Col. Stanislav Lunev
Friday, April 19, 2002

While the civilized world seeks some way to stop the bloodshed in the Middle East, our so-called friends in the region are doing as much as they can to increase current tensions and fuel violence.

Last week, Saudi Arabia raised more than $100 million for Palestinians in government-organized telethons. Billionaire investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, whose donation for victims of the Sept. 11 attack was rejected last fall by New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, donated $27 million to the Palestinian fund.

In October, Mr. Giuliani initially accepted a check for $10 million from Prince Alwaleed for a New York relief fund but later returned it when he learned about the prince's statement calling on the U.S. to "re-examine its policies in the Middle East and adopt a more balanced stance toward the Palestinian cause."

According to the Arab media, the telethons, broadcast live, were an attempt by the Saudi government to show support for the Palestinians. The purpose of the event was to benefit families of "martyrs," a word that has been used by the Palestinians to refer to suicide bombers, and actually to anyone else claiming to be a victim of alleged Israeli perfidy.

Also last week, thousands of protesters rallied despite a Saudi government ban on such demonstrations. Protesters called on Arabs to do more than just donate money, demanded a boycott of Israel and America, and expressed their desire for a jihad (holy war) in Palestine.

It would be understandable if all this had happened in Iraq, Iran and other rogue states that sponsor international terrorism. However, it happened in the country considered by liberal American politicians as our friend and ally in the Middle East and a partner in the anti-terrorism coalition.

It's no secret that Saudi Arabia was called home by 15 of the 19 terrorists responsible for murdering thousands of Americans and hundreds of foreign nationals on Sept. 11. It is also the home of Wahhabism, the fanatical brand of violence-obsessed Islam, which not only exists and prospers on the Arabian peninsula but is exported throughout the world, with cells as far away as Virginia.

It is the country that for many years has used so-called petrodollars to finance special Wahhabism schools throughout the world for training radicalized Islamic students and preparing them for the "holy war" against Christian and Jewish "infidels."

It is Wahhabism that has been responsible for most of the major terrorist attacks against the U.S. and the West during the last decade and now continues its crimes against the civilized world.

Saudi Arabia is a nation whose officials argue that the Palestinians are the "victims" of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, neglecting the fact that Jordan occupied the West Bank and Egypt occupied Gaza for nearly two decades after Arab nations failed to drive Israel into the sea during their first war in 1948.

It was also none other than Saudi authorities who played a major role in torpedoing the land-for-peace offer Israel made in Oslo (1993), at Wye River Plantation, Md. (1998), and Camp David (2000).

At the same time, they supported Yasser Arafat, who uses their agreements to pressure Israel into making more concessions, even while refusing to live up to his own obligations, and responding to Israeli initiatives not with counterproposals, but with deadly jihad.

There is no doubt that during negotiations over the peace process in the Middle East we have to support our real friends in the region who are trying only to survive. However, we have to be very careful in dealing with nations whose leaders look only at their own interests, which contradict our values and principles.

Col. Stanislav Lunev is the highest-ranking Soviet military intelligence officer ever to defect from Russia. Read his gripping story, Through the Eyes of the Enemy.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Middle East
War on Terrorism

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