Saudi Arabia to behead boy for political protest

[Razgovory]

I don't know how much of the money is "private" vs "public".  I put those phrases in scare quotes because of the peculiar nature of the Saudi royal family.

[Martinus]

I think you're vastly overstating the importance of the Saudis in this, if you disappeared their funding of Wahhabism I don't think you'd see that significant of a decrease in the spread of Islamic terrorism. Lots of major Islamic terrorist organizations have really broken with Saudi Wahhabism anyway.

That's not the point. The point is that Saudi-funded radical Islam in the West is a breeding ground for radicalisation of Muslims living in the West, and such Muslims later go on to join terrorist organisations or perpetrate "lone wolf" style attacks in the name of such organisations, the spat of which we have seen lately.

[Martinus]

One good solution, imho, that would not ostensibly compromise our values and freedoms and would not create a situation where discrimination could be alleged, would be to restrict foreign funding of religious organisations based on the mutuality principle.

In other words, you are free, as a non-US (or non-German etc.) citizen/organisation/etc. to fund a religious organisation or building of a place of worship in the relevant country (i.e. US, Germany etc.), if a citizen/organisation/etc. from the US, Germany etc. can go and do the same in your country.

This neatly rules out the Saudis from doing any religious funding in the West, while not, say, preventing Mormons or the Catholic church from operating in Western countries.

[The Brain]

Now why the fuck would you want the Catholic Church to operate in your country?

[Monoriu]

One good solution, imho, that would not ostensibly compromise our values and freedoms and would not create a situation where discrimination could be alleged, would be to restrict foreign funding of religious organisations based on the mutuality principle.

In other words, you are free, as a non-US (or non-German etc.) citizen/organisation/etc. to fund a religious organisation or building of a place of worship in the relevant country (i.e. US, Germany etc.), if a citizen/organisation/etc. from the US, Germany etc. can go and do the same in your country.

This neatly rules out the Saudis from doing any religious funding in the West, while not, say, preventing Mormons or the Catholic church from operating in Western countries.

Seems it will be easy to get around such rules.  Just set up a front organisation that is owned by a US citizen on the surface, and have that organisation do the religious activities.  Saudi Arabia controls that from behind the scenes. 

[Martinus]

One good solution, imho, that would not ostensibly compromise our values and freedoms and would not create a situation where discrimination could be alleged, would be to restrict foreign funding of religious organisations based on the mutuality principle.

In other words, you are free, as a non-US (or non-German etc.) citizen/organisation/etc. to fund a religious organisation or building of a place of worship in the relevant country (i.e. US, Germany etc.), if a citizen/organisation/etc. from the US, Germany etc. can go and do the same in your country.

This neatly rules out the Saudis from doing any religious funding in the West, while not, say, preventing Mormons or the Catholic church from operating in Western countries.

Seems it will be easy to get around such rules.  Just set up a front organisation that is owned by a US citizen on the surface, and have that organisation do the religious activities.  Saudi Arabia controls that from behind the scenes.

There are already tools we have to track this kind of fraud that we use for anti-money laundering and other similar purposes.

[Admiral Yi]

That's not the point. The point is that Saudi-funded radical Islam in the West is a breeding ground for radicalisation of Muslims living in the West, and such Muslims later go on to join terrorist organisations or perpetrate "lone wolf" style attacks in the name of such organisations, the spat of which we have seen lately.

It's strange that in all my reading about Muslim terrorist attacks in the west, or western Muslims who go to join ISIS or al Shabab or whatever, the reports never mention anything about Saudi-funded mosques or madrasas.  Generally they talk about ISIS or other radical Islamic propaganda on the internet.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Events in the USA will help destroy Saudi Arabia without any military action needed :

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/07/31/texas-shale-oil-has-fought-saudi-arabia-to-a-standstill/

Respect for good old American knowhow btw 

[Martinus]

That's not the point. The point is that Saudi-funded radical Islam in the West is a breeding ground for radicalisation of Muslims living in the West, and such Muslims later go on to join terrorist organisations or perpetrate "lone wolf" style attacks in the name of such organisations, the spat of which we have seen lately.

It's strange that in all my reading about Muslim terrorist attacks in the west, or western Muslims who go to join ISIS or al Shabab or whatever, the reports never mention anything about Saudi-funded mosques or madrasas.  Generally they talk about ISIS or other radical Islamic propaganda on the internet.

Are you saying there is no link or that media do not report about this? I thought that there is an established recognised link between Saudi funding for radical imams in the West. But I am open to being corrected on this.

In any case, I think it's a good policy for a country to allow foreign individuals the same rights that its own citizens would enjoy in the foreign country in question.

[Admiral Yi]

Are you saying there is no link or that media do not report about this?

I can't prove a negative.  No news report that I've read so far has discussed a link between terrorism and Saudi financed mosques or madrasas.

[Monoriu]

Events in the USA will help destroy Saudi Arabia without any military action needed :

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/07/31/texas-shale-oil-has-fought-saudi-arabia-to-a-standstill/

Respect for good old American knowhow btw 

I have read somewhere that the majority of Saudi oil exports go to Asia, not the US though.  China, Japan and India are the biggest buyers of Saudi oil.  Also, somehow fracking isn't very successful in China. 

[Martinus]

It took me 5 minutes to find these with google, with sources ranging from far left to far right and including reputable mainstream ones (like Telegraph):

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-yousaf-butt-/saudi-wahhabism-islam-terrorism_b_6501916.html

http://www.salon.com/2016/01/06/saudi_arabia_funds_and_exports_islamic_extremism_the_truth_behind_the_toxic_u_s_relationship_with_the_theocratic_nation/

http://theweek.com/articles/570297/how-saudi-arabia-exports-radical-islam

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/11140860/Qatar-and-Saudi-Arabia-have-ignited-time-bomb-by-funding-global-spread-of-radical-Islam.html

http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/03/22/polling-muslims-in-the-west-increasingly-sympathise-with-extremism-terror/

http://www.newstatesman.com/world-affairs/2014/11/wahhabism-isis-how-saudi-arabia-exported-main-source-global-terrorism

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/saudi-arabia-funding-islamic-extremism-west-german-vice-chancellor-sigmar-gabriel-a6763366.html

The news sources also quote high ranking officials of Western governments expressing this view. I am surprised you have never heard of anyone making this claim before. In fact, this seems like one of the few issues that, when it comes to Islamic terrorism, everybody is agreeing upon.

[celedhring]

There's loads of Saudi-funded salafist mosques in NE Spain. It's actually one of our top counter-terrorist concerns so they are kept under watch. So far no link has been substantiated between arrested jihadis in Spain and those. Most of those dismantled groups always operate using internet - it just makes sense to be frank, much more difficult to track and detect than a bunch of guys gathering at a mosque.

And I hate the Saudi regime and despise Salafism - but I have grown to accept OvB's position that there's no perfect solution to this. I guess we have to accept gradualism and that exerting soft pressure on the regime and the spread of liberal ideas will slowly (too slowly) make that cesspool a better place.

[celedhring]

That said, I have spoken to a bunch of muslims here that plainly refuse to go to the big Saudi or Moroccoan-funded mosques, and prefer the small (and pretty shitty) places funded by the local communities. Like a woman told me several weeks ago "if you take money from the sheikh, you're owned by the sheikh".

Let's not forget that those people are immigrants. If they're here is because they believe their countries of origin are pretty shitty places to begin with.

[Monoriu]

One thing I don't understand.  If those Saudi funded schools in the west are such huge problems, what stops the western governments from dealing with them directly?  Arrest and expel the personnel, shut down the schools, infiltrate them, put them on watch lists, refuse to grant them land or licences, give them bureaucratic red tape hell etc.  There are lots of ways to deal with this kind of problem.