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Yemen update 9/24\2015..Yemenis mark Eid al-Adha amid Saudi airstrikes, terrorist attack
Yemenis mark Eid al-Adha amid Saudi airstrikes, terrorist attack
Saudi jets target several residential areas in Yemen’s Sa’ada province
Saudi warplanes kill 6 civilians in Yemen’s Hajjah
ISIS Attacks Shia Mosque In Yemen With Twin Suicide Bombs
Yemen: Eid al-Adha celebrated in blood as deadly blasts claimed by IS group hit mosque
Saudi Arabia: Tour of Destroyed/Damaged Saudi NG Vehicles in Qamar
Saudi Arabia: Sentenced to death for protesting against monarchy, 21-year-old Shiite faces execution
Game of Thrones a-la-Gulf: Saudi royal said to be calling to family members to replace king
A letter has been allegedly circulating among members of the Saudi royal family, with warnings that the House of Saud may be losing its grip on power. The letter containing a number of political accusations is said to be penned by an unnamed royal himself.
“We [have] got closer and closer to the fall of the state and the loss of power,” online news portal Middle East Eye cited the letter on Tuesday. Signed by “a descendant of the King Abdulaziz of the House of Saud,” the letter is said to have been written by the late king’s grandson, who confirmed to MEE he was the author, but asked not to be named “for fear of negative repercussions.”
“We appeal to all the sons of King Abdulaziz… to summon an emergency meeting with all the family to discuss the situation and do everything that is need[ed] to save the country,” the four-page document reportedly says, with a senior Saudi prince calling for the current “incapable” Saudi King Salman and his son Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to be replaced.
The 79-year-old Saudi king in the spotlight of the backstairs intrigue has ruled the country since the death of his brother Abdullah in January. Apart from him and his son, the letter also mentions his nephew Mohammad bin Al-Nayef, calling the latter “extravagant and vain.” Both younger royals hold high positions in the Saudi government, and are responsible for decisions which saw oil prices fall steeply, as well as the war in Yemen.
The letter claims the recent military decisions, including the campaigns in Yemen, Syria and Iraq are “totally miscalculated,” having “weakened the trust of our people and [incited] other peoples against us.”
The document, which is said to be circulating among the princes via a secure means of mobile communication, also reportedly touches upon the financial challenges faced by the Gulf kingdom. While oil revenues make the overwhelming part of the state’s income, it has now found itself in a situation when oil prices have plummeted by more than half in over the year.
10 Reasons to Oppose the Saudi Monarchy
By Medea Benjamin
“http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/10-Reasons-to-Oppose-the-Saudi-Monarchy–20150919-0011.html”. If you intend to use it, please cite the source and provide a link to the original article. www.teleSURtv.net/english
Not only is the Saudi regime repressive at home and abroad, but U.S. weapons and U.S. support for the regime make Americans complicit.
During the discussion on the Iran nuclear deal, it has been strange to hear U.S. politicians fiercely condemn Iranian human rights abuses while remaining silent about worse abuses by U.S. ally Saudi Arabia. Not only is the Saudi regime repressive at home and abroad, but U.S. weapons and U.S. support for the regime make Americans complicit. So let’s look at the regime the U.S. government counts as its close friend.
1. Saudi Arabia is governed as an absolutist monarchy by a huge clan, the Saud family, and the throne passes from one king to another. The Cabinet is appointed by the king, and its policies have to be ratified by royal decree. Political parties are forbidden and there are no national elections.
2. Criticizing the monarchy, or defending human rights, can bring down severe and cruel punishments in addition to imprisonment. Raif Badawi was sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for writing a blog the government considered critical of its rule. Waleed Abulkhair is serving a 15-year sentence for his work as a human right attorney. New legislation effectively equates criticism of the government and other peaceful activities with terrorism. The government tightly controls the domestic press, banning journalists and editors who publish articles deemed offensive to the religious establishment or the ruling authorities. Over 400,000 websites that are considered immoral or politically sensitive are blocked. A January 2011 law requires all blogs and websites, or anyone posting news or commentary online, to have a license from the Ministry of Information or face fines and/or the closure of the website.
3. Saudi Arabia has one of the highest execution rates in the world, killing scores of people each year for a range of offenses including adultery, apostasy, drug use and sorcery. The government has conducted over 100 beheadings this year alone, often in public squares.
4. Saudi women are second-class citizens. The religious police enforce a policy of gender segregation and often harass women, using physical punishment to enforce a strict dress code. Women need the approval of a male guardian to marry, travel, enroll in a university, or obtain a passport and they’re prohibited from driving. According to interpretations of Sharia law, daughters generally receive half the inheritance awarded to their brothers, and the testimony of one man is equal to that of two women.
5. There is no freedom of religion. Islam is the official religion, and all Saudis are required by law to be Muslims. The government prohibits the public practice of any religion other than Islam and restricts the religious practices of the Shiite and Sufi Muslim minority sects. Although the government recognizes the right of non-Muslims to worship in private, it does not always respect this right in practice. The building of Shiite mosques is banned.
6. The Saudis export an extremist interpretation of Islam, Wahhabism, around the globe. Over the past three decades, Saudi Arabia spent US$4 billion per year on mosques, madrassas, preachers, students, and textbooks to spread Wahhabism and anti-Western sentiment. Let’s not forget that 15 of the 19 fanatical hijackers who carried out the 9/11 attacks were Saudis, as well as Osama bin Laden himself.
7. The country is built and runs thanks to foreign laborers, but the more than 6 million foreign workers have virtually no legal protections. Coming from poor countries, many are lured to the kingdom under false pretenses and forced to endure dangerous working and living conditions. Female migrants employed in Saudi homes as domestic workers report regular physical, sexual, and emotional abuse.
8. The Saudis are funding terrorism worldwide. A Wikileaks-revealed 2009 cable quotes then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying, “Donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide … More needs to be done since Saudi Arabia remains a critical financial support base for al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Lashkar e-Tayyiba and other terrorist groups.” In Syria the Saudis are supporting the most extreme sectarian forces and the thousands of volunteers who rally to their call. And while the Saudi government condemns ISIS, many experts, including 9/11 Commission Report lead author Bob Graham, believe that ISIL is a product of Saudi ideals, Saudi money and Saudi organizational support.
9. The Saudis have used their massive military apparatus to invade neighboring countries and quash democratic uprisings. In 2011, the Saudi military (using U.S. tanks) rolled into neighboring Bahrain and brutally crushed that nation’s budding pro-democracy movement. In 2015, the Saudis intervened in an internal conflict in Yemen, with a horrific bombing campaign (using American-made cluster munitions and F-15 fighter jets) that has killed and injured thousands of civilians. The conflict has created a severe humanitarian crisis affecting 80 percent of the Yemeni people.
10. The Saudis backed a coup in Egypt that killed over 1,000 people and saw over 40,000 political dissidents thrown into squalid prisons. While human rights activists the world over where condemning the brutal regime of Al Sisi, the Saudi government offered US$5 billion to prop up the Egyptian coup leader.
The cozy U.S .relationship with the Saudis has to do with oil, weapons sales and joint opposition to Iran. But with extremism spreading through the globe, a reduced U.S. need for Saudi oil, and a thawing of U.S. relations with Iran, now is the time to start calling for the U.S. government to sever its ties with the Saudi monarchs.
Medea Benjamin
Yemen as Laboratory: Why is the West So Silent About This Savage War?
What is at stake in Yemen that far more systematic violations of the Geneva Conventions than in any of the recent wars which Western powers have supported in the Arab world (Iraq, Syria, Libya and Gaza) are met with resounding silence?
For six months there has been a blockade of food and fuel, and management of aid (even that through the UN) as part of war strategy, bombing of civilian, historical, educational, religious and medical targets, destruction of infrastructure from roads to electricity and water, and use of prohibited weapons.
All of this occurs in a country of over twenty million persons, which has no effective air defences – a country as open to aerial bombardment as Gaza. Yet as an Israeli Foreign Ministry official has pointed out, the principles of international humanitarian law systematically violated in Yemen are those invoked by UN bodies, governments, the Western media, and civil organisations when they charge Israel with the commission of war crimes in Gaza.
In other words, by its silence and support for Coalition bombing in Yemen, the international community completes the erasure of legal reference in war.
That is a big price to pay for success in a conflict seemingly so minor it receives virtually no press coverage……………………..
Source: http://blogdogcicle.blogspot.com/2015/09/yemen-update-9242015yemenis-mark-eid-al.html
