The Saudi King Suddenly Changes Succession Rules Infuriating Conservative Saudis

Elaine Meinel Supkis

The mystery of the sudden resignation of Saudi ambassador Turki is solved. The king of Saudi Arabia announced new rules for choosing the king. This is to circumvent the conservative brother who is third in line. The end result of all this will be rather violent, I think. So thinks bin Laden, too.

This reporter doesn't understand what is going on in Saudi Arabia.

By Hugh Miles

Until now, the king alone has selected his successor

Saudi Arabia has significantly reduced the powers of its absolute monarchy by quietly removing the king's authority to choose his own successor.

This landmark constitutional reform, enacted by royal order last October but only disclosed this week, fundamentally changes the way the desert kingdom – which controls 25 per cent of the world's oil – is governed.

Um, I hate to say this, but the KING of Saudi Arabia decided to change the succession rules himself! This wasn't foisted on him, this is several key family members deciding amongst themselves, how to cut another influential family member out of the succession.

Until now, the interior minister, Prince Nayef, had been expected to become king after Sultan. This will almost certainly not happen. Prince Nayef, who is about 74, is a deeply conservative figure regarded as one of the principal obstacles to reform.

If anyone wants to know what will happen in the long run, I strongly suggest going to any of the Shakepsearean plays about the kings and queens of England---especially the 'War of the Roses' and the '100 Year's War' sections. Like Henry VI parts I and II or Richard III. Namely, there are all sorts of tricks one can use to jigger the succession but these can easily lead to fraternal wars.

During the War of the Roses, the solution was to kill off family members as fast as possible. This got worse and worse as they literally butchered each other. It is grim reading. The Plantegenets ruled for a long time but Edward I was a prolific father and his poor queen was dragged all over kingdom come, literally, and died in childbirth after being hauled off to Scotland where he was battling William Wallace.

He, like the Kings of Saudi Arabia and incidentally, the head of the bin Laden clan, had many children who then fought over the throne for several generations until the whole thing broke totally apart and they destroyed all of themselves. Wiped themselves out. Killed each other dead as door nails.

The bin Laden family has a certain member who is friendly with the now dispossessed royal who is, to put it mildly, pissed off as all hell. These people do not stand alone but have many followers who think the King of Saudi Arabia is an American dog and is corrupt and is destroying Islam. This is the revolution I keep talking about: it isn't the teeming masses attacking the royals but rather, a War of the Oil Rigs. Namely, the conservatives think oil is destroying Islam and they want to change this and this is quite possible by blowing up the oil rigs.

This possibility is known by the royals who want to live like American and European Christians and Jews. This, incidentally, is why bin Laden and Nayef will now react accordingly. The increasingly Christianized ruler and his part of the family got to the throne by murdering the last king, Faisal. He was killed by a nephew. This shows us clearly that this family is quite capable of murdering each other every bit as the British royals like to kill each other (pace, Princess Di). One Saudi Princess was stoned to death because she ran away from her husband, just for example.

They chop off each other's heads and do other brutal things. So expecting this latest stuff to be civilized is funny considering the history of all royalty and their penchant for killing each other over succession issues. Just like nothing is more bitter than families divorcing each other, this is much worse. Whole captive populations are at stake.

Anyone imagining that Nayef will take this lightly is foolish. On the face of this family coup of the Christianized parts that often live outside Saudi Arabia like the Ambassador, Turki, Nayef will lie low. But if he is off into the Desert (and I am betting he is there right now!)---he will be plotting his counter-strike! And he has an army of assassins near at hand: al Qaeda.

The rulers of Saudi Arabia hope the foreign mercenaries they have hired will protect them. But to be 'safe', they are sending their families out of the country...which is silly when one considers how al Qaeda operates overseas. The Christian mercenaries are supposed to suppress al Qaeda which is why the various wars that are falling apart frighten the Saudi rulers. They are terrified we won't keep a lid on Muslims for them and they know they will hang from lampposts if they can't force us to fight to the death, the Islamic revolutionaries who hate them.

King Abdullah established the new council by royal order on Oct 20 last year. Under the new system, Prince Turki himself, who was Saudi Arabia's intelligence chief before his ambassadorial appointments, is a credible candidate for crown prince.

He resigned abruptly from his post as ambassador in Washington last year for unexplained reasons.

Prince Turki is the one behind this little scheme. He is thoroughly Christianized and his job before going off to the USA, was to keep the Islamic revolutionaries and reactionaries under the harsh whip of the ruling royals. But of course, this is where the rift within the family lies: they spend a lot of effort pretending to be the leaders of Islam even as most of them have been lured out of the tent. But not all of them.

I wondered what was going on when Turki suddenly dropped everything and flew off to Saudi Arabia, here is a speech he made recently after returning to the USA (his real home now).

Prince Turki Al-Faisal, Saudi Ambassador to the US
Prepared remarks
New America Foundation
Washington, DC
January 17, 2007

In December, as you know, I decided to retire from my post as Ambassador. There was much talk about this in the press. You can discount all of it, including Mr. Clemons’ contribution. As Mark Twain said, “I have been through some terrible things in my life – some of which actually happened.”

The truth is King Abdullah has graciously allowed me to end my diplomatic term in order to spend more time with my family.

Indeed, he is spending much more time dealing with his 'family' which is gigantic, he has many relatives and most of them are leeches. The tension caused by the Saudi Royals and the king's choice of kneeling to the Christians and Jews and following them like a dog on a leash even as he desperately tries to control them with his oil, is where the major rift within Islam is.

His inability to stop the USA from killing Sunnis and fighting for Shi'as in Iraq is fatal, too. For bin Laden and his group are all Sunnis! And the Sunni/Shi'ite rift has been opened by the USA and the attempts of the USA to try to egg Iran into a war is frightening the King of Saudi Arabia because the Iranians have made it clear, they will lunge at Saudi Arabia if the USA or Israel work in cahoots with the overlords of Mecca to attack them.

Far from keeping the kings of Saudi Arabia in our grip, this latest move by Turki after consulting with the Christians and Jews in the USA, is a flaming firebrand that is going to set the entire kingdom alight.

Not today or tomorrow but on the day the present king dies. Then the swords will suddenly be drawn and the fighting will erupt. Turki hopes to defang his uncle and prevent this from happening. But I would suggest, historical forces are moving in the other direction: things are becoming more radicalized the more the Saudi Royals demoralize themselves, fleeing Islamic restrictions on their pleasures and joys.

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Comments

[JSmith]

"He is thoroughly Christianized and his job before going off to the USA, was to keep the Islamic revolutionaries and reactionaries under the harsh whip of the ruling royals."

I'm for that. The harsher the better!

"The tension caused by the Saudi Royals and the king's choice of kneeling to the Christians and Jews and following them like a dog on a leash even as he desperately tries to control them with his oil, is where the major rift within Islam is."

My, my... and here I was, thinking there was a rift between the Sunnis and the Shits. Silly me!

"This shows us clearly that this family is quite capable of murdering each other every bit as the British royals like to kill each other (pace, Princess Di)."

At least this family has some stuff worth squabbling over. But royals will squabble, even over nothing (I can't think of much worth killing over in Nepal, can you?)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1365393.stm

[JSmith]

Whoops. In my comment just above,

"the Sunnis and the Shits"

should have read

"the Sunnis and the Shiites."

The typo was unintentional.

[D. F. Facti]

Yes, that ould be a problem, wouldn't it, the fundamentalists blowing up the oil machinery. Wow. Did the Project for the New American Century calculate that possibility?

Nuking Iran would definitely screw up the flow of petrol.

Among other things.

Whatever do you suppose the brain trust is thinking?

************

Internet is slow as hell today - - - another hack attack?

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

A royal battle in Saudi Arabia=disaster. The Chinese magicians are saying this year of the pig will be full of wars done by piggish people and it seems we have an excess of these.

And yes, this will be the dreadful 'Battle for Mecca' I have been talking about. No joke here. Ie: will the conservatives win or the radical 'let's party with Europeans and Americans who like to get drunk like Jenna and Barbara Bush and their drunk parents?'

Make no mistake: this is a big, big, BIG issue in SA: drinking.

[JSmith]

I've been to Ar-Riyadh, and that place needs some nightclubs in the worst freakin' way! Allah didn't want me to have a cold beer when I'd finished work for the day either, the uncivilized lout...

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

On Mt. Olympus where Pegasus grazes when he isn't a constellation in the night sky, there is lots and lots of wine and women. Women who like poetry, dance, singing, history lessons, math homework and...hey, sounds like school.

Oh well. Better than the alternative, right?

[JSmith]

Hey - I'm ready to convert to Pegasism! Where do I sign up?

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

I just knew the 'math homework' would reel you in, Smith. Now you have to learn how to clean stalls. Like Hercules had to.

[JSmith]

I have, in fact, already mucked out my share of horse barns. In my childhood, we lived south of Lexington, KY - in "horse country". So we can check that one off the list.