Satire alert

No doubt the Donald will be happy with this version of events. After all, you cannot allow a mere act of butchery by a brutal regime get in the way of a Deal!

Saudis Admit Journalist Khashoggi Died During Botched Assassination Attempt

The Onion,

17 October, 2018

RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA—In a press conference ahead of a meeting with U.S. secretary of state Mike Pompeo, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman admitted Tuesday that journalist Jamal Khashoggi died during a botched assassination attempt. “We lured Mr. Khashoggi to our consulate in Turkey for what was supposed to be a straightforward, routine execution, but things went off the rails at some point during the torture portion, and he accidentally bled out,” said the crown prince, adding that under normal circumstances, journalists who negatively portray the Saudi regime are eliminated efficiently and without international uproar. “We offer our sincere apologies to the Khashoggi family for mishandling Jamal’s slaughter. This should have been a quick in-and-out death and dismemberment situation, not the drawn-out, hours-long bloodbath it turned into. We flubbed this one big time.” The crown prince also assured journalists that Saudi leaders plan to implement new murder guidelines to standardize future assassinations and reduce instances of bungled hits.

HOUSE OF BONE SAW UPDATED UPDATE: THE PATSY

After a long time investigating themselves – “investigation gone wrong”, anyone? – the House of Bone Saw finally seems to have found a fall guy.

It would have been tooooooooo easy if that was Maher Abdulaziz Mutreb; one of Mohammed Bone Saw’s (MBS) top body guards, expert on spying software, and fully identified by the Turks as the head of the 15-member Pulp Fiction hit squad.

Footage of Mutreb at the Saudi consulate; checking out of his Movenpick hotel; and at Istanbul’s airport, all in the same day, are all over the place on Turkish media.

That’s as good as it gets as an ersatz smoking gun – for now. The Turks have much juicier material.

And yet “The King” and the Clown Prince may be about to pull a brand new patsy-in-chief out of their “investigation”; Gen. Ahmed al-Assiri, who not only is a top adviser to MBS but the House of Bone Saw’s deputy head of intel.

Say hello to beheaded intel.

---Pepe Escobar, via Facebook