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Kushner and Trump protecting murderer, Prince Salman of Saudi Arabia


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2019 Dec 14, 10:14pm   471 views  2 comments

by Patrick   ➕follow (55)   💰tip   ignore  

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/12/jamal-khashoggi-congress-dni-mohammed-bin-salman

The annual military spending bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), was passed by a large majority in the House of Representatives on Wednesday and is expected to be approved by the Senate next week before being signed into law by Donald Trump.

In negotiations before the NDAA’s passage, sections stipulating that Khashoggi’s murderers be subject to punitive measures were stripped from the bill, on the insistence of the White House – as were clauses that would have cut US support for the Saudi war in Yemen.

According to the New York Times, the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, took a leading role in negotiations on behalf of the White House, and was insistent that the punitive clauses on Saudi Arabia should be removed.

But the final version of the bill retained language requiring the director of national intelligence (DNI) to present a formal determination within 30 days on who was responsible for the murder and dismemberment of Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October last year. ...

“We know that the intelligence community has assessed with high confidence that MBS bears at least some responsibility for Khashoggi’s murder and the cover-up that has followed,” Tom Malinowski, the Democratic congressman from New Jersey who drafted the Saudi human rights accountability legislation, told the Guardian. “So if they answer the question, honestly, MBS will be on the list.”

The congressional demand for a formal declaration, will be a test of the independence of the office of the DNI, since the ousting of Dan Coats from the post in the summer. His former deputy, Joseph Maguire, has been acting in the position since August.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if the White House put some pressure on the director of national intelligence to come to a different conclusion,” Malinowski said. “So we’ll be watching this with great interest. We do have the advantage of knowing in advance what the intelligence community thinks because they’ve already told us in a classified setting. So it will be quite striking if they tell us something that is different in response to this.”

Bruce Riedel, a former senior CIA officer and Saudi expert, said that Haspel is likely to have given the agency’s assessment of Prince Mohammed’s role in the Khashoggi murder in verbal form to the Senate, leaving the intelligence community enough wiggle room to hand over a list of the names of suspects the US has already named, excluding the crown prince.

“I’m doubtful [the CIA assessment] was conveyed in a written product. More likely it was in answer to questions,” Riedel said. He added that obscuring the crown prince’s involvement “is going to be a tight line to run, but no doubt this administration will run it”.

He said that the White House would have found it more “problematic” to convince Coats to issue a determination to Trump’s liking.

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1   Patrick   2019 Dec 15, 4:12pm  

HEYYOU says
Muslims killing Muslims. Who cares?


You're right, I don't really care much about Khashoggi, who was a member of the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood group himself.

What I care about is that Saudi Arabia murdered 2,977 random innocent people on 9/11, mostly Americans, and was then protected by the United States government (not the people!). The US government then went on to take out Saudi Arabia's enemy, Saddam, actually rewarding Saudi Arabia for murdering Americans.

So very wrong.
2   Patrick   2019 Dec 15, 5:01pm  

This is sadly true.

The Saudis are protected by our cocksucking "leaders" no matter how many people the Saudis murder.

Qatar is about the same. Funds murder, gets protection at our expense.

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