Interview with political observers Ali al-Ahmed, Mohsen Saleh, and Wafik Moustafa
As the wave of Islamic awakening spreads through the Middle East, political observers contend that the United States has failed to recognize the nature of public demands in the region.
Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch says Saudi authorities have arrested around 160 political dissidents in a bid to choke anti-government protests.
In a Wednesday interview with Press TV, political observers Ali al-Ahmed, the director of Institute for [Persian] Gulf Affairs (I[P]GA), Mohsen Saleh of the Lebanese University, and Wafik Moustafa, the chairman of the Conservative Arab Network, shared their insights on the current Saudi situation and other developments in the region. The following is the rough transcript of the interview.
Press TV: Mr. al-Ahmed, how and why does Saudi Arabia get away with these detentions which have been going on for quite some time in that country?
Al-Ahmed: The Saudi monarchy has been able to win the favors of the Western powers, especially in Washington DC, through different ways of buying influence with the policy makers; through direct cash assistance; and business contracts with American companies with influence over the policy makers, and also buying interest in the media. For example, ABC which is owned by Disney, and Fox News which is owned by News Corp, both have billions of dollars worth of stock owned by the Saudi ruling family, and former President Carter is probably the worst example, because he had received over 35 million dollars for his Carter Center in Atlanta which has a human rights center, but Carter has never raised the issue of human rights in Saudi Arabia. In fact he has refused to do that.
Basically, what the Saudi monarchy has been able to do is to buy the policy makers in this country — the majority of them — and to buy even the academia; Georgetown and other universities, and even Harvard has received money to keep it silent about Saudi Arabia and even think tanks in Washington DC, most of them do not address the Saudi issue and refuse to talk about it. If they do, they talk about it very sparingly, and this is to create a general perception that Saudi Arabia is an ally with the West; that the ruling family of al-Saud are progressive, democratic modernizers. So a lot of money has been spent in the West to buy that image and the Western leaders are willing to do these things, because they do not hold the people of that country in high regards, because it is still the dominant Western view that Arabs and Muslims are not really good enough for freedom; they are not smart enough to hand them democracy and modernization.
Press TV: In the report by Humans Rights Watch it has been mentioned that Persian Gulf nations have arrested bloggers, doctors and activists in a region that holds the world’s largest proven oil reserves. Mr. Moustafa, do you think it is about the oil or the Western weapons sales as a whole to the Persian Gulf countries, or is it a combination of both?
Moustafa: Well, there are a lot of points here. Saudi Arabia is first and foremost a part of the Arab world and it is a very important country for the Arab nations. It is very important to have political stabilization and economic development, and both of them are entwined together. You cannot have political stabilization without freedom of thought and freedom of press and freedom of assembly. Saudi Arabia is an integral part of what is happening in the Arab world. Everybody thought that in Egypt (ex-President) Mubarak is protected by the West and the Americans, but the West, and the Americans were very realist of the need of the people to express themselves and to feel a part in ownership of the country. In Saudi Arabia there is quite a large number of people who are unemployed; almost 50 percent unemployed. It is very difficult to discuss Saudi Arabia without the Arab world and the Muslim world. There is general culture retardation in the Arab world in particular, because of poor quality of education, and if this is not addressed properly, you are going to have mayhem like what we see in Yemen, and we see the confusion even in a country as sophisticated as Egypt.
Press TV: People under 30 in Saudi Arabia account for some 60 percent of the population. This population has grown up in the Internet age. Some say the Saudi monarchy has bought around 130 billion-dollar support to quell the recent protests. Mr. al-Ahmed, how much longer do you think the Saudi authorities are going to be able to sustain this type of approach that some say is just a bubble that is going to burst in a very near future?
Al-Ahmed: It is a bubble. It will burst in a matter of few months to be honest, because this bubble; this 100+ billion dollars that were announced to be spent are not going to go to most of the citizens. It is not going to be spent now. It is something over several years. Much of it will also be taken due to the massive corruption in the country. So the announcement is big, but the reality is small. This money is not going to benefit the majority of the population. It will not have that effect that the monarchy is hoping for, because of the young age of the population; because we have over 30 percent — this is a conservative number by the way — unemployment. The 70+ percent of the population cannot buy their own homes, so they live in rental apartments, and the poverty is over five million people.
All these conditions and what is happening in the region; the communication revolution; the fact that there are more people who are able to read and write, and they can see what is happening around them in the region and the world, is while the Saudi monarchy is still resistant and stagnant in providing any freedom or economic opportunities or political participation. This is the right mix for an explosion. I think that explosion will come when nobody is expecting it. It is going to happen and Saudi Arabia is not immune to it regardless of how much money they have to spend. We saw that in Libya, where a lot of money was spent as well to stop and to quell the revolution, but it happened. We saw that in other countries. So it is not about money alone. It is about freedom and people’s desire to participate in their government and to have control of their own affairs.
Press TV: Some critics say that the Saudi-backed crackdown on protesters by the Bahraini regime is a message that the Saudi authorities are sending to their own people. Mr. Saleh, do think this is going to work for Saudi Arabia itself given the context of the population of which 60 percent are 30 years old or younger?
Saleh: First of all, I should add that there is a treaty between the United States and Saudi Arabia that would allow the Saudis to control Saudi Arabia and parts of the Arabian peninsula in order to give the Americans the oil and have the control of it. That is why we see this kind of relationship that is under the interests. The Wahhabis are free to do whatever they like in Saudi Arabia. That is why they discriminate; they legislate according to Wahhabism, which is really a backward sect — if it is an Islamic sect. And they call other Muslims disbelievers. That is why they stepped against the Iranian revolution; Abdullah’s revolution; and even the Palestinian resistance. They try to contain it and they contain it with the United States. And when the revolution started in Bahrain, they also tried to contain it under the American orders and they fulfilled this agreement by intervening in Lebanon or in Palestine or in Iraq or in every place in this Arab world. The Saudis are an agent of the Americans. They intervene whenever the United States asks them. That is why they go to Bahrain, they act as if they own Bahrain, they attack people, they torture them and they demolish the mosques, and in Saudi Arabia they discriminate against the Shia in the east and they also discriminate against the Saudis who are not Wahhabis.
Press TV: Mr. Moustafa, how would you react to what Mr. Saleh said?
Moustafa: Personally I think after the uprising in Tunisia followed by that of Egypt’s, politics have turned upside down in the Middle East and in Saudi Arabia.
There is huge oil interest, economic interest, personal interest and real-estate interest from the part of America and Britain. The Wahhabis have to reshape themselves; they have to be readapted, because they cannot be in isolation and they cannot continue the way they continued in the past. The Wahhabi thinking is going to be in a difficult problem. The Islamic self in general will actually need some form of revolution of thinking in my view. Saudi Arabia has never had revolutions in real terms for centuries. It is the most tribal country in the world.
Press TV: What do you think the role of the United States is Mr. al-Ahmed? Once they said they are siding with the government, but now they are saying they are siding with people. Is that just window dressing?
Al-Ahmed: It is window dressing. The United States has since World War II had great relations and cooperation with the governments. They rarely dealt with people. In only a few cases they connected to the people and it was because it served their interest. For example, when the Russian invasion of Afghanistan happened, it was the [US] policy to engage with the Afghan people but when the Russians left, the Afghan people were forgotten. So it was not because they were connecting with Afghan people, it was part of a geo-political struggle with the Soviet Union at the time especially in the Arab region.
I think the United States has so far failed to establish any contact or help or recognize that there are people in that region that should be considered. In politics, you have to do that. You have to include all the players in your calculations, but in Washington DC, they do not even recognize the people, because to them the Arab people or the Arab street does not matter. They do not really put so much calculation. They do not put the street in their calculation in regard to their policies, and that has to change, because the Arab people in Egypt and Tunisia and the rest of the countries have shown that they are able to change realities in the street peacefully and they can build something that is better. Unfortunately, the policy in Washington remains to see these people as enemies; to be suspicious that people who are going to work may be against their interest and it is partly true that these people would like to be independent. That is considered to be anti-American in some quarters here in Washington for people to be free, independent of external pressure and to have better relations with their neighbors; for example, relations between Egypt and Iran, between the [Persian] Gulf countries or Iraq and Iran. That is considered to be anti-American. I do not understand it, but this is how they feel.
Press TV: Mr. Saleh, we have the Persian Gulf countries, and we have the Arab countries. Are the Arab countries in the Persian Gulf trying to set a standard where they should be immune to the Arab uprisings because they have monarchies in place?
Saleh: Of course the United States tries with its allies — the Saudis and others — to contain the revolutions whether in Tunisia or in Egypt, and it tries to put an end to the revolutions around Saudi Arabia. In Yemen, for example, what they are doing is they are trying to put the Americans face people who are revolting against Ali Abdullah Saleh. While they are maneuvering these revolutions in Yemen, they are also trying to put an end to the revolution in Bahrain. They are using all kinds of manipulation in order to be used by the United States.
The United States uses the Saudis and the Arabs to liberate Afghanistan from the Soviet Union and then to surround the Islamic republic in Iran and try to attack its interests there. Now the United States is trying to use the Saudis in Yemen and in Bahrain in order to reach its goals and interests in the [Persian] Gulf, and also tries to put the question in place to be immune from these revolutions. They do not want any reform. That is why the Saudis want to confiscate all kinds of mosques and all kinds of people, and try to put the Wahhabis in Bahrain and in the Arab [Persian] Gulf states. And they are also doing the same thing with Qatar and the Emirates and they are also trying to impose something on Oman and Jordan, and now in Syria. These people in Saudi Arabia are doing according to an American agenda. They do not know what to do.
Moustafa: I pick to disagree with my two colleagues for one thing on the ground, and I am sure in politics. The United States is not the president. The United States is a country; a Congress; a Senate; an elected government. What I want to say is very important that without American interference in Egypt, Mubarak would have been able to take a couple of thousands of Egyptians and control the situation. America weakened him. The same happened in Libya. If there was no no-fly zone of the Libyan air which was championed by Britain, France and the United States. Nonetheless, if it was not, I am sure Gaddafi would be in power now without killing three or four thousand people…
Saleh: Americans do not go to Egypt for the eyes of the Egyptians. They go for their interest and Obama said it frankly that they should forget the treaties between Israel and the United States. They want Egypt to come back to the United States and to Israel. They want to exploit this revolution.
Press TV: Mr. al-Ahmed, we would like to have your final comments on this please.
Al-Ahmed: I agree with both of my colleagues. The United States is there to its own interest, but at the same time its calculation. And the United States did support these things and it helped topple Mubarak, but because it served their interest and because Mubarak had expired. So I agree with both of them.
HSN/GHN
source : press tv
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