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Tiny, Wealthy Qatar Goes Its Own Way, and Pays for It
- kchoudhu 9y agoThis is as good a summary of what's going on in the GCC these days as I've seen since the blockade began in July, which is to say that everyone can describe what is happening, but no one seems to be able to explain why it is happening. The article's focus on regional leaders' egos is misplaced, I think, and fairly representative of our media's tendency to scrape the surface of any regional conflict that isn't in Europe or North America instead of looking for deeper explanations. Given the absence of any analytical clarity, pet theories abound. Mine is that the Saudi-UAE nexus doesn't want the crisis to be resolved anytime soon: having a crisis on the periphery to distract from their domestic tribulations is too damned useful. Citizens are are less likely to complain about reduced government subsidies if the government periodically reminds them that there's a cold war with Qatar, a hot war in Yemen, and an existential crisis in the form Iran right on their periphery.
- Gibbon1 9y agoQatar has natural gas and connections to Iran. And is still in the black economically. When I look at Saudi Arabia it looks like over time their oil income which pays all the bills is fixed while their population keeps growing. Both common poor people and the number of ultra rich. Divide one by the other and it's not pretty. UAE has no oil or gas income and is living off loans. Probably part of the reason the current king in waiting is trying to also jack his more distant relations for cash.
- lobster_johnson 9y agoUAE has the seventh [1] largest oil reserves in the world, and is the eighth [2] largest producer, according to Wikipedia. How does it not have any income? Meanwhile, Qatar produces about half as much, on par with nations such as Norway. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_the_United_Arab_Emirates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_the_United_Ara... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_oil_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_oil_produ...
- jessaustin 9y agoUAE royals spend a great deal more on racehorses...
- lobster_johnson 9y agoParent said income, not profits.
- nikcub 9y ago> UAE has no oil or gas income and is living off loans. You're thinking of Dubai. The major emirate has always been Abu Dhabi and they're resource rich a.f (and they provider of many loans to Dubai, including financing of the Burj Khalifa)
- Gibbon1 9y agoYou're correct, was thinking of Dubai. My bad.
- jessaustin 9y agoAl Jazeera has got to have something to do with it, right? The biggest threats to royalty are always their subjects, and even if AJ is somewhat discredited as Qatari propaganda in its neighbor's societies, it is also certainly more than that. As someone from a different hemisphere, I have to say the AJ Roku app is the single best way I've found to watch news. No one is risking the ire of his rulers to check out what the Saudi news department is saying.
- kchoudhu 9y agoThe Al Jazeera thing always struck me as a canard: it's been in operation for the last 20 years, why did it suddenly become such a sticking point in 2017?
- baybal2 9y agoFew year prior, a Saudi King died at a surprisingly convenient moment
- jessaustin 9y agoISTM it probably happened in 2011? The young prince wasn't in a position to do anything at that time, although one can imagine that Salman was bringing him around to listen to the various old dudes then, and the topic probably came up. He certainly hit the ground running in 2015.
- kchoudhu 9y agoRunning is such an overstatement of what he's been up to though...
- jessaustin 9y ago"Hit the ground running" is an English (well, actually American) idiom. It seems to have originated among the hobos, who judged it the best way to jump from a moving train. MbS might not physically be ready to run anywhere. Still, no one outside Saudi had heard of him four years ago. Since then, he seems to have been much more effective in pursuing his political goals than anyone else on the peninsula?
- jpatokal 9y agoRemember, these are all royalties where power is concentrated in a few people. Local politics consists basically of various family factions jockeying for power, so it gets very personal very fast and egos are a huge thing.
- Hasz 9y agoMy knowledge of middle eastern politics is not good, but how does Oman factor into this?
- sndean 9y agoA while ago I saw that Qatar was getting around some of the transport restrictions imposed in the Gulf by using ports in Oman. Edit: Here's an article that tries to answer your question: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/oman-stance-qatar-gulf-crisis-171125061013462.html https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/oman-stance-qatar-gul...
- jpatokal 9y agoIt doesn't. Both Kuwait and Oman try hard not to make waves so they can profit off both sides. Incidentally, so does the UAE: a huge portion of local investment, especially in Dubai, is linked to Iran, and not just regular trade but sanctions busting, money laundering, etc.
- kchoudhu 9y agoOman has maintained neutrality in the conflict, and their Sultan is doing shuttle diplomacy between Doha and Riyadh. In the interim, Qatar has rerouted all of its trans-shipping activity from Dubai to Muscat.
- roadbeats 9y agoHere is my question for HN readers: do you trust this article? Because it tries to fool us. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Europe, US and Turkey was the big alliance which tried to take down Syria. Please check the records western news channels in 2013, it was full of joyful propaganda about Free Syrian Army fighting for democracy in Syria. The actual goal was of course had nothing to do with democracy and Arab spring was total bullshit. The goal was to create a new pipeline from Qatar to Europe so Europe don’t have to buy gas from Russia. Syria, between Turkey and Jordan was the only barrier for this project. If they removed Assad, Russia would be screwed. This is why Russia got in the field and started fighting back to protect Assad. In 2014, Qatar and Turkey splitted from this alliance because they realized that Russia will not let Syria down. That was also the time FSA split into bunch of groups; Wahabist ISIS and socialist YPG. Noone ever questioned how a group backed by Saudi money would fight another backed by American money. Western news brainwashed the whole world with ISIS and YPG, people don’t even remember what did happen before; Russia won the war in both Ukraine and Syria, at same time. This is the deal; the war is lost, and the alliance is defeated & splitted. Qatar and Turkey are now enemies on the Russian side. The western alliance tried hard to take down their presidents by organizing coups but it failed. Qatar will survive just as Iran, Syria and Russia. The article is just another Western propaganda painting a middle eastern enemy as “little lone wolf”, and people just buy this stuff easily in the propaganda bubble they live in.
- caf 9y agoYou are completely misreading this article. It isn't painting Qatar as any kind of enemy - the article reads as very sympathetic to the Qatari position (which basically is that the Saudis consider it a vassal and aren't happy with it daring to have an independent foreign policy).
- roadbeats 9y agoI can't imagine a "very sympathetic" article accusing a country for hosting "terrorists". Did we read the same article ?
- 9y ago
- hristov 9y agoPretty good article although, it is still very soft on Saudi Arabia and too intent to glamorize bin Salman. But american media has always been intent on glamorizing bin Salman. What really pisses me off about this whole story is the role Trump played. It is not surprising to see Saudi Arabia and the Emirates to suddenly gang up in an surprising all out attack on Qatar in one morning. These types of intrigues happen in the Middle East quite often. What is unusual and very disappointing is that the US president also joined in the gang with his tweets. And the initial tweet was timed to come in exactly before the sanctions were announced ... it looked like the whole thing was carefully coordinated (even if it wasn't, it looked like it was and that is enough to damage the US reputation). And then when Tillerson was out there trying to diffuse the subject and ensure the safety of out base, Trump actually undermined him.
- jimjimjim 9y agodon't forget the pictures of them all touching the orb...
- KaoruAoiShiho 9y agoThis article sounds like it was funded by Qatar. If it got published then it probably means the US is souring on the Saudi/UAE ruse.
- jessaustin 9y agoIf only we would sour on the ongoing atrocities in Yemen...
- caresource_ta 9y agoWhy would this article be funded by Qatar? Because it's the same narrative that has existed and been written about for months or because the component facts can be independently researched and verified.
- gwbas1c 9y agoI thought hacker news is a politics-free site?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- myf01d 9y agoQatar is the biggest sponsor of Islamic radicalism and terrorism all over the world. They also pay western politicians and media to tarnish their neighbor countries especially Egypt.
- afroboy 9y agoSeriously? where are you proofs? and if your fictional proofs exist then why they didn't took Qatar into international court.
- myf01d 9y agoIf you really want to look for proofs, you can google it. I am an Arab and since the the mid 90s Qatar has been providing all Sunni islamic groups from MB, Hamas and Al Qaeda with all kinds of support (money, media, bribing western politicians, etc...)
- tobltobs 9y agoIf I google for this Saudi Arabia comes up first, by a big margin.
- myf01d 9y agoThey are both the biggest sponsors of terrorism then come Turkey and Pakistan. The key difference between Qatar and Saudi Arabia is that Qatar always supports the more extremist faction in every conflict. Saudi Arabia may not do that in every case. For instance, Saudi Arabia funds MB in Syria and supported the revolution against them in Egypt.
- joosters 9y agoSo you’re saying you have all the inside scoop on terrorism just because you’re an Arab? You should get a job in the US intelligence agencies, they seem to have similar thoughts!
- 9y ago
- AngeloAnolin 9y agoAnyone has a non-paywalled link for this?