A TIME TO SPEAK
Vol. III:1 (No. 25)
January 2003 - Tevet-Shevet 5763
PAYING THE PIPER:
PART I
"He who pays the piper calls the tune/" -- old adage
Wealth makes many friends. -- Proverbs 19:4
"If the reputation builds that the
Saudis take care of their friends when they leave office, you'd be surprised
how much better friends you have who are just coming into office."
-- Prince Bandar
ibn Sultan, Ambasador
of Saudi Arabia to the United States.
This Ambassador and various other Saudi princes -- there are some 7,000 of them -- are indeed generous to their friends, out of the enormous unearned wealth derived from the geological accident of the oil in their sands. Usually, they get value for their money, in the form of backing for an obsessively Judeophobic regime that also sponsors and subsidizes Islamist terrorism on an international scale.
Examples of their largesse are found in excerpts from
a report on "The Scandal of U.S.-Saudi Relations", by Daniel Pipes, National Interest, Winter 2002/03:
Dr. Pipes devotes much of this article to the extraordinary subservience of US Department of State and successive Administrations in dealings with Saudi Arabia. This goes so far, that the U.S. government declines even to protect the rights of American citizens vis-à-vis Saudi practice; among them, American-born girls and women who were abducted to the desert kingdom and then forbidden by its laws to return home.
The
author then goes on to the reason for this peculiarly inverted relationship:
What lies behind this pattern of obsequiousness? Where is the normally robust pursuit of U.S. interests? It is one thing when private companies bend over backwards to please the Saudis . . . but why does the U.S. government defer to the Kingdom in so many and unique ways?
'Oil' is likely to be the most common explanation proffered, but it does not hold. First, the U.S. government has never cringed before any other major oil supplier as it does to Saudi Arabia. Second, U.S.-Saudi ties have been premised since 1945 . . . on an enduring bargain in which Riyadh provides oil and gas to the United States and the world and Washington provides security to Saudi Arabia. Because this deal has even more importance for Saudis than Americans-survival versus energy supplies-oil cannot explain why the U.S. side has consistently acted as a supplicant.
Another possible factor is the proclivity of many Americans to strive to tolerate other people's customs and religious beliefs, which in the Saudi case involves such matters as the total covering of women, public executions and the absence of any pretense of democratic rule. But the lack of reciprocity from the Saudi side, decade after decade, suggests that something else besides an open spirit is at work; no matter how liberal, no one can endure such a one-sided relationship for so long unless there is a payoff.
The Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, helpfully hinted at an answer in a statement boasting of his success cultivating powerful Americans. 'If the reputation then builds that the Saudis take care of friends when they leave office', Bandar once observed, "you'd be surprised how much better friends you have who are just coming into office.' This effective admission of bribery goes far to explain why the usual laws, regulations and rights do not apply when Saudi Arabia is involved. Hume Horan, himself a former U.S. ambassador to the Kingdom, is the great and noble exception to this pattern. He says this of his former colleagues:
'There have been some people who really do go on the Saudi payroll, and they work as advisers and consultants. Prince Bandar is very good about massaging and promoting relationships like that. Money works wonders, and if you've got an awful lot of it, and a royal title-well, it's amusing to see how some Americans liquefy in front of a foreign potentate, just because he's called a prince.'
Over-the-top support of Saudi interests by former ambassador James E. Akins (who has criticized Arab governments for not being tougher with Washington and despaired that Arabs did not withdraw their money from U.S. banks) has caused him to be described as occasionally appearing 'more pro-Arab than the Arab officials'.
Several surveys of the post-government careers of ex-U.S. ambassadors to Riyadh all raise eyebrows. Steven Emerson characterizes their behavior as 'visceral, overt self-interested sycophancy.' National Review finds that the number of them 'who now push a pro-Saudi line is startling' and concludes that 'no other posting pays such rich dividends once one has left it, provided one is willing to become a public and private advocate of Saudi interests.' A National Post analysis looked at five former ambassadors and found that 'they have carved out a fine living insulting their own countrymen while shilling for one of the most corrupt regimes on Earth.' If you closed your eyes while listening to their apologies, 'you would think the person talking held a Saudi passport.'
A Washington Post account gives some idea of the nature of the 'rich dividends' reaped by former officials: Americans who have worked with the Saudis in official capacities often remain connected to them when they leave public office, from former president George H.W. Bush, who has given speeches for cash in Saudi Arabia since leaving office, to many previous ambassadors and military officers stationed in the Kingdom. In some cases, these connections have been lucrative. Walter Cutler, who served two tours as the U.S. ambassador in Saudi Arabia, now runs Meridian International Center in Washington, an organization that promotes international understanding through education and exchanges. Saudi donors have been 'very supportive' of the center, Cutler said.
[Edward] Walker, the former assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, is president of the Middle East Institute in Washington, which promotes understanding with the Arab world. Its board chairman is former senator Wyche Fowler, ambassador to Riyadh in the second Clinton administration. Saudi contributions covered $200,000 of the institute's $1.5 million budget last year, Walker said.
Nor is this a new problem. Many ex-Washington hands have been paid off by the Kingdom, including not only a bevy of former ambassadors but also such figures as Spiro T. Agnew, Jimmy Carter, Clark Clifford, John B. Connally and William E. Simon.
The heart of the problem is an all-too-human one, then: Americans in positions of authority bend the rules and break with standard policy out of personal greed. In this light, Hunter's report on the three main U.S. government goals in Saudi Arabia begins to make sense: strengthen the Saudi regime, cater to the Saud royal family, and facilitate U.S. exports.
All
of these fit the rubric of enhancing one's own appeal to the Saudis. So,
too, does Hunter's comment that 'the U.S. mission is so preoccupied with
extraneous duties-entertainment packages for high-level visitors, liquor
sales, and handling baggage for VIP visitors' that it has scant time to devote
to the proper concerns of an embassy. Likewise, his long list of high-profile
ex-officials who visited Saudi Arabia during his sojourn (Jimmy Carter, George
McGovern, Colin Powell, Mack McLarty, Richard Murphy) and 'who were feted
and presented with medals and gifts at closed ceremonies with the Saudi monarch'
also fits the pattern.[. . . .]"
Dr. Pipes
provides related material in his article "What Riyadh Buys [in Washington],"
New York Post, 11 December 2002:
[In
a previous article] I contrasted two official U.S. responses to news that
the Saudi ambassador's wife possibly funded the 9/11 hijackers: The Bush
administration pooh-poohed it, while leading U.S. senators expressed outrage.
I argued that this difference results from a Saudi-induced 'culture of corruption'
that pervades the upper reaches of the executive branch but does not extend
to the Congress. [. . . . ].
Surveying
this problem for National Review, Rod Dreher found the number of ex-ambassadors
who push a pro-Saudi line 'startling' and concluded that 'no other posting
pays such rich dividends once one has left it, provided one is willing to
become a public and private advocate of Saudi interests.'
Matt
Welch looked at five former U.S. ambassadors for Canada's National Post and
concluded, 'They have carved out a fine living insulting their own countrymen
while shilling for one of the most corrupt regimes on Earth.' If you closed
your eyes while listening to their apologies, 'you would think the person
talking held a Saudi passport.' [. . . .]
The
effect of the Saudis' massive pre-emptive bribing is to render the executive
branch quite incapable of dealing with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the
farsighted and disinterested manner that U.S. national interests require.
[. . . .]"
* * * * * * *
The billionaire Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, nephew of the reigning King Fahd, had the perhaps rare experience of rejection. He tried to contribute $10,000,000 to a fund for victims of of the Saudi terrorists who brought down New York's World Trade Center. When the gift came accompanied by the standard Saudi rhetoric against Israel, then New York Mayor Rudolf Giuliani returned the check.
Before
long, the Prince found a more grateful beneficiary, as reported in "Phillips
Academy accepts money from Saudi prince," Boston Globe,
1 January 2003:
Phillips Academy preparatory school in Andover acknowledged yesterday
that it had accepted a significant donation from a Saudi Arabian prince for
a scholarship fund honoring former President George H.W. Bush, even though
the prince's offer to help New York City after the September 11 terrorist
attacks was emphatically rejected by then-Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.
Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal . . . gave Phillips Academy in Andover
$500,000 for a scholarship fund, in honor of Bush, an alumnus, according
to school officials.
[. . . .] Phillips Academy spokeswoman Sharon Britton said yesterday that when the school solicited the gift, the prince's [anti-Israel] comments were not seen as a problem, nor was there any talk of returning the gift. [. . . .]"
* * * * * * *
Saudi princesses are no less benevolent than their husbands, brothers and cousins. Ambassador-Prince Bandar's own wife Princess Haifa, daughter of the late King Feisal, received a letter from an unknown woman telling of problems with medical bills. The Princess-Ambassadress dashed her off a check in six figures -- and the money by some strange route ended up among the resources of the perpetrators of the September 11 atrocities. The revelation so upset Her Royal Highness that various sympathetic Washington ladies rushed their condolences and sympathy to her -- including Mrs. George H.W. Bush and Mrs. Colin Powell.
Other Saudi princesses contributed lavishly to an official Saudi fundraising appeal for the families of PLO jihad-bombers who had sacrificed themselves in the cause of murdering Jews. [The standard Saudi appellation for Jews is "sons of monkeys and pigs".]
* * * * * * *
The
PLO is a beneficiary of official Saudi support as well as private charity:
As reported by SPA (Saudi Press Agency) 22 December 2003:
In line with directives of Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, the governor of Riyadh region, an amount of SR 4,411,239 [approximately $1,000,000], from the revenues of the Popular Committee for the Assistance of the Palestinian Mujahideen [Holy Warrior], were remitted today to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
This
was announced by Abdel-Rahim Jamous, the director of the offices of the Popular
Committee for the Assistance of the Palestinian Mujahideen in the Kingdom
of Saudi Arabia. . . . . Jamous highlighted the Kingdom's unwavering support
to the Palestinian cause . . . ."
* * * * * * *
Sometimes,
Saudi disbursements are made with modest anonymity. The identity of a paymaster
is exposed in "The Saudis' Secret Ads (against Israel)", by Michael Weisskopf
and Timothy J. Burger, Time Magazine, issue
post-dated 20 January 2003
When radio ads critical of Israel ran in 15 U.S. cities last spring, they identified the Alliance for Peace and Justice as sponsor. The alliance was described by its Washington p.r. firm, Qorvis Communications, as a consortium of Middle East - policy groups based in the U.S. But when Qorvis reported its ad work to the Justice Department last month, it revealed that funding for the $679,000 media buy actually came from another source: the
Saudi government.
As home to all but four of the Sept. 11 hijackers, Saudi Arabia had good reason to hide its p.r. offensive. A knowledgeable source tells TIME the alliance was created by the p.r. firm to disguise the role of the Saudis, who pay Qorvis more than $200,000 a month for its services. In a footnote to its Justice report, the firm said Riyadh helped fund the ads with a loan to the alliance, which was later repaid by a council representing Saudi business interests.
But the source tells TIME most of the 'repayments' came from businesses controlled by or close to the Saudi government and were solicited by Adel al-Jubeir, foreign-policy adviser to the Crown Prince and architect of the Saudi p.r. offensive. A Saudi embassy spokesman added that some of the funding came from three Arab-American interest groups. But officials of two of these groups said they had given nothing to the ad campaign, and the third group could not be reached. [. . . .]
* * * * * * *
Though the PLO is usually a recipient rather than a paymaster, it may also buy those useful to it. For example, Edward Abington, formerly U.S. Consul in Jerusalem -- at a time when the Consulate was locally dubbed "U.S. Embassy to the PLO" -- is now employed as a registered agent and public relations consultant for the PLO.
It
can even fund an Israeli Jew, as reported in "Haifa Student Admits Taking
PLO Aid in Libel Trial", Jerusalem Post, 1
September 2003:
Theodore Katz, who is being sued for libel by veterans of the Alexandroni
Brigade for writing in a masters thesis that their comrades massacred 150
to 200 men in the village of Tantura during the War of Independence, has
admitted receiving $10,000 from the PLO during the ensuing trial, . . .
Katz, 58, claimed to have stumbled upon the previously unknown
massacre story in oral histories from refugees of that period. . . . . After
a report about the thesis was published in [the Israeli newspaper] Ma'ariv
in January 2000, brigade veterans sued him for libel, denying the story.
During the trial, significant discrepancies were discovered between the oral
history cassettes and Katz's text.
Katz . . . initially agreed to a compromise in which the veterans
would drop their charges in exchange for an apology. Just 12 hours later,
however, Katz retracted, and changed lawyers.
Many suspected at the time that political interests had supplied
Katz with funds. Katz now admits that he was given $10,000 by the late Faisal
Husseini, then head of the PLO-supported Orient House, [th Israeli newspaper]
Yediot Aharonot reported Sunday.
It quoted him as saying he sees nothing wrong in receiving the
funds from the PLO.
The University of Haifa set up a committee, working with Katz, to recheck the audio tapes of the interviews for the thesis. It, too, found numerous discrepancies. In November, the thesis was ordered off the shelves of the university's libraries for six months, until Katz submits a corrected version, which he is apparently still working on nine months later, Yediot said."
* * * * * * *
".
. . in Paris this weekend most of my dining companions were outraged not
by the deaths of Palestinians or Israelis but by the shelling of Palestinian
Authority buildings.
"'These buildings,' one indignant
Frenchman told me, 'were built with money direct from the Union!' -- i.e.,
European Union -- 'We have given billions, and now it is rubble.'
"'Oh, your money is safe enough,'
I said. 'It's sitting in the Hamas' bigshots numbered bank accounts in Zurich.'"
-- Mark Steyn
The National Post (Canada)
25
March 2002
The EU [European Union] has always had a collectively generous heart when it comes to distributing alms for the PLO and for Israelis who advocate surrender to the PLO (known in Euro-lingua as "Advancing the Cause of Peace".)
In the distribution of funds to the PLO, it has played the benefactor who does not so much call the tune as pretend that it does not know the tune, even as it hums along. That has been the case in its subsidies for PLO schools and school texts that indoctrinate children in the cause of murdering Jews. It is even the case when the Euro-bucks come close to subsidies for the murders.
"B'nai Brith Charges EU Ignores Palestinian Channel
of Aid to Terrorists, by Herb Keinon, The Jerusalem Post, 26 December 2002:
The B'nai Brith World Center in Jerusalem released a 23-page report Wednesday that claims the EU has deliberately turned a blind eye to the alleged misuse of donated funds by the Palestinian Authority.
The report, based on previously published material, documents allegations of PA corruption and the diversion of donor funds to pay for terrorism. It is entitled "The Palestinian Authority: Where Does the Money Go?" was written by Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, director of the New York-based Center for the Study of Corruption and the Rule of Law.
The report is being used by B'nai Brith Europe to lobby the European Parliament to support the establishment of an official inquiry by the European Commission into the use of EU money to fund terrorism. A minimum of 157 signatures out of the 626-member parliament are needed to establish such and inquiry. So far, some 130 parliamentarians have signed the request.
According to the report, 'despite EU attempts to refute and downplay allegations, the EU aid money was used to fund terrorism. PA documents found by the IDF clearly show that the PA diverted international aid to fund its terrorist activities. Since we already know that the EU did not closely monitor the use of the money, if even a single dollar went to finance terror, the donor countries are guilty of aiding terrorism.'
An EU official Wednesday denied the allegations in the report, saying 'they have been made repeatedly in the past, and each time found to be untrue.'
According to the report, the PA uses various illicit methods to skim money from donated funds and promote terrorism. The methods include:
Claiming to need $60 million per month for salaries, when in fact only some $40.5 million is needed.
Using an exchange rate of NIS 7 to the dollar, when the rate was much higher. The difference, according to the report, was pocketed by the PA.
Deducting a mandatory Fatah membership fee of 1.5-2% of salaries paid to all PA security personnel.
Paying the salaries of Fatah terrorists
Last month, EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner Chris Patten, in response to a question by a European parliamentarian about the allegations of misuse of the funds, said he wanted an inquiry into the matter like 'a hole in the head'. [. . . .]
"An inquiry would make it enormously difficult to continue providing aid," Patten told a meeting of the European Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee last month. " . . . . If we sunder relations with the Palestinian Authority, it will be very difficult to claim that the EU is playing any kind of role in the Middle East region'."
An EU official states that there have already been inquiries on PLO use of EU donations, and allegations of misuse were "found to be untrue". If Sir Christopher has confidence in these certificates of purity, why does he so fear another inquiry? If the allegations are indeed not true, how would confirming that make it "enormously difficult" for the EU to continue the donations?
[Comment: Sir Christopher earned the accolade of knighthood for his services in delivering up the people of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China. However, as Foreign Affairs Commissioner for the European Union he is unassumingly as just plain "Chris".]
David Weinberg, Begin-Sadat Center,
Bar-Ilan University, considers the EU "role in the Middle East" that Sir
Christopher so cherishes, in "Follow the Euro Trail", Jerusalem Post,
2 July 2002:
[. . . . ] As Shareholder No. 1
in the Palestinian Authority, the European Union has a lot riding on Arafat.
So much so that EU leaders are finding it hard to accept that Arafat and
Co. have overshot their credit. [. . . . ] The money trail - the path from
suicide bomber and terrorist back to his or her paymaster - leads right to
PA Chairman Yasser Arafat. More than anything else, Washington sources say,
it was the direct funding conduit that runs between Arafat and his Al-Aksa
Martyrs Brigade (proud sponsors of many genocide bombings) that convinced
President George W. Bush to call for the PA leader's removal.
[. . . . ] Who then has bankrolled
Arafat? Washington ceased funding the PA years ago, when its ubiquitous corruption
became clear. Arafat's Arab brothers? Naw. They never have substantially
put their money where their collective mouth is. Even the biggest talker
of all, Saddam Hussein, prefers to transfer his "martyr rewards" directly
to the families of suicide bombers, and not through the PA.
The correct answer is the European
Union. The EU has been the PA's big-hearted sugar daddy - Yasser's bountiful
and boundless papa bear - the deepest honeypot the Palestinians could ever
hope for.
In sum, the EU has poured more than
$1.4 billion into propping up the PA since Oslo, not including funds contributed
separately and directly by EU component countries. This includes everything
from food and health services through training and equipping the PA intelligence
and police forces.
Since November 2001, the EU has
contributed an additional $9 million a month directly to the PA running budget
- about 10% of total PA finances.
At the EC Mediterranean Conference
in Valencia in April, PA Minister Nabil Shaath demanded another $1.9 billion
in 'emergency assistance,' including $20.6 million for 'weapons' and $40.6
million for 'support for refugee and martyr families.'
In the world of development assistance,
these are enormous sums of money - the size of which no other Third World
territory or country could ever dream of.
So, where are all the fruits of
this lofty largesse? Where are the new neighborhoods for Palestinian refugees?
The new infrastructure projects, the successful industrial parks, the small-business
incubators and thriving educational institutions - all carefully monitored
for quality and efficiency by EU inspectors?
They are buried under the weight
of PA waste, corruption, and - worst of all - terrorism and radicalism.
Consider: Brussels has bankrolled
and mentored PA television since its inception. It even rebuilt PA-TV antenna
towers after Israel toppled them during Operation Defensive Shield. This
is the same television that hourly broadcasts messages of jihad against the
Jews and praise for the Palestinian genocide bombers.
Consider: The PA school system has
enjoyed the investment of more than $300m. in EU funds since 1994, including
funds for the writing and production of the new, official PA textbooks.
I don't need to tell you that these
textbooks deny any ancient Jewish claim to Jerusalem and Israel; that murderer-martyrs
are praised; and that Israel is not to be found on any maps in these glorious,
EU-financed, educational tomes.
In early May, Jerusalem sent EU
headquarters a 100-page file detailing Arafat's funding of terrorist activities
against Israel. EU Commissioner for External Affairs Chris Patten's formal
response: 'We have to date not been shown any hard evidence that the EU funds
have been misused to finance terrorism.'
Patten's dodge is disingenuous and
duplicitous, because money is fungible. Every euro for social welfare contributed
to Arafat's budget by the EU frees up other PA funds for terrorism and the
purchase of weaponry.
This doesn't seem to bother the
EU - when it is dealing with Palestinians. [. . . .]
* * * * * * *
Even when funds may be contributed in humanitarian good faith, the end use can be problematic. Documents from PLO files reveal that food and medicine sent for the needy were stolen by PLO officials and sold on the black market for their own profit.
Contributions of food were also lost when Israeli military action against PLO terrorists in Gaza caused the ruin of a warehouse run by the UN's World Food Program. It has compensated the WFP for the full value of the wheat, rice, and vegetables.
END