is not because we know that you can’t speak to the audience. You’re speaking to millions.

Question: I’d like to just better understand the support for terrorism in Saudi Arabia. Just characterize that support. Who they are? You mentioned the religious element. Are they growing? Where were they before 9/11? What’s changed? So, we can get at the root cause, which is the support for the terrorists rather than the terrorists themselves.

Martin Peretz: I open it up to the panel.. ..Okay, Adam?

Adam Zagorin: I wrote down a recent intelligence estimate before I came here. You can take that for what it’s worth. I guess the population is about 20 some million.. ..There seems to be some agreement that there would be between 500 and 1,500 hardcore activists. Now, that’s a range that differs by a factor of three, right — 500 to 1,500, but compared to the 20 million, it’s a very minuscule figure. On the other hand, you don’t need more than five people or even maybe less to commit some atrocity. There’s obviously been some of that.

My sense is that there is a great deal of work to be done, and the trick here will be to maintain the discipline in these efforts going forward not just next month and next year but forever because the situation lends itself to the lack of the kind of institutional political structure and lends itself to having these problems potentially continue unless vigilance is maintained.

But, I do think there’s probably a very large number of people in Saudi Arabia who are not thrilled about the United States, not thrilled about U.S. support of Israel, not thrilled about our invasion of Iraq, and not thrilled about the visas, and you can just go on and on. But, I think that the number of those people who actually are happy to see Osama bin Laden killing people and the violence, especially giving that there are Saudi victims of these activities in the Kingdom. I think that those people are quite limited in the ones who are happy to see that kind of thing happening.

Also, we do have — for what it’s worth and it’s probably worth quite a bit at the moment — joint centers where Saudis and American security people sit side-by-side in Riyadh at undisclosed locations. So, the communication problems that Ambassador Jordan talked about, where one side knows something and the other side doesn’t — by the time they figure out what it is that they both know, you know, some other thing that’s happened. This is people analyzing things together and actually pulling on the same oar in the same room at the same time, and that’s going on in the security area and also, to some degree as well, in the financial area.

That’s encouraging. It’s just that, again, to sustain this over time and to appear that there’s such a level of U.S.-Saudi collaboration that it causes a backlash publicly among the public there who objects to these other U.S. policies. It’s a delicate balance, but I think that the Kingdom is not overrun with violent, plotting anti-Americans. There are plenty of Anti-Americans, but they’re not violent and plotting.

Martin Peretz: But, it seems a little implausible. There’s nothing I know, but my guess is that there are more than 1,500 sleeper people in Madrid. I mean I just came back from Europe. First of all, they’ve arrested almost that number.

Faye Bowers: Okay, I wanted to add on a little bit to what Adam said from when I was there in December. I spoke with three intelligence officials who were participating in that joint counterterrorism center. I think bottom line, truth be told, they don’t know how many terrorists there are. Accurate numbers were never kept of people who went to the training camps in Afghanistan in the ’80s or ’90s and who returned. For a long time, I think Saudi Arabia didn’t believe it had a problem with terrorism or with extremism. They didn’t see it until after those May and November attacks that everyone talks about. But you know, the intelligence officials told me when I was there — there could be six, there could be 60, there could be 600, or 600,000. So, that’s not a very comforting figure.

The other thing I found in terms of talking to people — normal Saudis — not one of them seemed to be for terror attacks for sure and wasn’t thrilled with what Osama bin Laden was doing in their part of the world. But, they also were extremely angry at the United States’ foreign policy. Every person I spoke with without exception had to sort of vent for the first few minutes that I was with them. While I was there, Saddam Hussein was captured. It was on their mind — American policy toward Iraq and the Palestinians especially. It was at the time where the United States was really pressuring Saudi Arabia to make changes in their educational system, to change their textbooks, to go after the religious leaders, and to come forward and make statements against terrorism and for cooperating with the United States.

Overall, the people, I think, are really against terrorism, but they’re really also against U.S. foreign policy, and they have sympathy toward groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as giving to charity is part of their culture. Almost everyone told me that they contribute independently to those kinds of groups because of the anger they feel toward U.S. foreign policy in the region.

Robert Jordan: Well, to get back to the question of where do these terrorists come from and how did this all get started, I think you do have to flash back about 20 years to the joint U.S.-Saudi efforts against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. It was part of American foreign policy to encourage Islamist extremists to wage jihad against the godless communists who had invaded Afghanistan. So, there was a great deal of cooperation between our government and the Saudis to encourage these young men to go off to these camps and to fight in Afghanistan. The best estimate is somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 young Saudi men had gone off to do this.

The Soviets were then kicked out; so, what happens? A number of them started wandering back. A number of them tried to look for some other cause. At this moment, it was almost like a perfect storm of converging realities here. You had an education system that had been influenced by the Muslim brotherhood from Egypt and a number of teachers who had been kicked out of Egypt and Syria for being too extremist. They find their way to Saudi Arabia, and they have 20 years of teaching.

MR. .. : Some of them went to the United States.

Robert Jordan: And, some went to the United States. They have 20 years of teaching. You have a demographic time bomb and one of the highest birth rates in the world. You have almost half the population, at this point, under the age of 15. It’s a nation of kids. So, you have the jihadis coming back and you have Osama bin Laden wanting to essentially become an outsourcing organization to kick Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. He went to the Saudi government and asked if he could be sort of a militia to kick out Saddam Hussein. The Saudis turned him down and brought a half-a-million U.S. troops in instead, and this boiled the water even further.

You also have a declining per capita income — it’s about a quarter of what is was in the 1980s. You have a burgeoning population without job skills; you have angry young men who can’t get jobs, and therefore can’t get married or even talk to a female. It is a cauldron that bubbles and boils. So now, we’re seeing, perhaps far too late, the efforts by the Saudi government to put the genie back in the bottle, and we’re going to have to be supportive of that, but only time will tell if we’ll have any success. But that’s frankly how it all got started. The 9/11 Commission Report is very good in its summary of this.

Jamie Gorelick: I agree with Bob’s recitation of the history. I think it’s very helpful to look back and see what has happened. The only point I would make here is that if we focus only on those of whatever number are the hardcore individuals dedicated to terrorism, we’re really missing the larger and more dangerous picture. We, in our 9/11 Commission Report, are very explicit about this — that there are two problems. There are the hardcore individuals, the religious zealots, who have objectified Westerners and who have identified us — who refuse to convert to their form of religion or abide by their policy dictates — as people who essentially don’t deserve to live. The only way to deal with them is to kill or capture them. They’re not going to be retrievable.

The larger problem, in our view — or at least as large — is this approval of that behavior and the sense that it is justified. It’s not just the fact that that approval is manifested in monetary support for terrorist activities or for imams who spew hate. It is that if we don’t address those atmospherics, we will increasingly permit a view within the larger society that we are a greater threat than Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. I think that’s what you have here. If we don’t address that, we have a very large problem and a generational threat to us in the hostility that one finds in various places in the Muslim world.

We are — and I think Faye had it right – in some places despised, and this is in a country where we were very well regarded and where the two populations were very close. I just don’t think we can afford that. We have in our book a fairly long discussion of this and of the ways in which we have to regain the moral high ground, where we have to find common values, and where we have to dissuade the larger populations.

If you look at the Pew data — and I’m not suggesting that we make our foreign policy or any decisions for that matter based on polls — but it is pretty striking that after 9/11 and even after the invasion of Afghanistan, which had the support of much of the Muslim world because it was viewed as justified, our standing in the world was very high and there was a unity of purpose, I think, around the world to address the threat of terrorism.

In the last couple of years, that has changed dramatically. So, if you look at places like Turkey, which is our — in many ways — strongest ally in the region, our standing has dropped from somewhere like two-thirds of the population to 20 percent. In Egypt, which is the second largest recipient of our foreign aid for 20 years, we are at the zero approval level, and I guess that’s within the margin of error of two percent. It could be two percent or maybe it’s minus two percent. But, it’s still pretty low. You see this around the Muslim world. I think that that is a recipe for even greater disaster, so I would not focus only on the smaller dedicated group.

I would just make one anecdotal remark. My experience with domestic terrorism suggests that the societal attitudes are important. When we were experiencing abortion clinic bombings and murders in this country, they seemed unstoppable because there would be Web sites where doctors who performed abortions would have big Xs through their faces, and there was essentially a hit list out there. The murder stopped when the Catholic Church in Boston — after a particularly egregious event in Boston — said, this has to stop. This is not the way that that we treat people however we think about abortion. We do not take lives. The fact is that it stopped after that. Now, I’m not saying there’s some – to use a bad phrase in this regard — magic bullet, but I do think that it is very important to address these societal attitudes.

MR. .. : Yes.

Question: I was just hoping you might explore with a little more granularity a few of the particular sources of anti-American attitudes in Saudi Arabia. I’m curious, for instance, to what extent does the — when you refer to the broader context — population or a substantial segment of it sympathize with the objectives of Al Qaeda if not the methods. For instance, establishing a Sunni Wahhabi dominated caliphate extending from North Africa through Central Asia –

MR. .. : Don’t forget Spain.

Question: Yes, well absolutely — and Austria, I guess. They may have something to say about it if that ever is on their doorstep. To what extent, for instance, is the hostility against the U.S. intervention in Iraq motivated principally by a concern that a democratic Iraq will be Shi’ite dominated given tribal tensions that the status quo ante was a comfortable known as objectionable as it appeared to be on other grounds?

Martin Peretz: Anybody?

Faye Bowers: I have a couple of responses to that. One is that I don’t think the people are a monolith. I think we sort of have a perception here in America that everyone in Saudi Arabia is devoutly, rabidly religious. I don’t think they all share the same level of devoutness at all.

I think the other thing that really formed perceptions, when I was there in December, was television. You know, they watch 24-hour cable like we do, but they see different pictures than we do. For example, in Iraq, they were seeing pictures of Iraqis being murdered every day — of Iraqi women, and children, and young men, and various things like that.

In the Palestinian territories, the same thing — day and day out, they are seeing the assassinations, they were seeing the — what they would call — Israeli offensiveness toward Palestinians. They saw that daily, and I think it has a really wearing effect on people. Then, they also see what they see to be total, unqualified U.S. support for those activities. It angers people, I felt, to no end. You know, they don’t come out and say, “Oh, we support Osama bin Laden, and we want this broad caliphate from here to here and we want it to include el Andelus, by the way, too.” I didn’t hear anyone say anything like that, but it was more anger toward the United States and Israel.

Martin Peretz: I want to say something about the continuous allusions to Israel. There are about 25,000 Palestinians in Saudi Arabia. My own sense is certainly that in the elite, nobody gives a damn about the Palestinians. There is, in fact, the kind of inter-ethnic contempt for the Palestinians that I have never heard in Israel itself. Now, you know, there are a lot of Palestinian refugees around in the Middle East. They cannot go to Saudi Arabia. In Saudi Arabia, it is so difficult for a Palestinian to get Saudi citizenship. There are what you have to call racist laws against Saudi Arabian citizenship for Palestinians.

Now, I’m not saying that you get bombarded with images, and it doesn’t have an effect. If you see Al Jazeera, you live in a different world than you live in this country. But, it’s a little too simple, it seems to me that there are interests in America who are organizing to say, “Well, if you could only get the Israelis to stop doing this.” Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote a column in The New York Times the other day that if you could get Israel to do this, and this, and this, then the Arabs will actually send soldiers to Iraq, and Iran will give up its nuclear ambitions. That’s crap.

Robert Jordan: Let me just add one sort of data point on the Palestinians. I think a lot of what you say is accurate about the way Palestinians are viewed in Saudi society, in terms of those who are actually in the kingdom. I think it’s not totally correct to say that a lot of –

Martin Peretz: Those are wonderful Palestinians. Actually, they are teachers and doctors.

Robert Jordan: You bet. Well, they do a lot of things, but that’s correct. They’re well educated in many instances. But, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia has spent a great deal of money on hospitals and hospital care for injured Palestinian children who actually are brought to Saudi Arabia for treatment. It doesn’t mean that there’s a “kumbayah” spirit going on necessarily. But, what it does mean is that I think they are expending some resources. As many of you know, they had one of these telethons where they raised a gazillion dollars for the children of martyrs, and martyrs included suicide bombers, and this was a very controversial issue between us at the time.

But, I think that the greater point isn’t whether it’s rational or correct for someone in Saudi Arabia to have this attitude that America is too close to Israel. What we’re really doing here is reporting on the reality and then how do we deal with it. I think the reality is that these are the attitudes that we see. The Pew research and other polling data show us this.

So, what do you do to turn the hearts and minds around? I think the 9/11 Commission Report, again, has some pretty good suggestions in that regard. It requires soft diplomacy, and soft power. It requires citizen exchanges. It requires a smarter visa policy in the United States to let the students back in if they can be cleared for security reasons. It requires reaching out to both societies instead of what I fear is happening, which is kind of a mutual disgust with each other right now, and I think that is the great danger in the relationship.

Jamie Gorelick: I would just add one comment here. We looked at this issue of whether the hostility is the product of our policies or the product of this mix of political and religious zeal. We certainly did not conclude that if we changed our policies, this problem would go away. I mean we took a lot of care in writing that section of the report because the fact is that you could throw Israel over the brink today, and it would not stop this group at all.

Now, that’s not to say that we as a country should not be faulted for not being as engaged as we should be in trying to foster peace in the Middle East, and I think that there are many in the Muslim world who see our disengagement from the peace process in a negative way. Faye is certainly right that if you look at what bin Laden predicted — that the United States’ interests in the Muslim world were to kill Muslims and humiliate them — when they see pictures from the war in Iraq and when they see reports from Abu Ghraib prison, he looks like he was right, and we look like we were wrong. We need to understand that. That’s not to say anything about our decision to go into Iraq other than you have to understand how it will be viewed and the critical stakes that we had in the aftermath in handling it correctly.

So, I think it is a false choice to say, “Is it our policy, or is it a religious zealotry, or political religious zealotry?” It’s both. If you only see one piece of it, you’re going to miss the fuller and more accurate picture.

Robert Jordan: Just to back that up, which was a very perceptive comment, evidence can be seen in the fact that one of Al Qaeda’s principle demands was that the United States withdraw its military troops from Saudi Arabia. We announced in the first week in May 2003 that we were pulling out of Prince Sultan Air Base. The next week, we had the three suicide bombings at the housing compounds in Riyadh. It didn’t make a bit of difference that we were pulling our troops out. Al Qaeda was still on the march, and it hasn’t deterred them in the slightest.

Question: Several of you mentioned individual reformists that you spoke with in Saudi Arabia or have known, and, of course, we have read about some of the very preliminary steps that the Saudi government has taken in terms of local elections. But, my specific question — and perhaps this is best directed toward Ambassador Jordan since you were there for two or three years not too long ago. Is your sense of the Saudi Majlis Ash Shura, because this is the consultative body, that on the one hand, it would be very easy to write it off as an appointed body but that has also shown signs of some activism, some independence? And also, any of the comments the panelists might have on local elections in Saudi Arabia because, with some hesitancy, the Saudis do seem to be moving, albeit very slowly, on that front. Thanks.

Robert Jordan: Yes, that’s an important question. To start with the local elections, they are now scheduled for February. Registration to vote will begin next month. Unfortunately, it appears that women will not be allowed to vote or to run for office, even though one woman had announced her campaign to run already.

Apparently, the give and take within the royal family, calibrating exactly how far they can go without losing traction with their people, has at least for the moment, stalled the ability to include woman in this round. There is a lot of hope that they will be included in future rounds.

The plan is, after these elections are held for half of the municipal council seats, that in due course, there will also then be elections for half of the regional council seats, and ultimately half of the Majlis Ash Shura. That is perhaps further down the line than we would like, but one of the things that is actually happening in the Majlis is, that even though they are an appointed body — they actually have one Shi’a representative in there right now who is a very well respected business man — and they are getting increasing power. They’re getting power to review the budget. They’re getting power to interrogate cabinet ministers, and in fact, about a year-and-a-half ago, they were reviewing certain pieces of legislations including a tax bill. They disapproved the tax bill. Well, the council of ministers had it within its power to overrule them, but they chose not to.

So, these are just little data points again to suggest that the Majlis is gaining in stature. They have committees — like they have a foreign relations committee — I’ve met with their committees from time to time — and the plan is to increase the size of the Majlis to about 200 people. It’s about 160 right now. So, this is an important development and one that I think we need to delicately nurture without, again, putting the kiss of death on it by too much grandstanding about how wonderful this progress is.

Faye Bowers: I would like to just add a couple of things about that. In the upcoming elections, I think from women I’ve talked to there — and I have a very good friend and colleague who is a Saudi journalist who writes now occasionally for our paper. She wrote the story about the woman who had initiated her own campaign, and it was quite disappointing that she won’t be able to run. But, this woman also told me — and from women that I spoke to in their homes in Saudi Arabia — this sort of presents another side of the picture for you — is that women there don’t want the process to go too quickly either. That’s sort of shocking to me as a woman to find that they maybe don’t want to go too fast. But, that is what many of them said.

Then, I think also after Saudi Arabia announced that women couldn’t run, they did announce that maybe after the February elections they would appoint a number of women to that council. Also, about the Majlis — when I was there, the council had appointed three women advisors, which they didn’t want to talk about too much publicly, but I got to meet with the women advisors, and they were gaining an incredible amount of power.
At first, they were just consulted about women’s issues, such as breastfeeding in public or things like that. But after a while, they were given much more, like foreign policy questions.

My point is that there is movement forward, I think, in all of these areas. I think in some respects quite impressive. Again, for us, I think we feel it’s at a snail’s pace. For them, these are earthshaking differences. This one woman I spoke with — who is now an advisor to the Majlis — she is a renowned international ophthalmologist, and we guess in her early forties. When she was born, her mother was 13-years-old and was put in arranged marriages. She was illiterate. They didn’t have girl schools in Saudi Arabia then. Those didn’t open, I believe, until 1962. So, this woman’s mother had four daughters by the time she was 19-years-old and moved to the United States with her husband, who had some sort of government job here in the United States. So, all the girls and the mother were educated in the United States, and all four girls have post-graduate degrees and have gone back to Saudi Arabia and are working for women’s issues. It was an incredible story.

Robert Jordan: She, in fact, is the head of the ophthalmology department at her hospital.

Faye Bowers: That’s right. She’s also the head of the seat at Johns Hopkins now as well.

Adam Zagorin: I just wanted to mention a little bit, in a way, about the sociology of all this. Here in this country, we’ve got — like it or don’t like it — we’ve got the gay marriage business; we’ve got garbage on television in many places or what some people feel is garbage; and we’ve got various cases of corruption. The United States, despite being the richest Western country, continues to hurdle forward — or whatever direction you want to call it — socially. This creates tensions, which lead to reaction. So, you have in this country social conservatives and even lots of other people who are appalled by the latest manifestation of modernity in our midst.

Well, if you think about that and then you think about a very traditional and in some ways almost feudal arrangement that you would have in Saudi Arabia — you need to think of the pace of change that these people are going through. Now, people have studied traditional societies undergoing Westernization. There are studies on this, and it is a stressful thing to live in a society that is rapidly Westernizing. What you tend to see is all the things that are associated with stress and anxiety — higher levels of addiction and alcohol consumptions, breakups, and shifts from the large family to small family.

Now, the thing that Jamie said a minute ago — I mean, you could pitch Israel over the brink. You could eliminate the invasion of Iraq. You have an anxious environment in any country where you have this rapid pace of change with respect to the family, with respect to religion, and it’s really fairly typical that there would be some kind of a reaction to that in the society from conservative and fundamental elements. Having said that, I personally believe that Osama bin Laden and his vision of the future has virtually nothing to offer. I think that the way that he addresses the problems and some of the predictable social issues in Saudi Arabia just doesn’t really offer much of anything.

Now, in this time of anxiety, some people have certainly turned to him. But, it’s very difficult to imagine a regime that had anything akin to his outlook that would provide jobs, that would ease this transition in a meaningful way, or that would assist the people who are upset. So, you have this anxious environment in which people seize on Israel and these other things. It’s not that they’re not issues, but they become flashpoints, I think, for a generalized anxiety, which is going to be there with or without those things. If it weren’t that, it would be something else.

Martin Peretz: I want to ask Bob question. It’s a historical question. The transfer of wealth from 1973, 10 years on, from the West to Saudi Arabia was enormous. An economic historian I know at Harvard says that it was larger than the transfer of wealth to Spain in the age of discovery. Why was so little made of it?

Robert Jordan: I’m not sure we ever see historical phenomena while we’re in the middle of them. It takes a while to digest. What we did see, though, was an enormous change in the early to mid-’80s. The per capita income in Saudi Arabia was about $28,000, which is about what it was in the United States at that time. Now, it’s about $8,000, which is a little bit more than it is in Mexico.

So, they’ve both ramped up, and now, they have gone back down on a per capita basis. But, I think you just don’t see these phenomena sometimes when you’re in the middle of them. I’m not sure how history will judge the transition that we’re in right now, or when people went through the Industrial Revolution. When do you see those transitions taking place?

Martin Peretz: This certainly was a tremendous opportunity that was forfeited.

Robert Jordan: Of course.

Martin Peretz: One more question.

Question: Since 9/11, I have become a student of Arabic affairs, and I’ve heard every expert anybody can name in the room discussing some of the fundamental issues. I am truly mystified as to what the outlook is for any positive result in our relationship with Saudi Arabia and lots of other countries that are Islamic. It just seems to me, we see the world so differently that just the very idea that Americans are raised with cutting a deal is just not possible. It’s just not the way they think.

Martin Peretz: Anybody want to take this one?

Robert Jordan: I’ll take a stab at that.

Martin Peretz: Tackle that cactus. [Laughter.]

MR. .. : To pick up on your final metaphor there about cutting a deal, this is a part of the world that is very used to cutting deals of all kinds. If you look at the history of Islam, there have been any numbers of internal religious debates. Obviously, there’s the Shi’ite, Sunni split. There was this bab al-ijtihad, the door of enlightenment, which opened where they were Greek-influenced debates and scholars within the religion.

Now, obviously, the headlines have gone, with very good reason, to some of the extremist elements. Without trying to deny for one second the extremely disturbing tendencies of the extremist elements and many of their fellow travelers and supporters, there are a lot of reasonable people in the Islamic world who just want to get on with business, and they want to be respected. I don’t think they’re that much different than we are, and they certainly are skilled in having relations with other groups, cutting deals, and all the rest.

I mean there is a gap. It will probably take a generation to work through this fix that we seem to be in now. I think it could be fixed because if you look at their history and the way that they do business, it suggests that they like to fix things when it’s in their interest to do so.

Martin Peretz: Bob, the last speaker.

Robert Jordan: Well, the hill is an extremely steep hill to climb, but I do think there are some points of hopefulness. One of the most important things that I worked on during my tenure as ambassador was Saudi accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), not because it was doing them a favor but because it is in the United States’ interest to see a stabilization and a rule of law that is implemented in their trade relations. This will require them to open up to foreign investment. They have already passed most of the major legislation that is required for qualification to the WTO. They are awaiting the bilateral agreement with the United States.

It is, in my view, critical for their social and political development that this accession be successful. They would come into the family of WTO nations. There will be more job opportunities for women, the birth rate will be affected, and ultimately, the political and social life of the country will be affected as well. So, I think there is hope in that regard. There is hope in this election situation they’re talking about, and there is considerable interest in reform as we heard today.

I would also broaden this to the entire Gulf and Arab world. I think we are seeing some very hopeful developments in places like Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, and certainly in the Emirates. We have a bilateral trade agreement that has been executed with Morocco. We have another one with Bahrain that will be before the Congress. We had a rule of law conference in Bahrain hosted by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. So, there are hopeful points, and it does the Arabs and Muslims a disservice to imply that they’re not capable of grasping these issues and moving their societies forward. There are enormous impediments, particularly in Saudi Arabia, but I think we’ve got to find ways to be supportive without being intrusive.

Faye Bowers: I just want to add one last thing. To me, it’s particularly helpful to look at other people as people like yourself. I think when you engage man-to-man or woman-to-woman with people in that part of the world, they’re just like we are. Moms have concerns about their kids going to school, getting a good education and getting a job at the end of that time. They worry about their boys maybe being exposed to extremism or radical views. But, they have the same sorts of wishes and motives that we do. I think it really helps a lot to look at people as just people like us.

Martin Peretz: Thank you, panel. Thank you, guests. This is the fourth of a series. There will be another one soon. Thank you.

Myths and Realities: Saudi Arabia Re-examined [Part 1]

Editor — Thu, 18 Nov 2004 17:35:09 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

This IOI provides portions of The New Republic’s symposium on public policy, entitled, “Myths and Realities: Saudi Arabia Re-examined.” This discussion held on October 27, 2004 was moderated by Martin Peretz, Editor-in-Chief, The New Republic. The panelists included: Robert Jordan, former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia; Jamie Gorelick, member of the 9/11 Commission; Adam Zagorin, Washington correspondent, Time Magazine; and Faye Bowers, intelligence and national security writer for The Christian Science Monitor.

The transcript was produced by the Federal News Service, Inc. and is reprinted here with permission.

This part includes the panelists presentations. The question and answer segment is provided as part two.

Martin Peretz: ..Let me introduce the panel: Robert Jordan, former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia; Adam Zagorin, who covers business and international economics, presumably a lot about oil, from Time Magazine; Jamie Gorelick, a member of the 9/11 Commission and a partner at Wilmer Cutler, and also a former student of mine; and Faye Bowers, intelligence and national security writer for The Christian Science Monitor.

Ambassador Jordan, will you begin?

Robert Jordan: Any way you want. Can you hear me from down here? I thought I’d just make this more informal.

First, I’m really delighted to be here today. I have not spent a lot of time talking to folks at The New Republic, but I have admired the sincerity and the zealousness with which they approach these topics, and I think this is kind of a truly groundbreaking sort of series here today.

You know, for generations, the United States’ relationship with the Saudis has been about oil and military cooperation. It’s been conducted at elite levels, and our peoples have known very little about each other. I think Saudis in many ways considered themselves almost adjunct American citizens before 9/11. Thousands of them had vacation homes in the United States. They’ve sent their kids to school here. And, because they were no threat to overstay their visas and take a job away from an American worker, they had easy access to visas to come to the United States.

September 11th changed all that. Because 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, we began to ask uncomfortable questions of the Saudis, and they didn’t like being treated as terrorists. We began to realize that what the Saudis teach in their schools and preach in their mosques is no longer an internal Saudi matter — it’s a matter of our national security. Issues of human rights, democracy, and countering the ideological support for terrorism took on a new urgency.

The Saudis resented what they saw as a kind of overreaction on our part to 9/11. They saw us as excessively stereotyping all Arabs, especially Saudis, and as being insensitive to Arab and Muslim suffering in the Palestinian territories and then later in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I think a significant milestone — as Marty [Peretz] alluded to — in the relationship was the terrorist attack on three Western housing compounds on May 12, 2003. I was there at that time. Thirty-four people were killed, including nine Americans. At that moment, I do believe that the Saudi leadership realized that al Qaeda really is intent in bringing them down first. This, I think, was verified by the report of the 9/11 Commission. Let me commend Jamie [Gorelick], by the way, as a representative of the commission, for an outstanding job. I have great respect for the work that they did and for the report they have put out as well as the interim reports.

MR. .. : And, they might win that National Book Award besides.

Robert Jordan: I’m very impressed with the report. And also, by the way, was very impressed with the staff. I met with the staff at some length. The professionalism and quality of the questioning by the staff was also first class.

But, after the attack in May 2003, we saw cooperation from the Saudis improving dramatically. We established a Joint Terrorism Center. We now have Americans and Saudis sitting shoulder-to-shoulder in a secret location viewing intelligence in real time. We have had a number of successes in knocking out some of the al Qaeda leadership as a consequence of this renewed and improved effort. So, we’re much closer to being partners in the war on terrorism.

But, I still believe that there is a tremendous amount of work to be done in fighting the battle against the ideological support for terrorism that comes from radical imams and teachers. The Saudis have been dealing with the problem, but the inertia of a tribal society that is really, frankly, seething with anger at the United States handicaps our ability to promote true reform and democracy as much as we would like. Now, the
Saudis are going to have to reform from within, and any American kibitzing is going to have to be handled with the utmost delicacy and generally in a more private and less public way, or it will be the kiss of death.

But, we do have a common enemy right now — Islamist terrorism. This common threat gives us a great opportunity for improvement in our relationship overtime.

So, I’ll stop there and pass the torch.

Jamie Gorelick: I agree with everything that Bob has said, and, of course, he’s much more of an expert on Saudi Arabia than I am. I’m here, I think, principally because of the 9/11 Commission Report, but we did look at the relationship, and we did write about the relationship. I would just like to share a few observations with you.

First of all, for decades, the relationship has been a central one for the United States, and the basic compact forged by FDR and Abdul Aziz has been that we help protect the Saudis, and they secure a supply of oil for our partners and us. That is not a sustainable basis for a relationship going forward we found. First of all, public opinion in both countries is not in a good place. In this country, we were fast to recognize that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis.

There are few defenders of Saudi Arabia in the public arena. That’s not to say that there aren’t people who have high regard for the country, but the public is not enamored of the Saudis, and the same is true about us as Americans in Saudi Arabia. We rate very poorly among the population in Saudi Arabia — and perhaps my three co-panelists, who are more knowledgeable about this, might want to address it. But, our policies in Israel and Iraq and our perceived hostility to Islam make it very difficult, I think, for the royal family to move because they have public opinion very much against us. So, we have an interesting quandary. We have this historical relationship, and we have mutual antipathy among the populations.

We were struck — all 10 of us on the commission — by former President Clinton’s remarks to us about Saudi Arabia. He recounted a conversation that he had with Crown Prince Abdullah on the margins of the World Economic Forum meeting where he said, “You know, I have very high regard for the crown prince. And, I said to him, you know, you should look at where you want this — where you want to be as a ruler of your country in 10 years. Can you imagine yourself in the place that you want to be on the current course that you have set?” That was a rhetorical question because he viewed the answer to that as obviously no. Therefore, there is a need for reform to deal with both the violent aspects of the culture within Saudi Arabia and externally in the embodiment of al Qaeda, and also with the discontent within the middle classes of people in Saudi Arabia, who do not feel really invested in the system.

Our principal recommendation with regard to Saudi Arabia is that we speak with candor with each other and that both sets of governments speak with candor to their populations and express why the relationship is important, what needs to change, and to engage. Here we were very specific in saying that public lambasting by the United States of the Saudi government and vice versa is not helpful. It’s simply not helpful. Now, we can talk about specific things that could be done, but the need for reform has always fallen to the bottom of the bilateral talks, and I’m sure that Bob [Jordan] can talk about this. There was always something more pressing, whether it was basing or something that we wanted the Saudis to do or pay for, and reform just was number eight in the talking points. And, you don’t get to number eight, and nobody takes number eight seriously.

We hope to do our part in clearing the air a little bit by dealing with some of the myths. There is no getting around the fact that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, but there is no evidence that the Saudi government had any participation in or funded in any way the attacks of 9/11, or for that matter al Qaeda, which is a notion that is strongly believed within our country in numerous quarters. However, there are many individuals within Saudi Arabia who have funded al Qaeda and have been reliable funders of al Qaeda, and they have funded the madrassahs, which spew out people who have no skills and are filled with hate. Both of these are big problems.

Now, as Bob said, after the attacks of 2003, the Saudi government came face-to-face with, I think, their own mortality. They really felt threatened. Their attitude both in terms of cooperation in the intelligence arena and looking hard at what they might do changed, and included within that were steps that they took to try to clamp down on the funding of al Qaeda. Now, they don’t have the same kind of banking system we have, so they have no ready regimes for doing this. So it’s harder than one might think if one only thinks about our or other Western financial systems. But, our [9/11 Commission] report called for the United States to be a partner with the Saudis in moving it toward reform and in changing the conversation between the United States and Saudi Arabia from just about oil and security. It has to go beyond those two.

I think I’ll stop there.

Adam Zagorin: I thought I would say a couple of things about oil and then some of the structural impediments to an improvement in the relationship, which I think we’re probably going to have to live with for quite some time.

On the oil front, perhaps some people remember a book, the latest expose of Mr. Woodward in which he asserted that there was some kind of arrangement between the administration, presumably brokered by the ambassador here, Prince Bandar, with respect to the idea that the Saudis would keep the oil price low and this would somehow help the reelection of our current president. Whatever reality that reporting may have had at the time — various people have denied it and so forth — I think we can all constitute, with a good deal of certainty, that the relationship somehow didn’t work out because the oil price has not stayed low. Whether the predicate to that thought impinges upon us, namely that and therefore the president will not be reelected, I think is far from self-evident either. But anyway, that reporting — whatever validity it may have had — was certainly a major headline when Mr. Woodward’s book was published.

It’s a perfect example of the kind of headline that people around the United States can read and appreciate without knowing anything in particular about Saudi Arabia because, as has been pointed out by previous panelists, oil is the thing that people think about. So then, they are invited to entertain the possibility of this kind of collusion and so forth, which for all I know may have occurred. I’m not trying to pass a judgment as to whether there was some sort of a deal or not. I feel pretty confident that the price of oil is a lot higher right now than it was when Mr. Woodward wrote that.

The point about Saudi Arabia’s oil is that — I forget what the latest numbers are — but Saudi Arabia is not the top supplier of oil to the United States, and neither is it the second — maybe the third, fourth, I don’t know.

[Editor's Note: The Energy Information Administration reported Saudi Arabia as ranked number two behind Canada for US supplies of crude plus refined products, and number one supplier of crude to the United States for 2003. During 2003, Saudi Arabia's share of U.S. crude oil imports was 17.8% (up from 16.6% during 2002).]

But, the point about Saudi Arabia is that since you have a global market in petroleum, and since it’s fungible, if you cut off a major source of supply or indeed the largest possible source of supply, in the case of Saudi Arabia, then prices everywhere rise. Whether it’s from Caracas being shipped up here or whatever source it is, the price of oil is going to go up. I don’t know what the figures are with respect to each of our individual allies — or what used to be called our allies — but there’s obviously a great dependency globally on having a stable, secure supply of oil, and just because the United States itself does takes oil from many sources doesn’t really undercut the importance of Saudi Arabia in the market.

Now, the fact that prices have gone up recently, some people have suggested that this means that OPEC is loosing its grip or that they can’t control anything. Other people have suggested that they’re quite happy to have the price go up as long as they don’t have to carry the blame for it because they’re racking it up on the cash register, so it works for them.

I certainly think if you look at Saudi actions over the course of this price increase that we’ve had recently, it may be true that Saudi Arabia’s role as the swing producer in OPEC and as the lever and kind of arbiter of world oil prices has been shown to be somewhat deficient during this latest run up. On the other hand, the Saudis have taken action to increase their supplies of oil. Therefore, one has the potential proposition that things would be worse had they not done so.

Finally, there are a lot of exogenous, non-Saudi factors that are related to the price of oil — like the price of natural gas, and its role as a substitute for oil and various production factors within the United States in particular, and so forth and so on. So, it’s a complex picture. But obviously, if you’ve got a global market and you’ve got a huge producer like Saudi Arabia, all of these factors — in one sense, one wants to take them into account, but in another sense, the notion that Saudi Arabia is not a hugely important interest of the United States in the oil sector — I mean, that still remains a fact.
If they were taken over by radical Islamic elements tomorrow, they’d still have to sell their oil, of course. So, one could posit to some degree that oil would be sold because the needs of whatever successor government that there might be — and I certainly don’t see any on the horizon — would include the need for oil receipts.

Now, on the structural side, we’ve got big visa restrictions on this country, which are going to continue forever. They’re not specifically aimed at Saudi Arabia, but there are many targets of these visa restrictions. I don’t see those going away. The military drawdown of the United States in Saudi Arabia has been somewhat significant in recent years. That has not prevented us from using certain facilities at the Prince Sultan Air Base and elsewhere in the Kingdom, but the presence of foreigners generally and U.S. military in the country has been drawn down. I don’t see that changing. In fact, one might think that it would. I think we’ll have access to the facilities probably when and if needed but the less said about it, the better.

Exxon-Mobil and other U.S. companies recently did not get some important contracts in Saudi Arabia. We aren’t selling them military stuff right now. That’s very visible. When Colin Powell, I believe, last visited the Kingdom, there were some constitutional reform-type people who — responsible by some lights — were not at liberty during — I think that they were invited into barred spaces for a period surrounding his visit. We had a woman, who Ambassador Jordan may know, because she worked for him — named Abercrombie Wynn Stanley, who tried to meet with some people in Saudi Arabia, not Islamists, but people who would like to see more reform and so forth. That was criticized by the Interior Minister.

Now, we’ve got so many problems in this country, why are we harping on all of this stuff in Saudi Arabia? I mean, these things happen, but these are kind of structural elements that I wanted to point to in the sense that I think that they will be relatively durable. I don’t see any of these kinds of problems going away all that quickly.

The last point is that the entire regime is bracketed by the unresolved, and at the moment, unresolvable succession issue. It’s difficult for me to imagine that there would be very dramatic steps in the Kingdom towards reform or anything else, absent a resolution of the succession issue. I don’t see that happening all that quickly, and even when it does happen because of, for example, the death of a leading figure, which would then precipitate a reshuffle of the responsible hierarchy, I see that process as being slow and gradual as much else in the Kingdom has been over the years. So, I guess we’re in for a period of more of the same where discipline and candid assessments of our interests and that kind of thing will be required to maintain the relationship on the best footing that can be had under the circumstances.

Faye Bowers: Well, I think the other three panelists have done a very good job of laying out all the underlying issues of the U.S.-Saudi relationship. I, as Marty mentioned, report on national security issues, which is mainly the United States’ war on terror and certainly looking at the Saudi aspects of that — what they do. I traveled to Saudi Arabia last December to report and write a four-part series on the effort Saudi Arabia is making alone both in security and financial and other types of reforms and what they’re doing jointly with the United States and other partners. I talked to a broad array of people, from officials in various levels of government to consular officers at other embassies to a broad array of women, a group of schoolchildren — that was extremely delightful — and I even got invited by 12 conservative Wahhabis to [an informal discussion session] one night. So, I had a really interesting sort of overall picture of the country presented to me.

Indeed, I found reform was taking place or at least a great discussion of reform. Almost everyone I talked to seemed to be really excited about the possibilities for the future. They seemed to have really bought into Saudi Arabia’s efforts to track down the terrorists and were on board with that. I think the religious and educational reforms are another story. That’s something we would see in our country as moving at a snail’s pace. But to them, I think, it was rather earthshaking.

So with that, I think we’ll just let you get on to your questions..

[The question and answer segment is provided as part two.]

As Fasting Ends, the Lessons of Ramadan Linger [Part Five]

Editor — Mon, 15 Nov 2004 18:07:13 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

We are pleased to present the final part of the “Ramadan Diary” series recently published by The Christian Science Monitor. We thank them for permission to share it with you.

Ramadan Diary:

Part One — “Enough Faith to Fast?”

Part Two — “A Month of Fast and Feast”

Part Three — “Halfway through the Ramadan Fast”

Part Four — “Waging ‘Inner Jihad’ on an Empty Stomach

As Fasting Ends, the Lessons of Ramadan Linger
By Faiza Saleh Ambah

Before we began our three-day Eid al-Fitr holiday, marking the end of Ramadan, I came across an article in a Saudi newspaper with a checklist of what makes a successful Ramadan.

First on the list: Recognizing that one can change for the better and acquiring patience and strong will. This month my deficiencies have shone as if spotlights were directed at them.

The article continues: Successful fasting means not only abstaining from food, drink, and lust from dawn to dusk, but also being honest, patient, and forgiving. I lose my temper with my children and argue with my sisters regularly. But, because I’m fasting and conscious of Ramadan’s requirements, I have become aware of that single moment, as quick as a finger-snap, when a person gives themselves the green light to lose their temper.

Be more charitable, says the article.

On Tuesday, I made some quick calculations to figure out my zakat, money for the poor due every Ramadan, which is 2.5 percent of what’s left of my income after I’ve calculated all my expenses. A devout friend, also named Faiza, distributes zakat for herself, her family, and her friends. I collected money from my sisters and joined her.

We drove to a neighborhood called Sabeel, which is mainly populated by illegal immigrants from Somali. We got out of the car to follow a janitor who lives there and who works at the university where Faiza teaches. Children ran after each other in the dark, garbage-strewn alleys. We moved cautiously, sidestepping a thin trail of sewage.

The janitor knocked on an iron door. Inside, children ran around a dirty room. Faiza insisted on entering to make sure the people were truly needy. “Why aren’t you working khala [aunt]?” she asked an old woman surrounded by three small children. “You used to be a janitor at the university, as well.”

“I worked there for 25 years. Then I broke my arm, and they replaced me,” the old woman answered.

“God is with you,” Faiza said and handed her a small envelope. We went from house to house where the stories were different, but the desperation is the same. Another woman’s husband is in prison, and her landlord has thrown her furniture out because she can’t pay her rent.

In the car on the long ride back, I was quiet; the stories and the smells stayed with me. But, Faiza was bubbly, energized by her good deeds. She seemed animated even though I could see only her eyes through the slit in her face veil. “The prophet, peace be upon him, said it makes God laugh with pleasure when we give charity to the poor,” she told me. “Charity can put an adulteress in heaven,” she rattled on, telling me a story recounted by the prophet of a prostitute who went to heaven for giving water to a thirsty dog. “Tomorrow, I’m going to another neighborhood to distribute more zakat, do you want to come with me?”

I shook my head, and she smiled. “Do you know why God prescribed zakat at the end of Ramadan? Because you’ve tasted for a whole month the hunger of the poor, you’ve empathized with them, and now you help them out. It’s Ramadan coming full circle.”

“But the poor are not only hungry and needy during Ramadan,” I said.

“And charity shouldn’t end there either,” she countered. “We don’t worship Ramadan, we worship the God of Ramadan. The God who said he prefers good deeds to be modest and continuous, instead of grand and infrequent.”

As we drove, I heard bits of Koranic verse from mosque loudspeakers at different intervals. The imams go through the whole Koran during the month of Ramadan and for several hours each day verses are broadcast throughout the city.

Three on the checklist: Sensing the unity of Muslims.

Last Monday, I performed another of Ramadan’s regular rituals, the pre-dawn Tahajud prayers that are encouraged but not obligatory. Dozens of women were streaming into our neighborhood mosque as I arrived with my mother and housemaid, Mahbooba, at 1 a.m..

There were close to 500 women there, and we took our place at the end of one of the rows. Ten minutes later, a woman came in and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with me. I felt uncomfortable at her proximity and moved closer to Mahbooba.

We were holding Korans and reading the verses the imam was speaking. But, I was so irritated by this woman who stuck to me that I couldn’t concentrate. I complained to my mother during an interval. “That’s how it’s supposed to be. You’re supposed to stand shoulder-to-shoulder like that.”

“With strangers?”

“You’re Muslims praying together,” she answered. Almost two hours later, we were done, and the imam started the supplication.

“God help us follow your guidance. God help us move closer to you and away from evil.” I heard a sound like ocean waves breaking, but I couldn’t tell what it was “God help us move towards the light and away from sin.” The sound grew more distinct but still eluded me.

“God help our brothers in Palestine, Iraq, Chechnya, and Kashmir regain their occupied lands. Help them defeat their enemies.” The muffled roar took shape; it was a chorus of amens from the men’s section. “God keep our parents healthy and our children healthy,” said the imam, his voice breaking.

“Amen.”

At the end of the 10-minute supplication, women grabbed tissues from boxes in front of them, wiping tears and blowing their noses. The energy in the mosque was clearer, lighter. I felt lifted and at peace, and the woman whose shoulder touched mine no longer seemed like such a bother.

Also, on the Ramadan check list: an increased mindfulness of God’s blessings.

When the crescent moon was sighted Friday, Ramadan ended here. Drinking green tea when I woke up yesterday was a treat that I had been looking forward to, but I still find, strangely enough, that I miss Ramadan. I miss the city’s mass immersion (at least the intention of it) into God and charity and trying to be our best. I miss the guidance of the sun, whose setting permitted me to eat and whose arrival forced me to abstain. And, I miss looking for the companionship of the moon and studying its shape to determine the days left of fasting.

Lastly, the article prescribes drawing closer to Allah. I have become very conscious of God during Ramadan — when I ate, when I drank water, and even when I didn’t. I thought about God every time I wanted to swear or get angry or think negative thoughts, which I came to realize is more often than I expected. And, I think that’s all part of the lesson.

But, the one lesson that I’m still striving to learn is balance. I pray that though Ramadan is over, God remains a presence in my life, not in grand gestures and infrequently, but consistently and in small doses.

Reprinted with permission.

Waging ‘Inner Jihad’ on an Empty Stomach Part Four

Editor — Fri, 12 Nov 2004 18:09:43 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

The following item of interest is the fourth selection from a series entitled, “Ramadan Diary.” This article originally appeared in The Christian Science Monitor and is reprinted here with permission.

Ramadan Diary:

Part One — “Enough Faith to Fast?”

Part Two — “A Month of Fast and Feast”

Part Three — “Halfway through the Ramadan Fast”

Waging ‘Inner Jihad’ on an Empty Stomach

After struggling with my first fast during Ramadan, Islam’s holiest month, my sister Reem arrives from overseas, and we decide to visit both Mecca and Medina, in spite of the fact that close to 2 million Muslims are expected in the holy cities this month.

We arrive in Medina Tuesday morning before dawn prayers. Pilgrims are walking down the dark streets, silently and in ever-increasing numbers as they approach the Prophet’s mosque as if hypnotized. Long crenelated minarets pierce the skies. The mosque, brightly lit from within, glows in the night. I can make out the singular green dome which marks the area where the Prophet is buried.

Later in the day, before the sunset prayers end the daily fast, my cousin, already in Medina, and I walk to the mosque. It’s packed with women sitting in line on the red carpets praying, sleeping, reading the Koran, or just chatting. We squeeze in between a group of Tunisian pilgrims. My cousin takes out a prayer book, and we huddle together and recite out loud, “God, let there be light in my heart, light in my hearing, light in my tongue, light before me, light behind me.”

Someone taps me on the shoulder and I look up. An elderly woman speaks in Urdu. I smile and shake my head. A few minutes later, she spreads out a plastic sheet. An Egyptian woman hands out free cups of yogurt while a Moroccan pilgrim on the other side hands out whole wheat brioche. It’s considered a blessing to feed someone fasting during Ramadan and by the time the call to prayer rings out, we have water, dates, and bread in front of us.

We recite the prayer for the occasion, “God, for you I have fasted and on your bounty I break my fast.” We dig in. At the end of sunset prayers, the imam asks the congregation to perform more prayers for the soul of someone who’s being prayed over at the mosque that day. “We’re going to pray for a stranger?” I ask my cousin.

“You recite the opening verse of the Koran, and then you pray for his forgiveness.”

“What if he was a bad person?”

“He was a Muslim,” she says by way of explanation.

I want to visit the prophet’s burial chamber and the Rawda, described by the prophet as a small stretch of heaven on earth beside his pulpit, but my cousin warns me there are long queues because women are allowed access to those sites for only a limited period. After two days in Medina, she’d been only once, while her husband had gone more than three times. “They act as if God is for men only, and it’s not,” she says.

Her words remind me of my visit to the Grand Mosque in Mecca last Saturday. My sister and I had gone for a minor pilgrimage, or umra, which during Ramadan is equal to, but does not take place of the hajj, one of the five pillars of Islam. While praying on the marble skirt that surrounds the Kaaba, the cube-shaped structure in the direction of which the world’s Muslims turn in their five daily prayers, a group of women veiled in black from head to toe and sporting mosque badges stood in front of us and clapped their hands. “Pilgrim, pilgrim, over there, over there.”

With my head on the cold marble floor, I was remembering the words of a Muslim preacher, “You are never as close to God as when you have your forehead on the floor in supplication.”

One of the women stands in front me and claps her hands again to get my attention. “Pilgrim, over there,” she orders.

I stand up. “Why?”

“No women allowed here.”

“Why not?” I ask, with an edge to my voice. “Who said?”

“Orders.”

One of her colleagues comes to me. “Don’t break your fast by fighting. Sit by the stairs, and I’ll try to find you a place on the skirt,” she tells me. I’m not mollified. What has struck me most with fasting is that the challenge has been neither thirst nor hunger, but trying to make it through the day in the Ramadan spirit; without getting angry, getting into arguments, or thinking bad thoughts.

“This is inner jihad,” says my other sister, Taghreed. “You struggle with yourself. You practice reining in your negative impulses during this month and hopefully it stays with you for the rest of the year.”

Late Wednesday, we debate whether to eat at home or go out for suhoor, our last meal of the evening, when Reem walks into the living room. “It’s the first night of the last 10 days of Ramadan. Tonight could be the Night of Power. Instead of going to Caspar & Gambini’s [restaurant], it’s better to stay home and pray.”

The night of power was when the first verses of the Koran were revealed to the prophet Muhammad, and on this night, according to the Koran, “Therein come down the angels and the spirit by God’s permission on every errand.” Nobody knows what day in Ramadan coincides with the Night of Power, only that it is during the last 10 days. According to his biographers, the prophet said, “One who spends the Night of Power in worship, one’s motive being faith and devotion, will have all one’s previous sins forgiven.”

Chastised, we decide to stay home. We eat a light meal of fava beans and feta cheese with tomatoes, then everyone heads out.
Just in case tonight coincides with the Night of Power I make a prayer. “Peace of mind, God,” I pray. “Peace of mind.”

Reprinted with permission.

Ambassador Wyche Fowler Interview

Editor — Thu, 11 Nov 2004 18:11:54 +0000

EDITOR’S NOTE:

Today, we present an interview with Wyche Fowler, Chairman of the Middle East Institute and U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia from 1996 to 2001. He talked with SUSRIS several days before the presidential election in the United States.

Ambassador Fowler’s tenure as America’s top diplomat in Saudi Arabia coincided with dramatic changes in the U.S. security situation in the Gulf, especially in the Kingdom. The terrorist bombing of a military dormitory in al-Khobar in 1996 led to an overhaul of the U.S. force posture, including the redeployment of Operation Southern Watch air forces from Dhahran to Prince Sultan Air Base. It also resulted in the involvement of American law enforcement elements in the investigation and new levels of cooperation between U.S. and Saudi officials to track down the terrorists and organizations responsible.

Ambassador Fowler shared insights on these significant developments in U.S.-Saudi relations as well as his appraisal of the current situation during this interview which was conducted by telephone from Washington on October 27, 2004.

U.S.-Saudi Relations: Attitudes and Perspectives
Ambassador Wyche Fowler Interview

SUSRIS: Thank you for speaking with us today. We appreciate hearing your perspective on US-Saudi relations. How would you assess the bilateral ties between Washington and Riyadh?

Amb. Wyche Fowler: Going back all the way to President Roosevelt, the Saudis demonstrated a strong friendship with American administrations, be they Republican or Democrat. They have worked across party lines and political lines. They have responded to the requests of the United States’ government in crisis, whether it be in military security or energy stability. They have sought to demonstrate that they see the United States, and by extension our people, as a firm and dependable friend.

However, I think it would be disingenuous to describe the Saudi-U.S. relationship on a government-to-government level, since 9/11, as being on solid footing. The fact that the majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudis has created a strain. It is reflected, particularly, in the public discussions through the media about the strength or quality of Saudi Arabia’s friendship to the United States.

SUSRIS: Can you comment on government-to-government ties and the level of cooperation, especially in the war on terrorism, that President Bush, Secretary of State Powell and others have applauded?

Amb. Fowler: I believe President Bush when he commented positively, over and over again, that on the government-to-government level, the cooperation in matters of intelligence, security and sharing of information has continued to improve dramatically. We have also combined our resources in the fight against terrorists in Saudi Arabia and around the region.

Counter-terrorism cooperation continues to improve — it accelerated certainly after 9/11 — but, it really began after the bombings in 1995 in Riyadh and in 1996 at Al Khobar. In both cases Americans were killed by terrorist attacks. The Saudis were flabbergasted and astonished not only that this had happened, but it had happened within their country. The call went out from the Saudi side for help with their security forces and their intelligence gathering. They regarded the United States as having superior technology and a more sophisticated network of intelligence.

It was those bombings that began, albeit on a much smaller scale than today’s level, cooperative efforts of exchanging information and finding a way to not only track the killers and find out who did it but to try to ensure that it did not happen again. Of course, after 9/11, we all poured resources into it. The Saudis realized — I think even their critics would acknowledge — that this was as much of a problem within Saudi Arabia as it might be in America in the future. The Saudis had a problem within their own country that had to be dealt with, and so, the sharing of information, sharing of resources and the determination to find and eliminate these cells was as much a part of the Saudis’ needs as it was to help America.

SUSRIS: Louis Freeh, former Director of the FBI, commented in a Wall Street Journal op-ed on the close coordination between the FBI and the Mabaheth, the kingdom’s antiterrorist police, during investigations of the bombings. How close was US-Saudi cooperation during that period?

Amb. Fowler: That was during my time in Saudi Arabia as well. I can tell you the extent of cooperation was inspired and directed by Louis Freeh and George Tenet. The Saudi security and police intelligence people had an extraordinary amount of respect for Mr. Freeh. They saw him as a straight shooter and an honest man. He not only asked for information, but he brought to the table offers to train Saudi security people in technologies and techniques at FBI facilities in the United States. He put together a mechanism by which information could be more quickly detected and shared. He, as well as George Tenet who also gained the respect of his counterparts in Saudi Arabia, are really responsible for the first systematic, cooperative efforts in the field of counterterrorism between Saudi Arabia and the United States.

SUSRIS: There is a perception fostered by some observers of US-Saudi relations that counterterrorism cooperation was poor prior to 9/11.

Amb. Fowler: I think the important thing to remember is that 9/11 was a cataclysmic event for both our countries. I think it was the catalyst for something like a Marshall Plan on behalf of the United States to harness our intelligence and counterterrorism activities. However, it was not the beginning. The groundwork had been laid. Committees were meeting. Information was being shared. In Saudi Arabia it began shortly after the terrorist attacks in 1995 and 1996 in Riyadh and Dhahran [Khobar].

SUSRIS: Can we talk a little bit more about the nature of the relationship during your tenure as US Ambassador in Riyadh? How did Saudi Arabians view Americans. What were feelings in the Kingdom about the Middle East peace process and the US role in it?

Amb. Fowler: Prior to 9/11, there were thousands of Saudis studying in the United States. They had been for the previous 20 to 30 years. Twenty-five or 30 years ago, America became the country of choice for those Saudis who wished to be educated overseas. Before that, it had been Europe. But, the Saudis who came to the United States liked what they saw. They liked Americans and American openness. They made friends while they were here, and many of those friendships resulted in commercial relationships, joint ventures or exchanges of one type or another later on. They learned, like Americans, to openly criticize policies that they didn’t like. Of course, we know, because the Israeli-Palestinian dispute has gone on so long and has been so terrible, that even our Saudi friends — those who studied here and those who have not been to the United States — believe there is a double standard regarding the US position on the Arab-Israeli conflict.

President Clinton was given very high marks in the region for trying very hard to resolve it and for his attempt at Camp David to negotiate with the Israelis and Palestinians — a cessation of the fighting and a peace agreement. They believe that he was even-handed and still refer to that event as an honest and skillful attempt to bring the Israelis and Palestinians to some kind of peaceful reconciliation.

Since that time, the current administration is thought not to be even-handed or an honest broker on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. That unquestionably is one of the accusations made by people in the Arab regions of the Gulf as an impediment to the relationships between their countries and the United States.

SUSRIS: Do you see any change in the attitude among Saudis of the U.S. role in the region. Has the US war in Iraq hardened attitudes among people who were already dismayed about U.S. policies in the area?

Amb. Fowler: No question, it has. There’s no question that many Arabs disapprove of American foreign policy, whether it be in Iraq, Israel-Palestine, Iran, or other places. But, until recently they respected and liked the American people and did not blame our government’s foreign policies on them.

The danger is that we are losing, I’m afraid, many of these people, who’ve said in the past, “Although we hate America’s policies, we like its people.” The danger is that unless we find a way to reverse the perception that all American policy is inimical to their interests, then you’re going to have a real crisis if all of a sudden the American people are getting blamed for policies rather than our government. It would then become dangerous to be an American abroad anywhere in the region.

SUSRIS: How can progress be made to reverse the hardened attitudes and the trend of fewer people to people contacts?

Amb. Fowler: The next administration, whoever it is, has to address this problem – the gulf in people to people connections. The understanding between people is very important. Right now our visa policies are understandably stricter than they were before 9/11. It has the unfortunate consequence of making it difficult for Saudi and other foreign students to study in America. Many of them were studying here and went home for their vacations and were unable to return, as we know. That is an understandable reason for people to be upset with us.

It’s not going to help the war on terror if Arab students are unable to experience the free life in the United States. It seems to me that it is better to have thousands of new foreign students, Saudis among them, in America who come to love its institutions and go home and promote democratic reform in their own countries.

The same should be said about Iraq. We should have 50,000 Iraqi students studying on scholarships in the United States right now. This would do more to ensure our goal of long term democracy in Iraq than about any policy now being pursued.

As I said, the next President of the United States is going to have to deal with the issues of foreign policy that have led to these feelings and have led to these restrictions. The president is going to have to resolve the problems in Israel and Palestine, the problems in Iraq, the continued reconstruction of Afghanistan, and the danger inherent in Iran and its nuclear program. What is so challenging is that he must deal with them simultaneously, in my opinion, because in the eyes of the Arab world, they are linked in many very complex but clear ways.

SUSRIS: Looking at the mirror image — the negative views among Americans of the Arab world — clearly, since 9/11, stereotypes have become more firmly rooted. Is there any reason to be optimistic that Americans will come to a fair understanding of the Arab world?

Amb. Fowler: It’s extraordinarily difficult because we are in a mess in that part of the world. Saudi Arabians, for instance, were totally vilified after 9/11. But, there is some encouraging news. The 9/11 Commission repudiated many of the charges that were made against the Saudis — that the government itself was funding terror and deliberately exported terrorism into our country.

The Saudis have cracked down effectively, not completely, but effectively on individual Saudis who have been sending money to extremist groups in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan. Why? Because they know that those who fund the violence in Iraq are also funding extremists in Saudi Arabia that are attacking the government and the people there. The Saudis know that, and they are acting on it. So, they tightened the laws on charities. They were very pleased that the G-8 Financial Action Task Force commended them a few months ago on their new laws and the administration of those laws.

There’s just so much that still needs to be done. It has to be done in concert. We’re not going to be able to eliminate terrorism coming out of that region by ourselves, and the Saudis are probably not going to be able to eliminate terrorists within their own country without sophisticated help, resources and cooperation from the United States.

SUSRIS: How can the American public be expected to read through the conflicting messages they get about US-Saudi relations?

Amb. Fowler: First of all, there were many irresponsible statements made during the political season. The Saudis are an easy whipping boy, and unfortunately, members of both parties during this American election, have tried to use the Saudis to their own political benefit.

It’s regrettable. You know, the half-truth is sometimes more effective as a political tool than the whole truth. But, often, it comes back to bite you when you try to make the right policy for our citizens, to shore up our allies, and to repair the damage in alliances that have always held firm during many crises in the past. That includes the Saudi-U.S. relationship.

Is it dangerous? Of course, it’s dangerous. But, most American businesses, who have had a history of successfully doing business in Saudi Arabia over the last 20, 30 or 40 years, do not want to leave and are not leaving. Now, that could change at any moment if there’s another attack on an American compound or on an office building housing American workers. But, American businesses with a history in Saudi Arabia are being careful, cautious and protective of their people. There has been no large-scale exodus.

On the contrary, because Saudi Arabia believes that they are winning the battle with the terrorists and have eliminated many of the cells, the doors are open to the world’s business people, Americans included, to come to Saudi Arabia. Since it is a country that values friendship in times of crisis, those businesses that want to factor in the risk of the security situation, I think, will be rewarded with a favorable welcome by the Saudi business establishment and the government.

SUSRIS: What is your assessment of reforms — economic, political and social — in Saudi Arabia?

Amb. Fowler: They are making genuine efforts at reforms. The government has announced that there will be elections for municipal governments next year. There is a question of whether or not women will be allowed to vote. I fear that, even in these first attempts at democratic elections, if women are not allowed to vote the elections may not be accepted as credible in our country. But, this is a big first step on the road to representative government and allowing people through their votes to participate in the selection of their leaders.

The advocates of a greater political openness are now allowed to petition the government, and they have done so at the highest level, bringing their request for reform to the Crown Prince himself. From what I read the press is, surprisingly, speaking openly about formally taboo subjects, such as the plight of divorced and abused women, drug addiction and even birth deformities that are attributable to intermarriage.

The role of women is expanding. There are laws that have been rewritten to encourage women to start their own businesses and invest capital. A few months ago, I think the government directed that land, for instance, in industrialized zones be set aside for businesses run and staffed by women. So, the economic and political role of educated women is being expanded.

Lastly, an issue of great concern to the United States — on education. That is still the greatest problem in Saudi Arabia — how to educate its people for good paying, modern jobs that will enable young Saudis to sustain themselves, marry, buy a home, and establish a stable and productive life.

The Saudi business community has for many years told the government that their universities were simply not producing the students who had modern skills. The government has belatedly moved to change the school curriculums and abandon teachings by rote, and the books also are being edited and reissued to eliminate those references to hatred of other peoples, which often leads to fanaticism. So, there’s much going on. It may be at a glacial pace by American standards, but things are happening at a very quick pace given how far Saudi Arabia has come in a short time.

SUSRIS: What is the most significant recollection of your experiences in Saudi Arabia, from 1996 to 2001?

Amb. Fowler: I found the Saudis to be warm and welcoming on the personal level, with a history of respect and admiration for the American people. World events, beginning with 9/11, have strained the personal relationships – that had been built over the last 40 to 50 years — between our peoples. That is what is sad and what must be overcome.

SUSRIS: Thank you, Ambassador Fowler for sharing your insight and experience.

Related Material:

SUSRIS Terrorism Timeline

Fowler Assures Davidson Audiences of Saudi Support, and Urges Sensitivity to Arab Needs

About Amb. Wyche Fowler

The Hon. Wyche Fowler, Jr., Chairman of the Board, Middle East Institute

Served as Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, 1996-2001.

Previously served in the U.S. Senate, 1986-1993; member of the Senate Appropriations, Budget, Energy and Agriculture Committees.

Elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1977; member of the Ways and Means and Foreign Affairs Committees, the Committee of Intelligence, and the Congressional Arts Caucus.

Practiced law in Atlanta for eight years prior to election.

Elected to Atlanta City Council, where he later served as president.

Expert on Saudi Arabia and Middle East affairs.

Source: Middle East Institute

U.S.-Saudi Relations: Attitudes and Perspectives: A Conversation with Wyche Fowler

Editor — Thu, 11 Nov 2004 16:02:06 +0000

U.S.-Saudi Relations: Attitudes and Perspectives
Ambassador Wyche Fowler Interview

EDITOR’S NOTE: