Sunlight answers a question – Last week the New York Times and the New York Post ran articles based on a classified congressional hearing.
In essence Massachusetts Democrat Congressman Stephen Lynch, who was present for the hearing, was used to push a story centered around his proposal to Congress to pass a resolution asking President Obama to declassify an entire 2002 report, “Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001.”
The context of Lynch’s request centers around this newly identified intelligence community report which, according to non-specific leaks, outlines Saudi Arabia’s involvement in supporting the 911 hijackers.
The question we had at the time was “why now”? Obviously someone is seeking to gain some form of benefit from this discussion – it would be intellectually dishonest to think such a conversation would happen in a political vacuum.
The answer to the “why” question can be found in an article published a few days ago in the Wall Street Journal. Within the Journal article you discover how much current anxiety and tension exists between the current Obama administration and the Saudi government against the backdrop of Obama’s failed Syria “Red Line”, and the Iranian Nuclear goals.
Put yourself up at 30,000 feet and you can see Denis McDonough, ValJar and the anti-Israel coalition at work here. You can see The BIG PICTURE inside the motive to push this classified intelligence report into the current day picture.
By looking at the big picture the motive for the Obama administration to “isolate – marginalize” and even threaten Saudi Arabia makes sense. Congressman Stephen Lynch is merely the lever to achieve the White House goal of turning current sentiment away from Saudi Arabia who, in an oddly connected series of events, now finds itself in alignment with Israel.
MONACO—A leading Saudi prince demanded a place for his country at talks with Iran, assailing the Obama administration for working behind Riyadh’s back and panning other recent U.S. steps in the Middle East.
Prince Turki al-Faisal, an Arab royal and a brother of Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, said Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states were stunned by the secret American-Iranian diplomacy that led to the breakthrough deal between Iran and other world powers last month.
His comments in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, rare in their bluntness, came on the sidelines of a security conference here at which he publicly blistered the U.S. for its role in Syria and in the region.
The Arab royal said the failure by Washington and the United Nations to take decisive steps to end the violence in Syria—which has claimed over 130,000 lives—bordered on “criminal negligence.”
Last week, the State Department said it had suspended nonlethal aid to the Syrian rebels after warehouses they controlled in northern Syria were overrun by Islamic militants with ties to al Qaeda. Saudi Arabia has armed some of those same rebels.
“The U.S. gave us the impression that they were going to do things in Syria that they finally didn’t,” Prince Turki said on the sidelines of the World Policy Conference in Monaco. “The aid they’re giving to the Free Syrian Army is irrelevant. Now they say they’re going to stop the aid: OK, stop it. It’s not doing anything anyway.”
Prince Turki also echoed concerns raised by Israel and members of the U.S. Congress that the interim nuclear accord with Iran didn’t go far enough to ensure Tehran won’t develop atomic bombs.
The talks with Iran that have been taking place in Geneva involve the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany, a diplomatic bloc called the P5+1.
“It’s important for us to sit down at the same table” as the global powers, Prince Turki said. “We have been absent.”
[…] he accused the White House of blindsiding Riyadh with its overtures to Iran, Saudi Arabia’s primary adversary.
Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Gulf nations are supporting the Sunni-dominated rebels in Syria, while Shiite Iran is supporting Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad, which is dominated by Alawites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
“What was surprising was that the talks that were going forward were kept from us,” he told the World Policy Conference. “How can you build trust when you keep secrets from what are supposed to be your closest allies?”
A senior administration official on Sunday declined to comment on the state of the U.S.-Saudi relationship. But the official confirmed that the White House didn’t notify Saudi Arabia about the secret talks with Iran—which were initiated at high levels last March in Oman—until this fall “when things became substantive.” (read more)
Now go back and look at the framework for the New York articles – […] Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) can’t reveal the nation identified by it without violating federal law. So they’ve proposed Congress pass a resolution asking President Obama to declassify the entire 2002 report, “Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001.”
Some information already has leaked from the classified section, which is based on both CIA and FBI documents, and it points back to Saudi Arabia, a presumed ally. (link)
