Thread: “The Al Sauds’ central nervous system has grown weak,”

Many similar articles being written in the region and beyond since Naif death of the struggle in the House of Saud.

Gulf reporters also criticising heavily Oman and Kuwait as well as the Saud and Bahrainis.

Sultan al Qassemi also writes on the problems.

“The Al Sauds’ central nervous system has grown weak,” says a Riyadh lawyer.

“They can respond to pain, but not to stimuli like complaints or new ideas.”


Structural reforms such as granting citizens a real say in government, or passing laws to bolster private enterprise by allowing mortgages, or opening equity markets, are sometimes discussed, but the easier option of throwing money at social programmes wins out. Instead of repairing old infrastructure, the preference has been for launching huge new projects named after the king: a giant financial centre on the outskirts of Riyadh, industrial cities, a university, and so on.

The second pillar of the Saudi state, its stern Wahhabist clerics, is also weaker than it was. Saudis for the most part remain fiercely attached to their faith, and the threat from jihadist radicals, which exploded in a wave of terrorism ten years ago, has receded. But the young, in particular, have grown sceptical of Wahhabist injunctions that command blind obedience to rulers. They turn instead to Salafist preachers who decry corruption (and in some cases languish in prison) or to secret societies associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, or to the constitutionalist movement, started by liberals, that has a growing Islamist component—and can thus serve to import the ideas of the Arab spring. “Our sheikhs have become a joke,” scoffs a Jeddah lawyer.

The country’s 30m or so people, two-thirds of them citizens and the rest expatriate workers or dependents, are largely complacent. Oil wealth does drip down. But the country is not so wealthy as all that. GDP per person remains below that of Slovenia. Middle-class households typically employ maids and drivers, and many Saudis are indeed immensely rich. But unofficial accounts suggest that as many as 3m Saudis, often in households headed by divorced or widowed women, live in relative poverty. Last year three young Saudis, Feras Boqna, Hussam al-Drewesh and Khaled al-Rasheed were detained after posting a ten-minute film on Saudi poverty to YouTube.

The beards have all grown longer

What the royal house of Al Saud has not done, and quite possibly cannot do, is get out ahead of the problem. “We are at a golden time, a peak,” says a prosperous stockbroker in Riyadh. “We have the resources right now to set things right, but the problems are growing faster than moves to fix them.” Rather than the bubbly confidence that might be expected coming off the top of an oil boom, the pervasive mood is of strained anticipation.

“We are in a sort of trance,” says a businessman in the oil-industry hub of Dammam, “waiting for biology to take its course.” King Abdullah, the oldest surviving son of Abdel Aziz bin Saud, the kingdom’s founder, is at least 89. His back problems cause him a lot of pain, which may well be heavily medicated. His half-brother and heir, Crown Prince Sultan, who had served for 49 years as defence minister, died last October at the age of 87. On June 16th Sultan’s replacement as next-in-line, Crown Prince Nayef, whose 37 years as interior minister had left him widely feared, also passed away. Prince Salman (pictured a step behind King Abdullah) who took over Sultan’s lucrative defence fief last year, is now confirmed as the new heir and crown prince. He is more than a decade younger, but has already suffered at least one stroke. Two of his 12 sons have died prematurely of heart disease......

http://www.economist.com/node/21557327

Egypt revolution has huge implications for the region and the Gulf is waking to the reality of Freedom and Justice and the right to choose.
The hatred of the MB by Al Saud and the conflict between MB and Wahabism will be a factor to consider as the beards try to control the region and dont forget that 80% of mosques in USA and Europe are Wahabi funded and supported and print Wahabi books and install Wahabi imams.

While all the Americans are crying about the MB victory they are turning a blind eye to the Wahabi ideology who breeds extremism and the fanatics in their own country.

article by Tariq Al Homayed editor of Asharq Al Awsat (owned by Prince Salman's sons) warning of MB rule in Egypt

Typical propaganda piece as the Al Saud attempt to keep Wahabi control of the region by the fanatics as the only security for the Al Saud throne and the wealth and the palaces.
So typical of the Al Saud to mention as ever the Iran !!!

Well today no Ayatollah got off a plane and Egypt this morning looked like Egypt and not Iran in 1979 and Al Saud forgets Egyptians have access to uncensored internet unlike them to know what is going on in the world!

Al Saud mourn the loss of their friend Mubarak.
The question is what next? will they arm and fund the filool in Egypt now?

Egypt: Fasten your seatbelts!

25/06/2012

By Tariq Alhomayed


Egypt, and indeed the entire region, has entered a new and dangerous stage, the consequences of which God only knows, after Muslim Brotherhood candidate, Mohamed Mursi, was announced as the country’s next president. Anybody who believes or imagines that we are witnessing a cinematic movie that will inevitably have a happy ending is mistaken, whilst all those who believe that this is a purely Egyptian affair are not just mistaken, but are negligent as well.

We must be aware that Egypt today is truly at a crossroads, and much will depend on which direction it takes, both domestically as well as across the Arab region. For the Egyptians, the battle has just begun: will the Egypt of tomorrow be like Turkey, namely a struggle between the Brotherhood and the military? If this occurs, we must not expect the end result in Egypt to be along the lines of the situation in Turkey. The Turkish model required a long time, whilst the Islamists in Turkey are different, and there are no Erdogan-like features in Egypt today. In fact, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood rejected Erdogan’s advice regarding the necessity of establishing a secularist state in Egypt! Will Egypt today be along the lines of Pakistan, namely with the Islamists on one side and the military on the other, and then add the judiciary to this? This has been a bad model until now, and it contains no glimmers of hope.

As for the other model- which is even worse - the Khomeinist revolution in Iran, which engulfed all the political powers and Iranian social currents that supported it? Some might say that the military will serve as the guarantors of Egypt, in addition to the strong judiciary present in the country. This is true, however we must remember that Egypt’s president is now a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, in other words the Brotherhood are ruling Egypt. This is the reality of the situation, and so much will depend on this, politically, economically, socially, religiously, and culturally, not just in Egypt, but throughout the entire Arab region. Anybody who says that the Brotherhood are the reality today, and therefore we must deal with them and not criticize them, and other such talk, is wrong. This is because, first and foremost, anybody who wants to be involved in politics must remember that criticism is permissible.

The other issue, which is most important, particularly to those who want to demonstrate pretend realism today, is that we must recall that the consequences of the Khomeinist experience are still affecting the region nearly 4 decades after the Khomeinist revolution, and the implications of this are clear in Lebanon, Iraq, Bahrain and Yemen. This is not to mention the exorbitant cost of the Khomeinist experience on the security of the Arab Gulf as a whole. We must also recall that in the five decades following the 1952 military coup in Egypt, the consequences of the Nasserite experience affected the Arab region as a whole, not just Egypt alone. This resulted in brutal wars, the collapse of Arab regimes by military coup, as well as political Islamist coups which were no less dangerous than the military variety. What is important to recall here is that the Nasserite experience set our region back by around 50 years, whilst also resulting in huge losses, underdevelopment and backwardness in most Arab states under military rule.

This is not a pessimistic reading of the situation, but a message to those who have buried their heads in the sand for a long time, to be wary and fasten their seatbelts for we now face a reality that many did not believe would ever happen, however in spite of this, it came to pass and will no doubt have huge consequences!

http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=2&id=30095

Originally Posted by Abu Sina

article by Tariq Al Homayed editor of Asharq Al Awsat (owned by Prince Salman's sons) warning of MB rule in Egypt

Typical propaganda piece as the Al Saud attempt to keep Wahabi control of the region by the fanatics as the only security for the Al Saud throne and the wealth and the palaces.
So typical of the Al Saud to mention as ever the Iran !!!

Well today no Ayatollah got off a plane and Egypt this morning looked like Egypt and not Iran in 1979 and Al Saud forgets Egyptians have access to uncensored internet unlike them to know what is going on in the world!

Al Saud mourn the loss of their friend Mubarak.
The question is what next? will they arm and fund the filool in Egypt now?



http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=2&id=30095

Saudi Arabia is not concerned about the MB in Egypt. Their hope is that Egypt will be stable and that literacy and their economy will improve.

You also have bad information concerning "Wahabi".... The clerics have power and influence only so long as the Saudi people defer to them... but most Saudis are very moderate and consider the Mutaween to be pests.

The population is far more open to cautious reform than the clerics.

As for the SAG leadership..... Younger royals have been trained up in preparation for taking over. So a son or nephew may have a long career in service working in one ministry or another.

Titles vary.. and I don't know them all.. but a man might be deputy of the interior or deputy minister of foreign affairs or deputy minister of defense... so when it comes time for them, they have 30 years of experience and are well prepared.

A Dictator's Worst Nightmare.

Originally Posted by Margot

Saudi Arabia is not concerned about the MB in Egypt. Their hope is that Egypt will be stable and that literacy and their economy will improve.

Their hope is that the Arab Spring will not be exported is the truth. Check the news Margot. It's one of the first phone calls Goldfinger wanted to hear from Morsi. Check out Morsis statements.

You also have bad information concerning "Wahabi".... The clerics have power and influence only so long as the Saudi people defer to them... but most Saudis are very moderate and consider the Mutaween to be pests.

Al Saud only have power as long as they defer to the Clerics and you must be the ONLY one in the world not to realise that. Slowly slowly, baby steps is how they deal with it.

As for the SAG leadership..... Younger royals have been trained up in preparation for taking over. So a son or nephew may have a long career in service working in one ministry or another.

It's not a question of what they are being 'trained up for' as you well know. It's about the family in fighting and WHO will take over once the 'old boys' are gone.