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  • King Salman
    How will the new King Salman change Saudi Arabia?

    He is also the family disciplinarian. When Saudi princes and princesses got into trouble, Khaled Almaeena says, it was Prince Salman who would quietly sort things out.

     

  • Saudi Arabia and 9/11
    Opinion: Was the Saudi Government Complicit in the 9/11 Attacks?

    Moussaoui’s anecdotes about Saudi perfidy are not plausible. Anyone who has read his testimony can see that he is not mentally well, and in any case one of Al Qaeda’s aims was to drive a wedge between the United States and Saudi Arabia so as more easily to overthrow the House of Saud. Most of the Al Qaeda governing board consisted of expatriate Egyptians, part of the al-Zawahiri Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which had merged with Al Qaeda. Yet bin Laden chose Saudi youth as the muscle for the 9/11 operation rather than the numerous Egyptians, Yemenis and other Arab nationalities. In so doing, he was trying to alienate Washington from Riyadh.

  • ISIS Numbers
    How Many Fighters Does the Islamic State Really Have?

    It still isn’t clear precisely how many fighters ISIL has, but its total force is likely to be closer to 100,000 than to 30,000 (although, unlike the martyrdom-seeking fanatics in its ranks, ISIL’s conscripts are more likely to turn tail and run in a tough situation). The low-end estimates are simply too low to be realistic, while the high-end estimates—of which many observers are intuitively skeptical—are far more plausible than they first appear once one attempts to break them down more systematically.

  • Guantanamo
    What Would it Actually Take to Close Guantanamo?

    Realistically, if Guantanamo is to be closed before the President leaves office, Congress has to lift the restriction on moving detainees to the United States this year. That’s going to be a hard legislative sell. And it means that the winnowing of the population will have to take place over the next few months. If the Guantanamo population is still above 100 in June or July, forget it; there simply won’t be time for the President to make a serious case to Congress that it should let him move the remaining detainees to facilities in the United States. If, on the other hand, the current momentum continues, and five or six months from now, we have between 80 and 100 detainees left at the facility, then the picture looks different.  The President would then need to spend the remainder of the year convincing Congress—probably in this year’s NDAA—to relax the restrictions on bringing detainees to the United States, and if he succeeded in doing so, he would then have his remaining year in office actually to effectuate that judgment.

  • Israel - Hezbollah
    Is war between Hezbollah and Israel inevitable?

    There has been a dangerous deterioration in Israel’s strategic position because of the open boast by Nasrallah that it is now fighting Israel not only from the Blue Line with Lebanon, but, also, on Syria’s frontline with Israel in the Golan. In other words, Hezbollah’s front with Israel now extends from the Mediterranean all the way to the disputed Golan on the Syrian border. Israel is unlikely to leave a threat like that unanswered. Moreover, Israel never shrinks from retaliation when its soldiers are killed, and especially when one of them is a middle-ranking officer.

  • Alwaleed Bin Talal
    Why Is A Saudi Prince Selling Out Of News Corp?

    The Prince hasn’t sold out completely – he still owns about 1% of the company, as well as a separate 6.6% shareholding in 21st Century Fox Inc which in itself is worth about $1.7 billion – but he previously also held 6.6% of News Corp NWSA -0.06%, or a total of 13.184 million class B shares. He’s shed all but two million of them.

  • Tunisia
    Why Was Tunisia the Only Arab Spring Country That Turned Out Well?

    Some factors are structural. Tunisia is a relatively small country without major geographical boundaries, meaning the entire country can be governed fairly easily from the capital. It’s also, as Brown puts it, “ethnically, religiously and linguistically unified.” So it was always less likely to see the sectarian divides and competing power centers that have plagued Yemen and Libya.

  • Economy
    How will new Saudi king handle the economy?

    Economists clarified that the custodian of the two holy mosques, King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz, has many economic and industrial files to handle. They underlined the big role he played in supporting the Saudi economy during King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz’s rule. Moreover, they indicated that while he governed the Riyadh emirate and was crown prince, he also led the development process in industrial and commercial sectors. He managed to achieve major accomplishments and build industrial cities that raised the industrial sector’s contribution to the national income.

  • Michelle Obama in Saudi Arabia
    Michelle Obama headscarf controversy – do Saudis really care?

    And significantly, this "backlash" was dwarfed by another tag related to the US President's visit to the kingdom. "King Salman leaves Obama to pray" attracted more than 170,000 messages. Saudis used this slogan to show their warm admiration for new King Salman leaving during the Obamas' visit to pray, as shown in a news report that was widely viewed on YouTube. "This is the man who left the leader of the most important country in the world to pray," a Saudi tweeted.

  • Women in Saudi Arabia
    Audio: What Will New King Mean For Women In Saudi Arabia?

    Melissa Block speaks with Rajaa Al Sanea, a dentist and Saudi writer best known for her novel, Girls of Riyadh. She talks about how women's rights changed and expectations for the new king.