Tuesday 19 April 2016

The Saudi 9/11 threat of America

Obama Responds To Saudi Threat To Dump Treasuries If Its Role In Sept 11 Is Probed

18 April, 2016

This weekend's biggest, and most shocking story, was the report that in response to a proposed Congressional Bill that would allow a probe into the Saudi role behind the Sept 11 terrorist attack, Saudi Arabia had threatened the US with dumping its roughly $750 billion in Treasury holdings.


What was curious about the story is that while Saudi Arabia implicitly admitted it had a role in the September 11, the Obama administration was actively doing everything in its power to prevent the Bill from passing, and thus to keep the truth under wraps, leading many to wonder if Obama was more concerned about his own people or a handful of uber-wealthy Saudi princes.


Moments ago White House spokesman Josh Earnest chimed in, and validated all of those fears.
  • EARNEST: BILL WOULD OPEN U.S. TO GLOBAL LEGAL VULNERABILITIES
  • WHITE HOUSE SAYS IT IS CONFIDENT THAT SAUDIS RECOGNIZE THE SHARED INTEREST WITH THE U.S. IN PROTECTING STABILITY OF INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL SYSTEM
  • EARNEST: DON'T KNOW IF BILL WILL BE TOPIC ON OBAMA SAUDI VISIT
And the punchline:
  • EARNEST COMMENTS ON BILL TO ALLOW LAWSUITS BY SEPT. 11 FAMILIES
  • EARNEST SAYS BILL TO ALLOW LAWSUITS AGAINST SAUDI CONCERNING
  • EARNEST: OBAMA WOULDN'T SIGN SUE-SAUDI BILL AS DRAFTED
In short: whether due to the Saudi threat, or just because of its default position on the matter, Obama will block the Bill and no further probes into Saudi involvement in the Sept 11 tragedy will be allowed.


And with that any concerns about whether the US president represents not only the interests of the Sept 11 victims and their families, but all all American people, and is intent on discovering who the real culprit behind the deadliest terrorist attack on US soil, as opposed to the interests of few Saudi billionaires and would much rather have the truth remain suppressed in 28 top secret pages and certainly in the public domain, were just answered.


9/11 families hit Obama for ‘siding with Saudi Arabia,’ want secret report declassified


A member of the FDNY salutes after laying a flower during a commemoration ceremony marking the 23rd anniversary of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing at the north reflecting pool of the 911 Memorial in New York © Shannon Stapleton

18 April, 2016

President Barack Obama is facing increased pressure due to a renewed effort to make a secret Congressional report public that may describe links between Saudi Arabia and the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.

Over the past week, families of 9/11 victims have criticized President Obama because of reports stating that his administration is lobbying Congress to block a bill that would allow terror victims to sue foreign governments connected to attacks on American soil. The criticism comes as Obama prepares to travel to Riyadh for the fourth time in his presidency.

Saudi Arabia has threatened to sell some $750 billion in US assets if the bill passes, fearing it could leave the country vulnerable in US courts, the New York Times reported. Many relatives of 9/11 victims believe Riyadh played a role in the attacks, particularly since 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi citizens.


Officially, the 9/11 Commission Report “found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded the organization.” However, a previous Congressional report, which the Commission followed up on, features 28 pages that more closely detail the hijackers’ sources of money and funding, and those documents have been kept classified for more than a decade.

Families of 9/11 victims have tried to sue Saudi Arabia in court over the country’s possible role in the attacks before, but US law grants foreign governments protection in domestic courts. Last year, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit claiming that the country had provided material support to the terrorists, ruling that Riyadh had sovereign immunity. Saudi attorneys argued in court that there was no evidence directly linking the country to 9/11.

If someone you loved was murdered and the person was just able to go away Scott free, would you be okay with that? I don’t think anybody would,” Loria Van Auken said to CBS News. Van Auken’s husband Kenneth worked in the North Tower of the World Trade Center and died in the attacks.

Judge tosses 9/11 suit against Saudi Arabia, citing sovereign immunity
 
 

Another 9/11 widow, Mindy Kleinberg, told the New York Times “it’s stunning to think that our government would back the Saudis over its own citizens.”

Now, the families of 9/11 victims are trying once again to have the classified pages of the Congressional report released to the public as part of a lawsuit against the Saudi Arabian government. The documents may also contain details on a support network for the hijackers that featured the involvement of the Saudis.

There are a lot of rocks out there that have been purposefully tamped down, that if were they turned over, would give us a more expansive view of the Saudi role,” Bob Graham, former chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said to CBS.

The Saudis know what they did. We know what they did,” Graham said.
Graham has also been pushing the president to release the 28 pages, and he told Fox News last week that Obama will make a decision on the matter within the next two months.

Iran ordered to pay $10.5 billion for 9/11 by US judge
 
 

Pressure on Obama is also growing from current members of his own party. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York) said the president should declassify the documents even before he travels to Saudi Arabia this Tuesday.

If the president is going to meet with the Saudi Arabian leadership and the royal family, they think it would be appropriate that this document be released before the president makes that trip, so that they can talk about whatever issues are in that document,” she said to 60 Minutes.

In addition to seeing whether Obama will release the pages, Americans are also waiting to see how the president will react to Riyadh’s threat of financial retaliation. The Obama administration has argued that stripping sovereign immunity from nations over terror attacks on the US would endanger Americans and spark similar legislation against the US.


Relations between the US and Riyadh have already been strained by the Iranian nuclear deal and unflattering comments made by Obama in an article that appeared in The Atlantic, in which he criticized the Saudis as “free riders.” Since news of Saudi Arabia’s financial threat came to light, however, the president has been urged by many Americans to take a tougher stance.

If the President allows himself to get pushed around this way in front of the world, then he earns every bit of the anger being directed at him by the extended family of September 11,” wrote Mike Lupica in a New York Daily News editorial.

This is about turning his back on the dead of Sept. 11 and their survivors, and letting his country down at the same time. He is like all the others who held his office before him, more desperate than ever in the late rounds to be remembered as a great President. Be one now.”









No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.