Tag: saudi arabia

Trump Stuns Press In Defending MbS Over Khashoggi Murder, As Saudis Float $1 Trillion Investment

Things were a bit rough during a Q&A with the White House press pool as Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) was at the White House Tuesday. One ABC reporter asked MbS point blank what he’s for many years tried to avoid being asked – about the murder of  journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Trump was none too happy about the question, and said it sought to ’embarrass’ a guest of the White House. 

“Who are you with? ABC? One of the worst in the business,” Trump had initially reacted, also after the journalist said that 9/11 families are not happy at MbS’ red carpet treatment in Washington. Despite US intelligence previously pointing to bin Salman’s role in overseeing the 2018 murder at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Trump brushed it off. The US president also went so far as to say of the victim, “You’re mentioning somebody that was extremely controversial.” And then he claimed MbS knew nothing about it. “A lot of people didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, things happen,” Trump also said in reference to Khashoggi.

But for this ‘positive PR’ and with the sitting US president running defense on behalf of the crown prince – which apparently has even resulted in Trump asking for ABC’s FCC license and right to broadcast to be revoked – bin Salman ‘must pay’. 

Indeed, MbS came bearing gifts. He committed the kingdom to increasing his planned investment into the U.S. economy to nearly $1 trillion. After this, the NY Times commented, “The new number the prince floated today, $1 trillion, is roughly the size of Saudi Arabia’s entire annual economic output.” 

Town Hall has broken this down as follows:

  • $750M+ already flowing into American manufacturing
  • $300M new gas-turbine investment in Greenville, SC
  • Tripling production at the SC plant
  • 500+ pieces NEW equipment installed
  • 1,800 real American manufacturing jobs created
  • Building skilled workforce pipeline with local communities
  • Supporting BOTH U.S. energy needs & Saudi demand
  • “REAL JOBS in the manufacturing space.”

“You’ve agreed to invest $600 billion into the United States and because he’s my friend, he might make it a trillion, but I’m going to have to work on him. But it’s 600. We can count on 600 billion. But, that number could go up a little bit higher,” Trump said Tuesday while speaking to MbS.

“That means investments in plants, in companies, money on Wall Street. And what it really means for everybody, what really counts is jobs. A lot of jobs. We have a lot of jobs,” Trump added.

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Is Saudi Arabia The Most Technocratic Nation On Earth?

Behold, the “Sky Stadium” announced by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as the latest jazzy edition to their utopian “smart city” project known as The Line or NEOM — an $8-trillion, 105-mile-long megastructure composed of two 1640-foot-high mirrored slabs that enclose a creamy nougat center of jungly foliage and water features integrated with apartments, offices, schools, and (of course) shopping. It’s completely insane, you understand. The Line was first featured on this site in August 2022. Three years on, the project is buckling under the weight of its psychotic grandiosity.

The 46,000-seat Sky Stadium will be perched 1,150-feet up and is slated to be completed in time for the 2034 Fifa football (soccer) World Cup. The initial A-I generated renderings at the top of the page show it suspended on a skyscraper above a sprawling city, but it is actually designed to be “nested” somewhere between the two slabs of The Line.

First announced in 2017 as part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 diversification push, The Line was envisioned as a futuristic “cognitive city” with vertical urbanism, AI integration, 100-percent renewable energy (solar power), and 95-percent land preservation of its barren surroundings in the Tabuk province, “for nature.”

Dunno about you, but I’d be a little nervous about watching a soccer game 1,150-feet above the desert floor. Sounds like a super-gigantic version of one of those Sky Bridge” failures of the 1990s, where a mere hundred drunken people swilling margaritas collapse a hanging architectural folly in a Shopping Mall. We’ll stand by for the halftime show there.

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Virginia Democrat gubernatorial nominee worked at Saudi school known for Hamas links, jihadi grads

he Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Virginia worked for a Saudi government-controlled school just after 9/11, at a time when the Islamic academy was already controversial for being controlled by the Saudi royal family and for its extremist textbooks which taught hatred of non-Muslims.

Abigail Spanberger, a former Democratic congresswoman from Virginia, is currently the favorite to be the state’s next governor, according to polling averages. When it was revealed during her first congressional run in 2018 that she had worked for the Islamic Saudi Academy in northern Virginia during the 2002-2003 school year, Spanberger said that she was “proud” and “not ashamed” of her work history, despite the fact that, when she chose to work at the school, it was also already well known for its links to the terrorist group Hamas and for its recent graduates who had seemingly considered carrying out a jihad-inspired suicide attack in Israel.

The problematic nature of the Saudi academy — known as the ISA in shorthand — would be revealed even further in the years which followed.

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12,000-year-old Rock Art Found in Desert Thought Uninhabitable

About 12,000 years ago, high up on a cliff in the desert of northern Arabia, an artist (or perhaps artists) was hard at work. Standing on a narrow ledge and with primitive tools, they engraved into the rock an image of a life-sized camel. This wasn’t the first artwork of its kind: in fact, there was already an entire row of fresh camel engravings on the  128 foot high (39 meter) cliff face, below which a shallow lake sparkled in the sunshine.

Over thousands of years, these engravings weathered the elements. They gradually eroded until they were almost invisible and had been forgotten. That is, until our international team discovered them and more than 170 others while on a field trip to the region, which sits near the southern edge of the Nefud Desert in Saudi Arabia, roughly two years ago.

As we explain in a new study, published today in Nature Communications, the engravings would have marked important desert water sources – and demonstrate the resilience and innovation of people who lived in such a harsh, arid environment.

Our earlier research had shown that between 10,000 and 6,000 years ago Arabia was much wetter than it is today. Grasslands had spread into areas that are now desert, and cattle herders used these pastures for their herds. The rock art they left behind is well known from two UNESCO World Heritage sites.

We could see there was also older rock art at these UNESCO sites. It was much larger and more detailed, showing life-sized and naturalistic camels and wild donkeys. But it was not clear how old it was. So in May 2023 we set out to find more of this ancient rock art in the hope of finding clues about its age.

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“Nuclear Bombs On Rent”? Has Saudi Arabia Just Rented Pakistan’s Nukes By Signing Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement?

In the grand halls of Riyadh’s royal palaces, where the air carries the smell of incense and strong purpose, two leaders came together on September 17, 2025. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif signed a deal that feels like a big shake-up in the Middle East.

This Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement, or SMDA, says that if one country is attacked, it’s like attacking both.

This sounds a lot like NATO’s famous Article 5, where members promise to defend each other. But this agreement is different—it’s between just two countries, and it hints at Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, about 170 of them, which Saudi Arabia has wanted for years.

Has the Kingdom, which guards the sentiments of millions, basically rented a nuclear shield from its friend without building its own? Has Pakistan opened up a shop selling protection to other countries?

This isn’t just a simple agreement; it’s a smart move that could bring Islamic nations closer or start a big worry about nuclear spread from Iran to Israel. Pakistan has started a trend of ‘RENT THE BOMB’.

The signing event was full of symbols—green and white flags waving like proud banners, the two men in traditional robes and suits shaking hands under high ceilings. But behind the pictures lies a deeper story.

For more than 50 years, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have been close allies. The Saudis have sent billions of dollars—over $30 billion since the 1980s—to help Pakistan with its military and economy.

In return, Pakistan has sent soldiers to protect Mecca and Medina, like during the 1979 takeover of the Grand Mosque, and trained Saudi troops to fight rebels. It was a fair trade:

Pakistan, stuck between big India and troubled Afghanistan, needed money to build its nuclear program after losing half its country in 1971. Saudi Arabia, surrounded by enemies like revolutionary Iran and Iraq, wanted a strong Sunni partner.

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Newly Declassified FBI/CIA Files Reveal Two Saudi Government Operatives “May Have Served as an Advance Team” for 9/11 Hijackers — Official Narrative in Tatters as Timeline Shifts Back to 1998

For over two decades, the American people have been told a carefully curated story about the September 11th attacks.

Now, newly declassified FBI and CIA records are shredding the “official narrative,” revealing that Saudi government operatives may have been on U.S. soil as early as December 1998, three years before nearly 3,000 Americans were murdered.

Exclusive reporting from veteran national security journalist Catherine Herridge exposes that two Saudi government employees, Mutaeb al-Sudairy and Adel al-Sadhan, were not mere tourists.

Instead, they were caught on video in 1999 surveying Washington, D.C. landmarks later listed as potential al-Qaeda targets, including the White House and Capitol.

The Gateway Pundit reported in 2024 that in the CBS video, Omar al-Bayoumi, who the FBI says was a Saudi operative, was seen casing the US Capitol in Washington, DC, the likely target of the Flight 93 operation that was thwarted that day by American passengers and heroes.

The video was found by British police during a raid on Bayoumi’s UK apartment days after the 9/11 attacks.

According to ProPublica, Bayoumi was joined on the trip by two Saudi clerics, Adel al-Sadhan and Mutaeb al-Sudairy.

They were so-called propagators, emissaries of the Islamic Affairs Ministry sent to proselytize abroad. U.S. investigators later linked them to a handful of Islamist militants.

Former FBI veteran and Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, William R. Evanina, confirmed to Herridge that the two were here in the US for a reason.

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Saudi AI Firm Launches Halal Chatbot

Companies with AI chatbots love to highlight their capability as translators, but they still default to English, both in function and in the information they are trained on. With that in mind, Humain, an AI company in Saudi Arabia, has now launched an Arabic-native chatbot.

The bot, called Humain Chat, runs on the Allam large language model, according to Bloomberg, which the company claims was trained on “one of the largest Arabic datasets ever assembled” and is the “world’s most advanced Arabic-first AI model.” The company says that it is not only fluent in the Arabic language, but also in “Islamic culture, values and heritage.” (If you have religious concerns about using Humain Chat, consult your local Imam.) The chatbot, which will be made available as an app, will first be available only in Saudi Arabia and currently supports bilingual conversations in Arabic and English, supporting dialects including Egyptian and Lebanese. The plan is for the app to roll out across the Middle East and eventually go global, with the goal of serving the nearly 500 million Arabic-speaking people across the world.

Humain took on Allam and the chatbot project after it was started by the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority, a government agency and tech regulator. For that reason, Bloomberg raises the possibility that Humain Chat may comply with censorship requests of the Saudi government and restrict the kind of information made available to users.

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Saudi Arabia Keeps Executing Foreigners On Drug Charges At ‘Horrifying’ Rate

There has been a surge in executions in Saudi Arabia, particularly in relation to drug offences, a new report published by Amnesty International on Monday has revealed.

The kingdom executed 1,816 people between January 2014 and June 2025, according to the official Saudi Press Agency. Of those, nearly one third (597) were for drug-related offences, which may not be punishable by death under international human rights law and norms. Around three quarters of those executed for drug offences were foreign nationals.

“We are witnessing a truly horrifying trend, with foreign nationals being put to death at a startling rate for crimes that should never carry the death penalty,” Amnesty’s Kristine Beckerle said. 

Executions in Saudi Arabia have risen steadily over the past year and a half. In 2024, the kingdom executed 345 people – the highest annual figure that Amnesty has recorded in over three decades. 

So far this year, 180 people have been executed. Last month alone, 46 executions were carried out, 37 of which were for drug-related offences. 

They were made up of nationals from Egypt, Ethiopia, Jordan, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia and Syria. In January 2021, Riyadh had announced a moratorium on drug related-executions, but that was lifted in November the following year.

‘Cruel, inhuman and degrading’

Last month, inmates and their relatives told Middle East Eye that executions could take place “any day”. The men were all from Ethiopia and Somalia and had been convicted of drug trafficking. 

“They have told us to say our goodbyes,” one of the convicted men told MEE. “We were told that executions would begin shortly after Eid al-Adha (5-9 June), and now they have started.”

In its report, Amnesty interviewed the families of 13 inmates on death row, as well as community members and consulate officials. It also reviewed court documents. 

Based on the testimonies and evidence, it concluded that limited levels of education and disadvantaged socio-economic status of foreign nationals increased their risk of exploitation and lack of legal representation. 

The family of 27-year-old Khalid Mohammed Ibrahim, who was put on death row on alleged drug trafficking charges, told MEE it had been a harrowing seven years for the family since he was arrested.

“He tried to enter the country through Yemen,” his older brother Muleta said. “A border guard encouraged him to tell his jailers that he was a drug smuggler, saying it would get him sent to court and quickly cleared since there was no evidence. He believed them.”

In addition to drug offences, Amnesty reported on the use of the death penalty against Saudi Arabia’s Shia minority on “terrorism” related charges. 

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Shocking footage shows Saudi police beat women and girls inside secret prisons where families send ‘disobedient’ females to be locked away and punished for YEARS to break their spirit

Shocking footage obtained by MailOnline shows Saudi police beating women detained inside secretive facilities where families send ‘disobedient’ women and girls to be punished.

Women seen in the clip were said to be staging a peaceful sit-in protest over poor living conditions at their so-called ‘care home’ in Khamis Mushair, in Asir Province.

Security and police officers at the ‘Social Education Home for Girls’ are seen rushing in and hitting the woman; some as they lay helpless on the ground.

Women were seen being dragged by their hair, beaten with belts and sticks, and subjected to other forms of physical abuse.

The video, which caused outrage among rights activists in Saudi Arabia when it first circulated in 2022, re-emerged as former detainees bravely spoke out about their experiences held in ‘Dar al-Reaya’ facilities across the country.

Dr Maryam Aldossari, a Saudi academic at Royal Holloway, University of London, told MailOnline that despite recent reforms, many women remain held in these de facto prisons, unable to leave until a male guardian permits them.

She cited examples of women enduring horrifying conditions inside the facilities, some reportedly even moved to take their own lives due to alleged abuse.

‘It still exists,’ she warned. ‘We still know people who are there and God knows when they will leave.

‘They completely cut them [off]. There are cameras everywhere. If you misbehave you must go to these small individual rooms, you are separated.

‘Anything can be considered as a violation of women’s rights.’

Dr Aldossari, who left Saudi Arabia in 2008 to study and work in the UK, today works with Al Qst (ALQST), a human rights organisation that documents and promotes human rights in Saudi Arabia.

‘What we do hear – it’s such a dark time in Saudi Arabia. This is becoming a police state,’ she said. ‘People are scared.’

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Trump, Saudis secure $600B investment deal to include billions in US defense weapons

President Trump on Tuesday secured a $600 billion commitment from Saudi Arabia to invest in the United States along with a multibillion-dollar defense partnership following a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh.

The investment, according to a White House fact sheet, will strengthen energy security, defense, technology and access to global infrastructure and critical minerals. It includes a $142 billion defense and security deal that equips Saudi Arabia with state-of-the-art war equipment provided by dozens of U.S. firms.

The equipment includes air and missile defense and air force and space advancements.

The White House called the deal “historic and transformative for both countries” and said it brings in “a new golden era of partnership.”

Days after Trump’s inauguration, the crown prince first announced the Arab nation would invest $600 billion in the U.S. over the four years of Trump’s second term. The White House is detailing those investments following the meeting in Saudi Arabia.

As part of the deal, Saudi Arabian company DataVolt is moving forward with plans to invest $20 billion in artificial intelligence data centers and energy infrastructure in the U.S., and top companies such as Google, Oracle, Salesforce and Uber, among others, are investing $80 billion in technologies in both countries.

Also included in the deal are infrastructure projects American companies Hill International, Jacobs, Parsons, and AECOM are taking on in Saudi Arabia, including at King Salman International Airport, to total $2 billion in U.S. services exports.

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