Colonial Karma

Anyone with half a brain cell knows that Saudi Arabia shares the same ideology as ISIS and al-Qaeda. Anyone knows that only last year candidate Donald Trump rightly condemned Hilary Clinton’s proximity to the Saudi Arabian ruling clan while at the same time supposedly being a champion of women’s rights. Yet here he was in the capital of jihadism on his visit abroad as President lecturing Muslims on the need to combat extremism in a land were public floggings and executions are a norm. Where campaigners for freedom of speech are met, if they’re lucky, with prison sentences.

But for a moment let’s put aside Trump’s brass-necked and sickening hypocrisy. Early in his speech he regurgitated this myth about the founding of the Kingdom that demands unpacking:

“King Abdulaziz, the founder of the Kingdom who united your great people. Working alongside another beloved leader — American President Franklin Roosevelt — King Abdulaziz began the enduring partnership between our two countries.”

Firstly, the notion that AbdulAziz ‘founded’ the Kingdom is mythic nonsense. The British actually founded the Kingdom and AbdulAziz was merely their puppet. When AbdulAziz expanded into the Ha’il region (in the north) it was because the British drove him there because the then rulers, the Rashidis, rejected the British Empire’s advances to be another puppet. The British even sent in reinforcements for AbdulAziz to capture the region.

When the same AbdalAziz expanded into Hijaz, the eastern region where the holy shrines are, it was because the then ruler, the Hashemites, refused to accept Britain’s Zionist colonial project in Palestine. So-called “Lawrence of Arabia” was sent by Churchill to bribe the leader of the Hashemites to sign away Palestine. He refused and within several years he was out on his ear courtesy of the British puppet, AbdulAziz, who invaded and occupied the area containing the holy shrines.  

Secondly, the notion that AbdulAziz ‘united’ his people is also highly doubtful. The late biographer of the Saudi clan, Said Aburish makes an argument that AbdulAziz didn’t know what ‘unity’ is. All he was concerned with was tribal raids, loot and capturing the women folk of his tribal enemies – very similar to what ISIS are known for in Syria and Iraq. Aburish, if I remember correctly, argues that the notion of AbdulAziz as ‘unifier’ originates with the British biographers.

After AbdulAziz had completed the Empire’s bidding it then christened all the territory he had captured on the way, the “Kingdom of Saudi Arabia”. Specifically, Geroge Rendel, head of the Middle East desk of the Foreign Office took full credit for the naming of the puppet’s country.

Thirdly, even the notion that Roosevelt-AbdulAziz began an “enduring partnership” needs to be questioned. There is some evidence to strongly suggest that the British deliberately off-loaded the Saudi clan to the Americans to financially rope them into the region. The Empire felt that Iraq, Iran and the other statelets of the region would fully cater their (oil) needs so they could afford and spare to hand over AbdulAziz to the Americans.

All in all, what we can learn from the Trump speech is that you know the Republic, which was supposedly founded in Enlightenment ideals, is in permanent decline when it needs to prostitute itself to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars to a medieval theocracy founded by its former imperial master.  

By the way, anyone remember candidate Trump’s tweets claiming Saudi Arabia was responsible for 9/11?