Word: saud
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Increasingly, commentators, members of Congress and policymakers, including a minority within the Bush Administration, are questioning the closeness of the U.S.'s relationship with this backward, authoritarian, fundamentalist state. Maybe the 600 families that lost loved ones in 9/11 and are holding the House of Saud accountable in a $1 trillion lawsuit have a point. This July a bill to add Saudi Arabia to the U.S. list of states that sponsor terrorism garnered 191 votes in the House before going down. Some critics of Saudi Arabia are even suggesting that the U.S. invaded the wrong country and seized the wrong...
After the May 12 attacks, the House of Saud understood that it was under direct assault by an organization committed to its overthrow. Though bin Laden, a Saudi, long ago condemned the royal family for allowing U.S. troops on Saudi soil starting in 1990, his group had refrained from violence within the kingdom. Its reasons were clear to U.S. intelligence. Says a former Bush Administration official: "There were al-Qaeda agents in the kingdom that urged al-Qaeda not to strike in Saudi Arabia because they [the Saudis] might cut off the spigot" of funds flowing to the group...
...SAUD: Turning Iraq into a stable country, how can this be disadvantageous to Saudi Arabia? We were facing a country that was attacking us militarily. We would much rather be threatened by democratic ideas than with Scud missiles and weapons of mass destruction. [In Saudi Arabia], real reform is being done with the intention of keeping the social cohesion and unity of the country together. We are not playing experiments in labs. We believe we are going at it with the ear of our leaders to the heartbeat of the people, what they expect, what they need...
...SAUD: They will see, but talk has to lead action, not the other way around. We are not going to have, as happened [with the Shah] in Iran, a revolution from the top forcing the population into something that they don't want...
...SAUD: We believe we can handle it. And we have done a pretty good job of it, but this is no time to remain complacent, but vigilant. I hope we solve the problem and remove this cancer from our country. Everyone is shocked...