You Say You Want a Revolution…

Tags

a newer world, abolish advertising, Alfred Lord Tennyson, American greed, army loyal to who?, Baby it’s cold inside too, ban everything someone hates, banning pop songs, Canadian government, censorship for feminists, climate change, cost of living, cut out middle-man, end bureaucracy, end inherited wealth, end red tape, epater les bourgeoisie, extermination of homo sapiens, feminist nonsense, flat tax at ten percent, food riots, global warming, how to overthrow a state, Indigenous land rights, inflation is a tax, Karl Marx, late-phase capitalism, money v morality, Paris riots, police as paramilitary, police will not kill fellow citizens, revolution, Saudi Arabia, system is broken, the French Revolution II, those who produce only money, time to act, tipping point, Ulysses, useless jobs, vanishing liberty, Wahhabist heresy

Old patient communists in Paris are wondering if their time has finally come, Not since 1968 has there been so much fierce resistance to a system known as status quo. And this is not a trivial issue of girls being allowed to sleeo with boys – the spark igniting ’68. This is fundamental, a 21^st century bread riot about the unaffordable cost of living. Perhaps the dismay over what little has been done about climate change is in there too? But this wave will spread, is already spreading, breaking on other shores with similar concerns as well as ones of their own. It will soon be here, if Carnarcosis wakes up to smell the price of coffee. Cheerfully, so it seemed, we heard today that food prices will rise dramatically next year. Perhaps to head off vegans who imagine it won’t affect them, an emphasis was placed on steep rises in the cost of fruits and vegetables. On a news broadcast that included the blunt message from environment ministers meeting in Poland that we are headed for extinction if we don’t act now. Not assemble committees and commission reports, but ACT, something politicians are usually unable to do because most are lawyers and the law moves so slowly it’s still in the 18^th century. We are the first generation to know in detail the science behind climate change, and we’re also the last generation who may – may – be able to act before the planet becomes too inhospitable for any effective actions to be plausible. In fact it is probably already too late, so is this all just gallows humour?

Unable to broadcast a constant battle-cry for environmental action, so we don’t rubbish the planet and ourselves with it, the CBC, and other court jesters, did manage to ban from the airwaves a perennially popular song from 1944, “Baby, it’s cold outside”. Kudos, bold move! But really? I must have heard that song a few hundred times, and not once did it ever occur to me the lyrics were offensive, a brazen attempt at seduction precluding the female’s rights in such a situation. It didn’t occur to me probably because the lyrics are not in the least offensive. It’s cold outside, baby, stay here where it’s warm. Offensive? Manipulative? Nah, it’s just a lovingly cute conceit in a wintry song that evokes the things that enduringly please us this time of year. “It may have been acceptable back in the forties,’ said some kultural obersturmbanfuhrer, “but it has no place in today’s world.” I think this about a lot of music I hear these days, but I wouldn’t dream of telling everyone their songs are now banned, principally because I don’t like them. Such a problem has a remedy so simple anyone can use it: If you don’t like a song or a book or a film, don’t listen to it, read it or watch it. Who is this solution not good enough for? Ah, you. Well, ma’am, I’m afraid you are a tyrant in cheap clothing, beneath which are a thunderflash and jackboots. We cannot beam you back to the Third Reich, alas – no time machine – but might we suggest an acceptable alternative? It’s Saudi Arabia, where your problems are solved before they arise: all music is banned, along with singing and dancing. A few other things too, but you’ll discover those for yourself, as well as encountering a tremendous need there for more feminist thinking. Perfect? We have a flight this Friday, may I book you on it?

Does whoever in the CBC responsible for this joke think such bans should be extended to all the arts, ancient and modern, if they contain anything someone, or even just you, are offended by? Where to begin? Well, the Bible is a good start, many rapes, sexual chauvinism on a monumental scale, and gender inequality almost worse than Saudi Arabia. I could proceed on through the canon, then the oriental canon (oh, how that Li Po objectifies women!), and African ones, (Wole Soyinka’s male characters drink too much and treat women like chattels) but I think the point is made. We shall be left with nothing if the power to censor is handed to some humourless automaton, in state broadcasting or anywhere else. In fact I am an owner of the CBC, one of 30 million, and I object to censorship in any form being perpetrated by my public broadcaster. Today it’s a harmless pop song, tomorrow it’s Finnegans’ Wake or Lolita. Grow up, ladies, and lighten up too. You don’t want history to remember you as the one who banned “White Christmas” for its overtly racist lyrics – or do you?

A great deal of trivial nonsense flew around just before the French Revolution, possibly to divert attention away from the appalling enormities of a status quo, a 5 percent, who treated the other 95 worse than beasts of the field, squeezing them until many died of want, if despair didn’t get there first. This announced steep rise in prices begs the question: Why? We surely all know by now that Marx was ostensibly right about capitalism’s proclivity to devour itself, or like Saturn its children. Market volatility is a sign, but a volatile bond market is an veritable omen. That market is supposed to be so stable it’s boring, because it was always so safe, the yield-curves pleasingly stable and always heading in the right direction but slowly. Now yield curves are all over the place and prices are up and down like the Assyrian empire. This reflects a general governmental instability, because bonds are mostly government debt. Politicians are obviously on their way out of the rulership game, and no one trusts them because they’re all such untrustworthy liars, lining pockets while doing nothing for the public whose arse they once plated for a vote. In a sunnier age this could be overlooked, but not anymore. When life becomes less affordable we, the people will take a look behind the scenes. What will we find?

 

We will find that between farm or grower and buyer or customer there are layers of middle men and women who produce nothing except money. Every activity creates businesses within it, some of them vital, some not so much. And commerce itself has some gigantic enterprises within it that need to be examined. Take advertising and marketing. These two swallow up a goodly portion of any company’s profits, and they do the rest of us no good at all. One might say they even harm us by interrupting shows or films with moronic exhortations comprised mostly of shameless lies. Who needs this so-called “information of choice” that is the ad man’s clarion call raison d’etre? Not I. On the rare occasions I need anything new, I ask someone to go online and see what the consensus says about this or that product. I can honestly say that no ad has ever influenced me to buy anything at all ever. I don’t have TV in fact because the stultifying ads revolt me. I watch, or really just listen to Netflix because there are no ads. If this changed I would cancel my subscription. Film is or can be a serious art form, in fact it’s the dominant form of our age, and to watch a Bertolucci, an Orson Welles, a Scorsese, or a Bergman and have it interrupted by some inane jingle boosting unneeded rubbish is to me like someone gluing a puerile imogee over Picasso’s Desmoiselles d’Avignon, or spraying commercial graffiti on Michaelangelo’s David. Beside those working in it, is there anyone to defend the continued existence of advertising and marketing? No? Away with them then, which is bound to bring prices down.

 

Next we’ll be looking into other areas that suck up money the way an anteater inhales ants. Bureaucracy and the red tape preventing ordinary men and women from opening snall businesses – that will go. We’ll tolerate the consequences of less health regulations and the number of toilets the way we’ve tolerated mindless regulations for years. As capitalism staggers and heads for a terminal collapse, our elites will panic. I mean the one percent who have more than the rest of us combined. These are the people for who the police act as a private army (have you noticed how paramilitary the cops have become?). We shall see what happens in Paris when the police, who after all suffer too in a bad economy, refuse to fire on their fellow citizens, and even go over to their side, as happened in 1789. For a revolution, this is the axial moment. Once police or army, ort both are with you it’s all over. You seize the media broadcasters, or their towers of insolence, and you sit your new leader in a studio: Newsflash! The government has fallen and the Popular Front for Canadian Liberation is now in charge. There is no reason to panic. The police and army will protect us all. But things will change here. And things will have to change. Real liberty must be returned to us all, and those who impoverish us by their unconscionable profits or obscene severance packages must realise it’s all over now, that scam. Tax at a flat 10 percent for all, no exceptions, only necessities written off, all hidden assets confiscated. No more inherited wealth, leave them a house, it’s more than enough, and take pride in the amount you left for your nation. Narrow the gap between haves and have-nots, or else the have-nots will do it themselves. Now we turn to the banks, far trickier than anyone else, but essentially working an astounding angle for the last century. They take your money and loan it to someone else at a percentage of interest you cannot get for yourself, and then they actually CHARGE you for whatever you do with your own money. Amazing racket, no? And now they have encouraged everyone to borrow as much as possible, and spend, spend, spend, whether you need what you buy or not. Interest rates have been very low for very long (I don’t mean the credit card shy operators, who sometimes dare say 28 percent is low interest for them, which is true, and which will also shut their racket down). What we want is a currency actually worth its face value, thus backed, as it used to be, by gold or platinum. It’s important to remember that inflation is actually another tax, and in a tax-ridden nation we do not want another tax, do we? Income federal and provincial, GST whenever you buy or sell anything, vehicle taxation, property taxes, school taxes (if you have kids or not), and a thousand other insidious and invidious ways of taxing us that bring the overall tax rate here up to well over 80 percent. Anything over 10 percent I say is extortionate and antisocial. The free health care where I live is lousy, incompetent and sometimes even dodgy. We shall pay for it through a non-profit state insurance plan. We can now afford it and the system will be better or else forced to get better. Rid of all those who sit in between taking their cut like medieval barons, the economy will thrive like never before, no one in the middle to ad costs by producing nothing but their own wealth. This attitude will prevail in every aspect of commercial life. And it will need to.

 

Desperation will drive this or any country to revolt, and the desperation on its way to us now is a planetary catastrophe unequalled in human history. Survival will be everyone’s main concern, and pure survival brings out the ruthlessness in anyone. Those who cling to old ways and continue forms of theft will be dealt with harshly. It’s unfortunate, but then so is greed and starvation. Reps from the 20 most prosperous nations on earth have now told us the tipping point has passed. We and everything that calls this world home face appalling upheavals, cataclysmic weather and seismic events, and very probably an extinction of species not unprecedented but certainly never seen by human eyes, and one of those species will be our own. The long, long struggles of history, the glorious achievements in art and science, all of it for nothing, lost forever in time. It is indeed unthinkable, but just because we cannot think about it does not mean it cannot happen, because, my friends, it is happening already, and the top climate scientists – women and men who have warned us for years this was going on – aren’t exactly saying we told you so now, but they are pointing out that for all the decades they were ignored by governments their predictions gradually all came true, due to the stupendous inaction of those in positions of responsibility. Now they are saying that their new predictions cannot be averted so easily if at all, because, as was said half a century ago, beyond a certain point there is no possibility of reversing the damage done. Greenhouse gases, human activity, corporate farming techniques, a psychopathic need to burn fossil fuels, and most of all the kind of insane greed that denies the evidence of science for profits, these are among the causes for ecological worry cited over my entire lifetime yet not acted upon. Why? Because, yet again, all governments are controlled by big businesses who have no desire to see a bottom line disfigured by expensive changes to processes or machines merely to save the earth. Business thinks only of the next quarter’s report. Shareholders want to see better dividends, not a falling share price due to environmental restrictions. This ballooning disaster cannot continue, and public rage will be at such a pitch by then that those who placed their wealth above the welfare of all life on earth will be viewed as common criminals and sociopaths. True, it is a good way to build a business, but it is not good for an economy in the long term, and, as we can see, it isn’t good for anything else on the planet either.

 

Perhaps we shall go cap in hand to the Indigenous and ask them to show us a better way. After all, they were here for millennia and did no harm at all. Possibly we should return all the land boosted from them out of sheer guilt? Nonetheless, they know how to survive and be self-sufficient. Few of us know such things, and we shall need to learn very quickly.

 

One feels sorrow and shame for Americans, the only one out of 20 prosperous nations to refuse any action on global warming, with a president who might not understand a scientific paper but knows someone who could explain it to him, still announcing that he doesn’t believe in climate change. Science requires no belief. It is not like politics or politicians. Empirical fact is the essence of science, meaning facts that cannot be fake news because they’re verifiable by anyone. Trump’s followers may get no news except his news and whatever they call the stuff broadcast by Fox, but Trump himself has all news sources available to him. This makes his denial of the inconvenient truth an act of conscious evil – evil being defined as doing harm you are conscious of being harmful as you do it – and such acts are capital crimes when they involve, as this will and already has done, the lives of millions. Motive for evil deed? Profits for friends, family and self. No judge will be remotely lenient, especially if the country is bankrupted by the cost of global warming’s destructive effects, as will be the case. The US dollar will cease being a global currency, its value possibly wiped out overnight, as a debt so vast no one can even tell you exactly how much it is becomes due and there’s nothing to pay with. Creditors will seize assets, at cents on a dollar, so much of the country will be owned by the Chinese or the Russians and others. Not that America was ever great, but the risible slogan will come to seem cruelly ironic when China looks for cheap labour in Wisconsin or Ohio. Trump will forever remain as a cautionary tale, a symbol of what happens when morality caves in to money, and the public is deliberately deceived into electing someone who no one wants to do business with after doing business with him. He is a man too who represents all those whose wealth was obtained crookedly, by not paying contractors, lying to partners, as well as to everyone else including himself, and thinking of a deal only interms of how much he can squeeze out of it. That is a protection racket not a deal. For such a baggy ego this will be a dingy end indeed, yet I doubt if a single soul will feel pity for the Man Who Tried To Sell The World As It’s Warranty Expired. It is the grimmest time I can ever recall, and my heart goes out to those decent simple islanders in the South Pacific whose culture of millennia is inextricable from their island home, a paradise that will have vanished entirely under the sea within five years. Where will 300,000 people go to continue with their lives? What happens to their culture when their world has vanished? Perhaps our Indigenous brothers and sisters can answer this, along with all the other questions we shall have for them. Maybe the National Chief – is it Perry Belgard? – should be asked to head up a provisional government, at least while we all work out the essentials for a better world.

 

Your food prices rise next year, withhold taxes and demand to see the books explaining why the prices rose. Demand an accounting for every penny a politician spends. Every project suddenly costs $500 million – bridge repairs, scheme to help someone, aid to African country, whatever it is –  but when I want to build something and the estimate is $500 I question it, ask for a breakdown, check it all thoroughly. But the government just writes another check. Five years later we hear of massive corruption, bid fixing, kickbacks. Does our money ever come back to us? No, the system is broken, broken deliberately to allow what you have to leak out through the cracks into someone else’s pockets. It is time to make it new again. On that note I shall leave you with the end of Tennyson’s “Ulysses”.

 

Come, my friends,

‘T is not too late to seek a newer world.

Push off, and sitting well in order smite

The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds

To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths

Of all the western stars, until I die.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

 

robertspaulwilliam@gmail.com

What To Do About Saudi Arabia

Tags

9/11 terrorists, Bush family, China, Donald Trump, Islamic State funding, Jered Kushner, Kashoggi murder, Military-industrial complex, Mohammed bin Salman, Noam Chomsky, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Saudi-UU relations, Trump family, Wahhabism

It seems that Mohammed bin Salman is about to admit that the journalist Jamal Kashoggi has been murdered, but he has no idea who did the deed or why. Some think he’ll say a “rogue element” did it, but if so it had nothing to do with him. If such an admission comes, what will we, the West, do about it? Nothing comes to mind, l mean doing nothing. If overwhelming evidence points to you as a murderer, and the police arrive with questions, would “I know nothing about it” have the cops thanking you and going on their way? No. Call it the Russian gambit, and it only works if you’re the absolute despotic ruler of a country. When a Putin or a bin Salman are asked if they committed a crime, they deny it. Does anyone ever say, “Yep, it was me, I’m the one”? It seems laughable when the media report these denials as if they might even be true. Last month MBS was threatening Canada with punishment for criticizing what’s risibly termed his “human rights record” – a broken record if ever there was one. Our critique was not only justified, it was absolutely essential to clarifying Canada’s position vis a vis international law. Now MBS is quite clearly the man who ordered a murder on sovereign territory of someone whose crime was… what? Criticizing MBS, and doing it reasonably and justifiably. If we attempt sanctions or some other punishment for this barbarous and illegal act, says MBS, he’ll punish us back and harder. Am I missing something here?

 

It’s been a while since any head of state asserted his right to do whatever he feels like doing, since absolutist monarchies pretty much died out in 1793, when Louis XVI went to the guillotine. Even North Korea seems to know those days are gone now. So the kingdom of al-Sa’ud stands alone, one man at the helm and doing whatever he wants to do with no opposition at all. I explained a few blogs back how Saudi Arabia functions, its royal princelings and princesses in the thousands, it’s religion a travesty supposedly based on Islam, its reins of power now in one man’s hands – one man who exemplifies the cliché of absolute power corrupting absolutely. But let’s be clear about this religion of theirs. Wahhabism has as much to do with Islam as Mormonism does with Christianity, and its central doctrines are ones of hatred and intolerance, vehemently towards “infidels” of course, but also towards all sects of Islam with the exception of Sunnis, who are nominal patrons. The lucrative control of Islamic holy sites, Mecca and Medina, is in Saudi hands, meaning the Shia, Ismailis, Sufis and many others cannot make the prescribed Haj pilgrimage under Wahhabi law. This law also condones mistreatment of non-believers, particularly us infidels, who can be robbed, cheated, defrauded, lied to, and abused in numerous other ways with impunity and the sanction of the Wahhabi faith, if you can call it that. So MBS has no spiritual qualms about lying to most of the world, although I doubt if the fate of his soul is something he gives much thought at all to. So here we have this barbaric throw-back to a medieval sensibility acting as if it’s a superpower, waging a unjust and brutal war in its back yard, treating women as chattels, beheading homosexuals, imprisoning anyone for any reason, with no rule of law worth the name, and now assassinating critics on foreign soil for reasons so flimsy they’re not even mentioned anymore. This is not some impoverished cess pit in the lower third of the Third World either. It is per capita one of the richest nations on earth, although these riches are controlled by around a millionth of one percent of the population. But to keep the hoi polloi docile the amenities and infrastructures are good, a hospital on every block, the cities clean and virtually brand new. There are really no rural areas to worry about since the rest of the country is basically a beach. Besides the total lack of any rights, there’s not much to complain about – unless you’re female.

 

Here’s a story I heard from a horse next to the horse’s mouth. One of the Saudi princesses, one of the thousands, went to study at the American University in Cairo. She found the slums and poverty of Egypt intoxicating, “so real” she said “after the sterility of my homeland”. Real life was appealing, as it can be. At university she met and fell in love with a westerner, a tall blond American boy. She told her family she intended to marry him and live in the US. The family blew up, ordering her home. She knew enough not to return, because she knew what happened to girls like her. But her brother, who she was close to, persuaded her to meet him in Cairo and discuss the situation amicably. She went to the meeting, where she was kidnapped and flown back to Riyadh in a private jet. She was locked in a special room on the roof of her family house. There were no windows, and she was forbidden any visitors and all conversation. Food was shoved in through a slot in the door. She’s been in that room now for fifteen years. Her food is still taken in, so she’s alive. But those aware of the situation believe she is now completely insane. This is Saudi Arabia. This is the place we are wondering how to punish for a state-sanctioned murder on foreign soil. And Donald Trump found MBS thoroughly convincing when he denied all knowledge of malfeasance. What exactly is going on between the US and Saudi Arabia?

 

The United States of Amnesia no doubt forgets now that the only airplane allowed to fly after the Twin Towers fell on 9-11-01 was the one taking members of the Saudi Royal family out of America. Why them and no one else? Well, the Saudi ambassador in those days, Prince Bandar, was to so close to the Bush family that he was affectionately known as “Bandar Bush” – and of course the Bush family business is oil. There’s another factor too: most of the 9/11 terrorist hijackers were Saudis (the rest were Egyptians), something never properly explained, researched or really even pursued. Instead, Afghanistan was bombed, and then Iraq was invaded. The fog of war conceals most irritating details. It does not, however, occlude the fact that funding for al Qaeda and Islamic State, along with other violent factions, comes principally from the Wahhabi clerics, who share Saudi wealth with the princes. It’s an hereditary clan, like the Mafia. Fast forward to now, and what do we find going on? Well, Trump’s son-in-law, the ubiquitous Jered Kushner, is said to have close ties with MBS, who himself is reported to have said, “Trump’s family is in my pocket”. Breaking with tradition, the first state visit Trump made as president was, not to reliable allies like Canada or the UK, but to, yes, Saudi Arabia. Why? What was discussed? We don’t know. But Jered Kushner is not a government employee, so his close ties must be about private business, no? The president burbles on about this $110 billion deal that’s in jeopardy, apparently, if the US imposes sanctions on Saudi Arabia. Oh, the jobs in danger, the GDP tanking, the sheer horror of losing any deal! But $110 billion is a pittance compared with the Saudi trillions invested in US corporations (they’ve got a pile in Canada too), especially aerospace and the arms mega-business. There’s been a lot of Saudi-US chatter over the past few days, and I imagine it’s about these invested trillions. MBS makes a few hundred million daily, so a few billion isn’t even worth his while. The question is this: Are the Saudis threatening to pull out their trillions and invest them in China or, God forbid, Russia? Or are the Americans threatening to confiscate Saudi assets wherever they’re to be found? This long and mysteriously chummy relationship can only be about money, money mainly in the form of oil. The combo of oil and money leads us inexorably to the venerable old Military-Industrial complex, which lives entirely on oil and money. The Trump family, individually and collectively, are heavily invested in this hydra-headed monster churning out death in a myriad of forms, and consequently needing many small wars running all the time to keep the supply-line busy. The Saudis obviously have a spanner somehow poised to be thrown into these works; otherwise who’d care what happened to them?

 

As I said last time, seizing Saudi assets would be an appropriate and deservedly painful punishment, because a punishment there surely has to be? The kingdom would make an amusing theme park, Despotworld or Tyrantland. But the situation is not really amusing enough for satire. Instead I will leave you with some wise words from one of the few wise men left in America:

“Let me finally return to Dwight Macdonald and the responsibility of intellectuals. Macdonald quotes an interview with a death-camp paymaster who burst into tears when told that the Russians would hang him. “Why should they? What have I done?” he asked. Macdonald concludes: “Only those who are willing to resist authority themselves when it conflicts too intolerably with their personal moral code, only they have the right to condemn the death-camp paymaster.” The question, “What have I done?” is one that we may well ask ourselves, as we read each day of fresh atrocities in Vietnam—as we create, or mouth, or tolerate the deceptions that will be used to justify the next defense of freedom.

— Noam  Chomsky, “The Responsibility of Intellectuals” (1967).

The beat goes on and on and on, so where are those intellectuals willing and able to take responsibility for this latest abomination? What is it that is all it takes for evil to succeed?

Saudi Barbaria

Tags

9/11, Al Qaeda, barbarism, colonialism, Crown Prince Sultan, human rights, Ibn Sa’ud, iran, ISIS, Islamic extremism, oil, paul william roberts, Persia, Saudi Arabia, Saudi religion, Taliban, threat to Canada, Wahhab, Wahhabism, Women's Rights

When Saudi Arabia threatens Canada for demanding the release of women’s rights activists there, my first reaction is to laugh, because I’ve always thought the place wallowed proudly in its panoramic abuse of human rights in general. Let’s take a look at this puffed-up, backward stretch of oil-rich sand, more a family business than any kind of state.

 

Cobbled together by Ibn Sa’ud, patriarch and owner of many goats, in the 18^th century, it was a fractious confederation of semi-nomadic tribes, from each of which he took a bride, until British colonial plunderers gave it the nod as a “kingdom” – meaning it might have some utility as an “ally”, should the need for one arise. Then along came a man named Wahhab, according to his own parents deranged, who saw himself as, not a second coming of the Prophet Mohammed but a far greater being, one destined to be Caliph of the entire Islamic world. His version of Islam, essentially a heresy, resembled a penal code of unbendable rules, many of which ostensibly outlawed pleasure, music, dancing, and so on. Ibn Sa’ud saw great virtue in an alliance with Wahhab and the sponsorship of his “faith” chiefly because it solved his most frustrating problem. What the old sand-pirate craved to do most was raid the rich caravans coming from Persia, but Islamic law forbade a Muslim from attacking and robbing other Muslims. Wahhabism, however, maintained that other forms of the religion – Shia, Sufi, Aluwite, Ismaili, etc. – were not Islam, were in fact infidels who should be attacked and robbed. The Persians were of course Shia. This was music to Ibn Sa’ud’s ears’ and so a deal was struck which essentially divided the kingdom equally between princes of his house and Wahhabite priests. The caravans from Persia were now legitimate prey, and hostility between the two places remains bitter to this day. The Kingdom likes you to think its national religion is orthodox Sunni Islam, yet it is not. Proof of this came early too. When the Saudis annexed the holy city of Mecca, traditionally held by Hashemite Sunnis, there was inordinate bloodshed. But the biggest problem arose during the first Haj pilgrimage, when Egyptian Sunni pilgrims marched towards the city singing their traditional Haj songs. What to do? Remember, singing is banned in Wahhabism. After some debate, the Saudi troops slaughtered all the Egyptians, men, women and children, which adroitly fixed that dilemma. The Brits, who regarded the Middle East as their bailiwick, didn’t care what Arabs did to other Arabs – or didn’t care until there was a reason to care.

 

This came with oil, which it was agreed would be co-owned by Brits and Saudis. Under numerous distracting corporations, to avoid accusations of monopoly, this arrangement still continues, orient and occident, with America now more of the occident. By the seventies, everyone knew the Saudis were fabulously wealthy, because princes from the hereditary family business were throwing their money around in all the casinos and whorehouses of Europe. But what of the equally hereditary priesthood, who could hardly be seen at gaming tables or in brothels? What did they do with their share of the loot? Well, sad to say, they invested in spreading their despicable heresy around the globe with free schools and mosques (hard for a poor nation to refuse) that all espoused the hateful creed, that still vehemently denounces other forms of Islam (except the Sunni form, of course), whose adherents are recommended for execution, or indeed whatever enormity you fancy visiting on them.

 

I will state unambiguously that Wahhabism, the Saudi state religion, is entirely responsible for all so-called Islamic extremism, from Al Qaeda to ISIS and beyond. The notion of founding a “caliphate”, a major preoccupation of these factions, is precisely the same megalomaniacal fantasy that Wahhab himself dreamt up. Osama bun Laden, the 9/11 bombers, the Taliban, and every other murderous maniac crawling around the planet’s less fortunate areas – all Wahhabis or funded by Wahhabi money. Fact.

 

And these are the people – inspired by their new and obnoxiously self-important Crown Prince – who now threaten us? Saudi Arabia is the only place I have ever been that I thoroughly detested, whose menfolk – for the womenfolk are all imprisoned – I found uniquely uncivilized, whose culture I found non-existent, and whose social mores I found completely barbaric. Homosexuality is punished by beheading. Freedom of speech is unheard of, and if it peeps a teeny bit gets a minimum of a thousand lashes. A joint of pot is worth 20 years in jail or worse – and in Saudi Barbaria twenty years is at least twenty years. It goes on and, as I said, I thought they were pleased and proud of this medieval intolerance. Now I find that posturing buffoon at the helm is touchy about being advised to catch up with international laws… well, I’m inclined to say, ‘Let’s invade and free the women, along with everyone who is not a prince or priest.” Those parasites can be set to work building a submarine zoo for themselves.

 

robertspaulwilliam@gmail.com

Saudi Arabia on Trial

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Saudi Arabia

 

A bill passed by the US Congress promises this. It was vetoed by President Obama – who cited concerns that it would allow the world to sue America for war crimes – but many Democrats and most Republicans waived such valid concerns aside. I should admit that I am all for suing Saudi Arabia, particularly the Wahhabite clergy, whose vast wealth finances much terrorism, and all of the Third World’s free Islamist schools, which teach the obnoxious Wahhabibite heresy, along with its hateful attitudes towards Shia Muslims, Sufis, and the numerous other orthodox Muslim sects. The proposed law-suit concerns 9/11, of course – why would Americans concern themselves with matters that don’t concern them? But, attempting to skirt the many conspiracy theories, there are indeed many vexing questions about that fateful day. For example, why was the only aircraft permitted to fly a Saudi jetliner taking royals back home? For that matter, who gave the order for US fighters to stand down, when standard procedure during a hijacking is for airforce jets to scramble? On a more mundane level: what happened to the security-camera footage that would have captured the airplane which hit the Pentagon? If it was an airplane. At least one on-site observer claims it was a US-army missile. Just show the footage, and then – no problem. The conspiracy-minded claim that 9/11 was a plot, a disaster designed to change the course of history and, particularly, US law-enforcement. Well, there is no doubt that US law-enforcement dramatically changed course after September 11^th, 2001, erasing many of the constitutional provisions for basic citizens’ rights. Although the lack of citizen-protest may suggest that those who don’t value rights ought not to have them. The disaster may have been an opening for opportunists – as some say the Reichstag fire was for Hitler’s Nazis, encouraging more severe racial laws – or it may have been diabolically planned. This latter is hard to believe, not for want of diabolism in the parties necessarily involved, but for the rampant stupidity such parties habitually display. Unless limited to one or two people, a conspiracy is impossible to keep secret. Even things about 9/11 that have a logical explanation are still cloaked in a ridiculous miasma of so-called security. For instance, any viewer of video showing the towers coming down can see, if the tape is slowed down, explosions blowing out each lower corner. As levels blow out, the upper structures come down. It’s obvious and undeniable. I asked a Manhattan architect about it. The answer was straightforward enough. ‘Any towers built from the late fifties on,’ he said, ‘have plastic explosives built into the corners of each floor. It’s essential. You can’t have these structures falling down in the event of a catastrophe. One would fall onto another, and in no time you’d have a domino-effect where half the city was brought down. The explosives are perfectly safe – they need a detonator to ignite – but their existence is kept secret because people are jumpy. Who wants to live or work in a building wired to explode? But, as you saw, it came in useful.’ That explained, for me, an anomaly preposterously easy to spot. One wonders why network media haven’t pointed it out. Slow the tape, and it’s plain to see – unless you’ve been told not to see it.

But taking the Saudis to court involves other issues. True, 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals. True too that various Saudi consulates and embassies in the US assisted in some way the hijackers needs for accommodations, materiel, and, yes, flying lessons. But how to find the personnel operating in these diplomatic enclaves at that time? The answer is they won’t be found. A thousand reasons will make this reasonable – apart from the problem of Arabic names written in Arabic.

But, for all the specific evidences of malfeasance, Saudi Arabia is also one vast galloping example of global despicability. For far too long – or for far too much oil – the Kingdom has got a free pass from the West. This would be a West deploring human rights violations and even ‘barbarism’ elsewhere. Well, elsewhere ought to include the spurious Gulf kleptocracy. Where women have no rights whatsoever. Where music is banned. Where political gatherings are banned. Where possession of alcohol is cause for a death, or, if not, a life sentence. Where homosexuals are executed – beheaded by sword. Where you can be sentenced – like a friend of mine – for five years in jail if found guilty of possessing half a joint. And five years there is five years, not a third of that. You’re confined, ridiculed, abused, and then released. You never view the Kingdom in a kindly way again. All the dismal place warrants, to any outsider, is a massive cleaning up.

Bearing in mind the perennial free pass, it will be interesting to observe how current Saudi hierarchs wheedle their way out this latest, and wholly justified, accusatory predicament,

 

Paul William Roberts

 

How to Deal with ISIS

Tags

France, Middle East, politics, Saudi Arabia, terrorism, Wahhabism

       ^{At the so-called Peace Conference held at Paris in 1919, T.E. Lawrence (of Arabia) arrived with Sheik Faisal, leader of the Arabs who had acted as vital British allies in the war against Ottoman  Turkey, and were promised, in return, a nation of their own. Lawrence and his friend were kept waiting for several weeks before Faisal was allowed to speak on behalf of his people and the lands they had been promised – which included Palestine [see documents in the British Arab Office archives]. Faisal was allowed only a brief time to speak, since by then the secret Sykes-Picot agreement had already divided up the major Arab territories, like Syria and Iraq, between Britain and France. Faisal left empty-handed, and Lawrence eventually committed suicide out of shame for the deceit he had, unwittingly, played a major part in perpetuating. The harsh treatment of Germany by major powers at that conference led directly to the rise of Hitler, who was persuaded by the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, leading Muslim authority in Palestine, not to deport European  Jews there, since it would cause a severe conflict. This led directly to the Holocaust.}

                ^{In 1955, President Eisenhower in Washington was informed at an intelligence briefing that the hostility towards America displayed by the average Arab was a direct consequence of US support for tyrannical dictators in the region who effectively dashed the hopes of the masses for a semblance of democracy. Eisenhower, a decent man [see his last address on the dangers of a Military-industrial complex], was disturbed by this news, yet the CIA assured him the situation in West Asia was just as it should be. The US and UK destroyed Iran’s first democratically-elected government in the fifties, too, replacing it with a puppet Shah, whose mandate was to crush communism in any form, and in any way necessary. His Savak secret police used this excuse to eradicate all varieties of resistance, leading directly to the 1979 Revolution. Always favouring dictatorships, and craving light sweet crude oil – the finest – first the UK, then the US, backed Saudi Arabia – now the worst and most backward tyranny on earth – for its oil. No one knew, or else no one cared, that, traditionally, half the Saudi state’s income – hundreds of billions – went to the princes, while the other half went to an hereditary clergy. These clerics subscribed to what is, essentially, an Islamic heresy concocted by a self-proclaimed prophet in the 18th century named Wahhab, whose primary goals were to please the old King Ibn Saud, and to make himself Caliph of a vast Islamic state. To please the King, whose main desire then was to raid rich Persian caravans – forbidden in Islam, where a Muslim may not fight another Muslim – Wahhab declared the Shia, a sect ruling Iran, to be non-Muslims,, thus their caravans could be raided. Similarly, he banned the Sufis, Ismailis, and everything not orthodox Sunni Islam; also banning music and dancing while he was at it. In effect, he reduced the magnificence of Islam to a prison code. His descendants now rule Saudi religion with an iron hand, executing homosexuals, oppressing women, and so on; also using their share of the oil billions to establish free schools in poor countries, where their hate-filled perversion of Islam is taught, with an emphasis on Jihad as war against all infidels – an easy thing, since the Koran in Arabic is impossible to definitively understand, and all translations are merely interpretations. The Wahhabite clergy finance numerous websites which attempt to radicalize impressionable minds, often by quoting spurious apocryphal prophetic texts predicting a kind of End Time war, which will be fought in Iraq and Syria – although their strategic and tactical advice is designed for 9th century tribal war, not the 21st century variety, no matter that the countries mentioned still exist. It does not take a genius to work out that Saudi clerics, and some royalty, are behind the so-called Jihadist movement, and are funding the fantasised Islamic State, which is really just the resurrection of pseudo-prophet Wahhab’s monomaniacal dream 200 years ago. It is telling that the deranged kid, who shot a guard  and tried to invade Ottawa’s Parliament, told his mother he wished to study Islam in Riyadh, where all he would learn would be the heresy of Wahhab. A serious student would aim to study at al-Ahram in Cairo, the heart of Sunni orthodoxy.  To me, at least, this proves he was radicalized by Wahhabite websites, which need to be  identified, traced, and shut down. The financial affairs of Saudi clerics also need to be examined, and all funds frozen. Their schools in the undeveloped world need to be monitored for inciting hatred and distorting Islam, and then, ideally, replaced by UNESCO with real schools. The Saudi tyranny also needs to be dismantled, liberating women, as well as paving the way for real democratic elections.}

                ^{As the above snippets of history show, the originators of this current chaos in West Asia are the UK, France, and the US. Canada has no responsibility in the matter, which ought to be left to the three nations involved.}

^{Since the fanciful Islamic State, or ISIS, has now, contrary to Koranic teachings, declared war against innocent civilians – some even Muslims – in the West, the only possible response is massive retaliation. Between them, the UK, France, and the US need to put a million boots on the ground, backed up by drones, Stealth Bombers, Cruise  Missiles, and accurate intelligence. Attack, as we know, is the best method of defense. The ISIS leaders – not idiots in the least – need to be identified and, ideally, captured. To drive home the point, after a proper trial, I would not object to these poisonous individuals being publically guillotined in the Place de la Concorde, the video also posted on U=Tube, just to show that a liberal democracy does not mean weakness. If ISIS commanders, as is their wont, hide in public places or World Heritage sites, like Palmyra – which I know well and fear is now gone forever – Special Forces need to go in and take out only the enemy. I have seen the SAS and others in action, and know their extraordinary capabilities at such clean operations. A coalition of those three countries perpetrating this current mayhem, whether in the past or in the present, would symbolize much to the majority of Arabs who yearn only for peace. A million men on the ground would tell ISIS that their game was over.}

^{It will mean scouring Syria, removing Assad – let the Iranians or Russians have him if they’re so fond of him – sorting rebels from ISIS interlopers, and installing a provisional government until such a time as free and fair elections are feasible. Access to the important Shia shrine, the tomb of Fatima, the Prophet’s daughter, must be guaranteed for all Shia pilgrims – which is the main reason Iran is backing the sectarian Shia leader, Assad. Should the empire-hungry, and increasingly militant, Czar Putin object, he ought to told to back off, and take a salutary lesson from the military might displayed, realizing no Russian winter could save his country from a similar assault, if was  provoked.}

                ^{In Iraq, the situation would be different. Although the author of ISIS Apocalypse attributes the collaboration of Iraqi tribes to an al-Quaeda innovation, it is in fact a technique Saddam Hussein deployed whenever he sought mass-support, which shows that much of the ISIS insurgency there consists of skilled fighters from the old Sunni Republican Guard, which has a legitimate grievance relating to the current Shia domination over Baghdad’s parliament. Since the uninformed idiocy of US Intelligence services was responsible for creating this unthought-out mess, it behooves America to fashion a new Iraqi government in which Sunni, Shia, and others are are equally represented, and Kurdish loyalty is appropriately rewarded with a sovereign state. In the new Iraq, those all-important oil revenues must be equitably shared by all. If Iraqi Sunnis were convinced of such a bright future they would themselves rid the country of ISIS fanatics, whose whereabouts and strategies they will know well. Tribal leaders, if approached with the respect they warrant – not summoned to US HQ, as they were in 2003 – would also be of invaluable assistance. US Intelligence seems to have no understanding of tribal ways, possibly dating back to their brutal mistreatment of Native Indians after 1776?}

                ^{As for Saudi Arabia, my preference would be for a UK-US invasion of liberation, ousting the royalty, and rounding up those clerics most responsible for fomenting terrorism, and, if found guilty, offered – as Saudi law rarely offers – a choice between execution or a videotaped denunciation of their own distortions of Islam, including the admission that murder and terror are nowhere endorsed in the Koran, nor are killers or suicide-bombers promised rewards in paradise. If necessary, a videotaped debate between orthodox Islamic scholars and Wahhabite clergy should be arranged, to show Muslims worldwide that they have been wantonly misled, and often by the use of spurious texts written long after the Prophet’s death, in direct contradiction to his teachings. Even the Hadith states that Mohammed’s last words were an order for his followers not to schism and to take care of women’s rights. Nowhere does he sanction a priesthood, either, so the injunctions from Imams or Ayatollahs have no validity whatsoever for any devout Muslim. It rests upon the shoulders of Saudi clerics to undo the damage they have done to a faith they profess to uphold. Such a liberation of Saudi Arabia would also need to confiscate all oil revenues to be put in escrow and then be equitably divided up amongst the people by an elected government. Furthermore, the Saudi military should be deprived of all the sophisticated aircraft and weaponry supplied by the US, thus preventing any more attacks on Shia communities in the Yemen and elsewhere, which, to date, have been carried out freely.}

                ^{As opposed as I am to the two-state solution for Israel-Palestine’s eternal conflict, I think a Palestinian state is probably the only answer – but it ought to comprise parts of Jordan, Iraq, and Syria, with access to holy sites, like Hebron or Bethlehem, and Jerusalem, common to three religions, guaranteed under international law as neutral zones, with the proviso that any violence perpetrated by any member of any religion will result in all members of that faith being denied access to the site or shrine for many years. Similarly, any hostility from a new Palestinian state towards Israel would result in severe penalties, including a military purge and international embargoes. Israel must accept the same conditions, and receive funding for helping build infrastructures and agriculture – thus good relations – with the new Palestine. Any peace talks will now stall over the question of Jerusalem; this plan overcomes the problem by making all holy sites neutral, weapons-free areas, supervised by Israelis with oversight by UN peacekeepers. A glance at the map shows clearly those areas of Jordan, Iraq and Syria, largely empty now, that could easily become Palestine without threatening Israeli security.}

                ^{Since the UK and France drew the map – thank you Winston Churchill – and the US solidified its irrational borders, the three nations can just as easily redraw it along more rational lines to serve new needs.}

                ^{Canada, however, cannot be blamed for the Mess, and ought to have no military involvement. It is not hard to observe that most terrorist attacks are against the three imperialist culprits responsible for deceiving the Arabs or imposing military dictators in the region – as is yet again the case in Egypt, whose brief democracy displeased Washington, much as the one in Iran did sixty years ago. Dictators are so much easier to deal with: they do what they’re told, or else they’re replaced. A democracy does not jump so readily when the ringmaster cracks his whip.}

                ^{ISIS has to go. The appalling attacks in Paris alone are an act of war; and wars are won by overwhelming force and grim determination. Land a million troops pledged to erase ISIS from history, and the Arab tribes will  swiftly get the message. They admire enormous strength and ruthless retribution. The Hydra may have been able to grow more heads endlessly, yet ISIS will not be so endowed. The body of its leadership gone – ideally on U-tube – the many-headed networks or foreign cells will wither and die, especially when told they are violating Islamic principles rather than furthering them.}

^{The Caliphate was an early medieval dream, and even then it did not last long – besides having no sanction in the Koran. Those whose imperial hubris caused these problems ought now to correct matters in every way, and then, having done their very best, leave these new nations to shift for themselves peacefully and through their own form of democratic processes. Canada’s ‘allies’ have only ever summoned us to help fight their wars. Americans know nothing about us, except for the igloos; and the English scorn us privately as just another colony renamed. As Pierre Trudeau often said, our real friends are the Scandinavian countries, with which we have most in common, and which stay well away from neo-imperial adventures. Justin Trudeau should take his father’s advice, and let those who broke West Asia mend it. Canadians have no wish to be a super-power, nor do we have the means. An alliance with the neighbourhood bullies only brings you more trouble when you’re caught alone. Besides, we are going to need all that money spent on machines of death to fulfill all those rash election promises for which we voted.}

 

^{Sincerely with love,}

^{Paul William Roberts}

The Ottawa Shooter

Tags

govnerment, Islam, Ottawa, Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism

It astounds me that the comment made by the Ottawa shooter’s mother stating that her son intended studying the Koran in Saudi Arabia has not received more attention. To study the Koran in Saudi Arabia would mean to study the heretical Wahhabite version of Islam, which besides relegating women to chattel status, banning music and denouncing Islamic forms such as the Shia and the Sufis also advocates a violent war in the name of Jihad against all infidels–that would be those who do not subscribe to the Wahhabite heresy. If anyone in Ottawa or elsewhere were attuned to the reality of the situation within Islam, they would be fully conscious that the impetus for this man’s violent deed must have come via a website originating in Saudi Arabia and espousing the heretical and extremist Wahhabite doctrine. Someone seriously wishing to study the Koran would do so in Cairo, the centre, or Vatican of Sunni Islam. As usual, I am amazed by the ineptitude of government advisers on such subjects–if indeed such exist.

My Birthday

Tags

Canada, Islam, journalism, Middle East, politics, Saudi Arabia, stephen harper, syria, war

What better gift could I receive on my birthday than the news that Canada is about to send in ‘advisers’ to assist the Iraqi military in its struggle against the organization whose name varies from ISIS to ISOS, but which we shall call IS, for ‘Islamic State’? Without much elaboration – since I have stated the case so often – I shall keep these comments brief. Firstly, the term ‘advisers’ – which I noticed originally back when the USA was inheriting the Vietnam War from France – actually means highly-trained special forces; the kind of soldiers able to take an entire town or base without assistance. The vagueness of Prime Minister Harper’s description of this advisory unit as “several dozen men” confirms this suspicion, ‘several’ being one of the most meaningless terms in the                                                                                                                                                    language. ‘Advisers’ has always been Pentagon code for Special Forces. I met such people when I was in Iraq in 2003, and they had been there long before the actual invasion itself began, their principal task being to knock out Saddam’s desert bases, thereby immobilizing his most highly-trained forces. So let us dispense with the myth of ‘advisers’. If actual advice were required by Iraq’s military, a couple of men could perform this task; ‘several dozen’ would merely be superfluous, if not confusing. Let us assume that Britain will send in its SAS, and the US its Delta Force. This tells us the problem is troublesome, yet easily contained.

Next arises the issue of why the Canadian public is not consulted about such an action, which will undoubtedly result in Canadian deaths, if not an involvement in another debacle as insolvable and pointless as Afghanistan or Vietnam. Not to mention the cost to taxpayers. Are we really living in a democracy? Does Harper actually comprehend the function of a Parliament? What became of public discussion?

The last issue I can be bothered to raise before my birthday dinner is the one of how to stop IS in its progress, including the execution of men I still deem colleagues. Does no one wonder why these beheaded journalists are all termed ‘independent’? I always reported on war zones as an ‘independent’, but it was only when my reports from Iraq in 2003 were so eagerly received by the Globe and Mail, and the CBC, that I realised why. They had none of their own people on the ground because they could not – or would not – afford the insurance to cover reporters in danger spots. They happily take the reporting of such independents venturing into areas where a story really exists, yet they offer nothing in condolence or compensation to those who have provided the material they would otherwise lack. It seems likely I lost my eyesight from exposure to toxins in Iraq, yet I would no more dream of asking the Globe or CBC for compensation than I would of suing the Pentagon for its war.

As I have stated ad nauseam, the way to stop IS is to locate the channels of funding which, I can guarantee, originate from the Wahhabi priesthood of Saudi Arabia. This is not a crew of crazed vicars handing over the collection plate. This is an hereditary priesthood receiving, by law and tradition, half the Saudi oil wealth. The ethnic cleansing being performed by IS alone demonstrates its close Wahhabi ties. Wahhabism is ostensibly a Muslim heresy which, for self-serving purposes, condemns the Shia and other Muslim sects as non-Islamic. It also regards women as subhuman and views music and dancing as satanic. Unfortunately, however, it also has an annual income in the trillions of dollars, which it has used to spread its malicious heretical version of Islam all over the world since the oil boom of the 1970s. It also funds IS, and all the Al Quaeda spin-off factions. Notice how none of these pseudo-Islamic psychopaths ever bother a Sunni-led regime. Read books about the sect, for Christ’s sake, if you don’t believe me. If you want to see more Canadian soldiers die for nothing, then please don’t bother to inform yourself about any issue at all. If, however, you would prefer Canada to engage solely in just wars, ask your MPs and MPPs to raise the issue of Saudi funding for IS in Parliament. Demand to know why the most backward and barbaric state on earth is tolerated simply for its oil wealth. Also ask why Iraq, not Syria, is the cause behind intervention. Could it possibly be that Syria has no oil? If any country deserves to be invaded it is surely Saudi Arabia. If any faith deserves to be prohibited it is surely Wahhabism. If oil is not the issue – as the liars in high places will doubtless assure us – then leave Iraq to sort out its own problems. Interfering in them will solve nothing in the long run but further antagonizing those few deranged Islamist radicals who still believe the Crusades have yet to end. “Whoops,” as George W. Bush said, “I didn’t mean to say ‘crusade’.”

 

With love, as always, Paul William Roberts

What You Aren’t Told About Islamist Terrorism

Tags

Islam, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, United States of America

There are some conspiracy theorists who claim the sad deaths of Robin Williams and Lauren Bacall were ‘black operations’ designed to distract media attention away from events in Ferguson, Missouri. While obviously this is stultifying nonsense, there are very valid questions to be raised regarding what the media choose to treat as news, and how they choose to treat it.

I, for one, am growing heartily sick of media refusal to provide a context for both the current situation in Iraq, and so-called Islamist terrorism in general. What I am about to say has been said before, and not just by myself, but in numerous                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     far more-learned and densely-foot-noted books. Yet the information has been largely ignored by a media curiously reluctant to provide viewers or listeners with any context for events, which thus seem to exist in a disconnected void, much like a television series where each episode is a complete story, not reliant upon any knowledge of previous episodes.

With Iraq this entails no mention of the American invasion of 2003 – covered first-hand in my book A War Against Truth – which violated international law, and was predicted by many to result in the current factional chaos. As I predicted here some weeks ago, the threat to U.S. oil interests would oblige America to respond with lethal force. The situation will further deteriorate, and I shall not be surprised to see U.S. boots on the ground soon enough – particularly since they are already on the ground in remote desert bases, stationed there purely to protect oil concerns. The reader ought to remember that America has never closed a base – they still exist in Japan, Italy, Germany, and other defeated victims of World War II; as well as in the numerous objectives of American imperialism, from Indo-China to the Philippines, the Caribbean, and Central America. Although such bases are occasionally mentioned in connection with U.S. operations requiring their use – Weisbaden, for example – I have never heard any media pundit question their existence seventy years, in some cases, after the war which justified their initial construction.

This, however, is not my point here – although it does remain a question demanding both to be asked and answered. My point here is going to be stark, unembellished, and profoundly offensive to some – and those ‘some’ are profoundly offensive to me. I am tempted to state the case in point form as an aid to comprehension, and to add emphasis that this is fact, not opinion:

01: Wahhabite Islam is responsible for all Islamist Terrorism. It is the sole form of Islam officially sanctioned by Saudi Arabia.

02: Wahhab, the founder, was an 18^th century Muslim with delusions of grandeur that appealed to Ibn Sa’ud, who was then attempting, through a prodigious campaign of inter-tribal marriages, to make himself ruler of Arabia – then an ill-defined area of nomadic peoples. Wahhab – whose own parents regarded him as insane – saw himself as greater than the Prophet Mohammed, aspiring to be Caliph of a vast Islamic empire. This meshed in nicely with Ibn Sa’ud’s own plans, giving them a religious sanction. Thus, a partnership was formed between priest and prince – not unlike that advocated by ancient Hebrew texts – dividing control of the inchoate Saudi Arabia between an hereditary monarchy and an hereditary priesthood, which exist to this day, splitting the fabulous oil wealth – undreamt of in the 18^th century – between Wahhabite priests and Saudi royalty.

03: Many of Wahhab’s heretical interpretations of Islam were suited to Ibn Sa’ud’s specific needs: for example, Islam forbids Muslims from attacking other Muslims. Ibn Sa’ud badly wanted to raid the rich merchant caravans travelling west from Persia, yet, Iranians being Muslim, he could not do. Thus Wahhab proclaimed the Shia form of Islam practiced in Persia to be un-Islamic, thereby justifying Ibn Sa’ud’s raids, which increased pre-oil wealth handsomely.

04: In order to increase the power of his own sect, excluding other Islamic influences, Wahhab also declared Sufis, and other branches of more mystical forms of Islam, to be un-Islamic. He also banned music and dancing.

05: Wahhab effectively reduced his form of Islam to something approaching a prison code, which merely existed to be obeyed.

06: When Ibn Sa’ud conquered the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, putting himself in charge of the lucrative Haj pilgrimage, which all Muslims able to do so are encouraged to perform at least once, he was faced with a large group of Egyptian pilgrims singing their traditional Haj songs. On the advice of Wahhab – for whom music was anathema – all these Egyptians pilgrims were slaughtered.

07: Wahhab, to further his own ambitions of becoming global Caliph, began emphasising passages in the Koran urging Jihad against infidels as a divine injunction. Some scholars even suggest that Wahhab himself embellished such passages to make them sound more like a physical, rather than a spiritual war.

08: The Koran can only be read in Arabic, since more than an third of it is impossibly difficult to comprehend, due to the antiquity of the language. All translations are thus interpretations, and Wahhabi translations are among the most prevalent, and the most suspect, in their presentation of Jihad as a literal war, rather than the inner, spiritual struggle it is – much like the war referred to in the Bhagavad Gita.

09: It has been well known what the Saudi royalty spent their half of the sudden and unexpected torrent of oil dollars on; yet few seem aware of what the Wahhabi theocrats did with their share. We are talking about hundreds of billions of dollars. From the 1970s on, Wahhabi money was poured into free schools, built all over the world, and not merely in nominally Islamic countries. Africa has been a major target. The form of Islam taught in these schools was the heretical doctrine of Wahhab, preaching a violent Jihad as one of its major tenets. This has not gone unnoticed – a friend of mine in Zambia tried to close down such schools – yet free education has proved hard to argue against, especially when it is accompanied by such perquisites as free loans for agricultural equipment, clothing, and so on.

10: Except in nations where school curricula are carefully monitored, the Wahhabi heresy is now being taught as Islam, encouraging, among many monstrosities, the glories of martyrdom in all its hideous forms. Furthermore, through a complex network of banking facilities, Wahhabi money is financing Jihadi movements everywhere, providing weapons and expertise.

11: Ask yourself why the only airplane allowed to fly on 9/11 carried members of the Saudi royal family out of the U.S.A. Then ask yourself if the C.I.A., with all its resources, is unaware of Wahhabi involvement in international terror.

12: Hardly any average citizen understands the Sunni-Shia schism in Islam – why is this not explained by the media? Is one person in a million aware of the Wahhabite heresy co-ruling Saudi Arabia, and dividing its wealth? How many ‘news junkies’ know that Wahhabism is solely responsible for the current fear of Islam as a threat to world peace? Why should this be?

One possible answer to such nagging questions is that the current situation suits someone with the power to keep it going for their own interests. By far the most barbaric and backward of wealthy world states, Saudi Arabia remains unscathed by tribulations afflicting much of the Arab world. They even have a secret yet widely acknowledged pact of mutual cooperation with Israel. Besides the Wahhabi menace, one would expect a little more pressure brought to bear on the Kingdom by western feminists. Yet the descendants of Ibn Sa’ud and Wahhab seem to dwell within a titanium time capsule, within which they are free to run a society on 12^th century lines, as well as to sponsor and espouse movements and activities which are by far the most disturbing, lethal and disruptive in the world where dwell the rest of us. Harass your senators, congressmen, and members of parliament, I suggest. Ask these questions, and demand answers. No one more than I would be happier to learn that answers are available. I would post them here, without doubt. In the meantime, wait for U.S. efforts to safeguard the oil that most Iraqis still imagine is theirs; and, of course, do nothing for Syria – neediest of needy spots – because Syrians don’t have to imagine they own oil; they know they do not. It is up to us to make this planet a better place, and forcing the media to provide a little context for its discombobulated and hysterical content would be a good place to start.

With love, as always,

Paul William Roberts.