FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
Jamal Khashoggi, Turki, bin Laden, and the FBI
Oct. 17, 2018 (EIRNS)—On June 2nd, 2002, Lyndon LaRouche was the keynote speaker in a major conference on oil and gas in international politics, organized by the Zayed Center in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates. The whole cabinet of the U.A.E., and several current and former oil ministers were sitting in the front row to listen to LaRouche. The U.A.E. energy minister shared the podium with him.
LaRouche focused on two points that could, potentially, become a revolution in this British-controlled region: 1. The City of London-Wall Street-dominated international system is on the verge of collapse. Take the lifeboats to a new system, LaRouche told the high-level audience (i.e., abandon the sinking ship of the British Empire where you invest all your wealth). 2. Stop exporting raw oil, build nuclear power and create a high-value petrochemical industry (i.e., independence).
LaRouche’s remarks received unprecedented, wide coverage in the Persian Gulf region. In the months following this conference, LaRouche and his associates held many conferences in Abu Dhabi and were writing regular columns and articles for leading Gulf newspapers, including inside Saudi Arabia itself. LaRouche became a household name, and a strong voice of wisdom from within the U.S. to stop perpetual wars.
In the meantime, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney were busy faking the case for the invasion of Iraq. On Feb. 5th, 2003 (several weeks before the invasion of Iraq, and the same day as Colin Powell’s UN speech) Jamal Khashoggi wrote an op-ed in the leading Arabic, Saudi-owned, London-based daily Asharq Al-Awsat, and simultaneously in Kuwaiti and Lebanese dailies: “LaRouche and His Associates: Stay Away from Them, Otherwise They Will Make You Crazy.” He rattled off the usual slanders against LaRouche and issued a warning that from now on, no one should ever invite LaRouche or his associates to any conferences in the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, or in Arabic media.
Khashoggi was not writing from his position as a journalist in Riyadh, but from London, from his post as advisor to then Saudi Ambassador to Britain, Prince Turki al-Faisal, who went from being Intelligence Director (creator and controller of Afghan Mujahideen) to becoming Ambassador—to avoid the 9/11 talk about Saudi involvement, and obviously to take part in the preparations for the invasion of Iraq, Syria, etc. Turki was Ambassador in Britain from January 2002 to 2005. Then he served for one year as Ambassador to Washington from July 2005 to December 2006; All the time, Khashoggi served as his advisor.
According to well-informed U.S. intelligence sources, Khashoggi was the liaison between Prince Turki and Osama bin Laden in 1996-1998. Prior to that period, bin Laden and his London office managers of his Advise and Reform Committee (Khaled al-Fawwaz, Abdallah al-Masaari and Saad al-Fagih) were mobilizing, sometimes with the help of the BBC, against the al-Saud monarchy. Al-Fawwaz was trying to get bin Laden to move to London from Sudan (where the government of Khartoum were contemplating in 1996 to extradite him to the U.S. or Saudi Arabia).... Khashoggi’s role in this affair was to persuade bin Laden to stop attacking the Saudi royal family and, in return, get free passage to Afghanistan where he would be protected and supported by Saudi assets. He was free to attack American or other Western targets, but not Saudi Arabia.
If one listens carefully to what President Donald Trump said in his visit to Riyadh in May 2017 where he made a speech in front of 50 leaders of Muslim nations, he said the support for Islamic jihadism should stop now. Many people thought he was talking to Iran. In reality, he was talking to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, et al. The Islamic jihadism that emerged out of the MI6-CIA-Saudi joint efforts against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and against other progressive governments in the Muslim world, was now facing its last stand.
What followed was that almost all open support to the Islamic terrorist groups in Syria was stopped, and Turkey went to cooperating with Russia. This was the beginning of the end of the terrorism in Syria. Qatar was scapegoated as a leading supporter of Sunni terrorist groups like Al-Nusra and the Muslim Brotherhood, not Saudi Arabia. Despite all the theatrics of blockade against Qatar from Saudi Arabia’s side, and well-financed conferences advocating regime-change in Qatar, observers with a good knowledge of the region never considered this anti-Qatari operation a serious matter. It was all distraction. Both Saudi Arabia and Qatar are under U.S.-British protection. So, the Muslim Brotherhood are being rounded up in several countries and sent to jail, except in Tunis and Turkey where they are in power. With Russia and China’s forceful backing of Syria, the use of Islamic jihadism for geopolitical purposes, including the Chechens and Uighurs against Russia and China is being rendered obsolete.
So, what will happen to the Wahhabi cult in Saudi Arabia, and their alliance with al-Saud, which is one of the four legs the Saudi Kingdom is standing on (the other three being allegiance to the British Crown, oil, and protection by the U.S.)? If any of these four disappears, the Saudi monarchy would be shaken.
British and U.S. liberal media have been pushing Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (known as MBS) as the reformist prince. Khashoggi, even in his exile in the U.S. in the past year, was pushing the same line, and never attacked MBS directly. The target of Khashoggi was the clergy. But he was doing that as a provocateur.
The killing of Khashoggi, which was described by an intelligence source as tantamount to a terrorist attack in its effect, was conducted by someone to create a shock in the Saudi Kingdom. It must be an inside force from within Saudi Arabia. But what is the purpose of it? Khashoggi was no threat at all. He was only a used-up asset, whose bloody shirt is being carried around in Western media to make him a martyr of free speech, and at the same time to paint President Trump as the terrible buddy of his murderers in Saudi Arabia. This contributes to the coup attempt launched against him by forces in Britain and America.
