I feel great about coming to Saudi Arabia.
It’s one thing to say you’re feminist, but then what does that mean? Not selling arms to a regime that is the most repressive and probably one of the worst human rights violators, particularly towards women, like Saudi Arabia?
For us, driving is not what we are looking for, but being in the driver’s seat of our only destiny. That means ending guardianship in Saudi Arabia, which means recognizing women as full citizens.
I think the real target of al-Qaeda is Saudi Arabia by the way. They hate us and we’re a vehicle to get at Saudi Arabia. I think Osama bin Laden really wants to topple that regime and have his people move in, but that’s a whole other story.
As a woman in Saudi Arabia, you have one of two options. You either lose your mind – which at first happened to me because I fell into a deep depression – or you become a feminist.
Lebanon is restless, Syria got its walking papers, Egypt is scheduling elections with more than one candidate, and even Saudi Arabia, whose rulers are perhaps more terrified of women than rulers anywhere else in the world, allowed limited municipal elections.
And in Iraq we tried to implement the same policy that was so successful in Saudi Arabia, but Saddam Hussein didn’t buy. When the economic hit men fail in this scenario, the next step is what we call the jackals.
I went to Saudi Arabia in 2010, and spent most of my time in Jeddah and the King Abdullah Economic City.
Saudi Arabia is, of course, the keystone of OPEC. Saudi Arabia has had the distinction of remaining stable through all the escalating tumult of recent decades, reliably pumping out its roughly 10 million barrels a day like Bossy the cow in America’s oil import barn.
Traditionally, all the kings of Saudi Arabia have been sons of the founder of Saudi Arabia, and they’ve gone from one son to the next.
I was born in England, but then I lived in Calgary, Saudi Arabia, Cyprus, India, Vancouver, London, Toronto, and now L.A.
Americans want to democratise us. OK, but why not go and democratise Saudi Arabia. Are we anything like Saudi Arabia? No, we are far from that. So why aren’t they democratising Saudi Arabia? Because they are bastards, but they are their bastards.
I was the first senior American official to meet with Riyadh’s dynamic Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman after the Saudi intervention in Yemen in 2015. I reiterated the United States’ commitment to defend Saudi Arabia against Houthi aggression and to help press the Houthis back to the bargaining table.
‘Lawrence of Arabia’ is a film that anyone wanting to become an actor should watch at least six hundred times.
Most dramatically, and perhaps least noticed, is the violence inside Saudi Arabia itself.
That is what I want: I want a better Saudi Arabia. I don’t see myself as an opposition. I’m not calling for the overthrow of the regime, because I know it’s not possible and is too risky, and there is no one to overthrow the regime. I’m just calling for reform of the regime.
There’s no question that tar sands in Canada are probably the largest source of oil available to the U.S. over a long period of time. There’s as much oil in the tar sands probably as there is in Saudi Arabia. The problem is, there’s a huge capital requirement to develop that.
If Iran obtains nuclear weapons, then almost certainly Saudi Arabia will do the same, as will Egypt, Turkey and perhaps others in the region.
The people of India and Arabia have interacted across the waters between them for thousands of years.
I would like to see evolution in my country, not revolution. It is much better for us to work together with the government to transform Saudi Arabia for the future.
On the fields of Media, of Arabia, and of Armenia, two great armies will assemble thrice. The host near the bank of the Araxes, they will fall in the land of the great Suleiman.
Because America is the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. We have the world’s largest reserves of natural gas, and the world’s most sophisticated production and storage facilities, by a wide margin.
America is the Saudi Arabia of coal.
Saudi Arabia is the bulwark of our relationship, especially when it comes to Iran, and without the partnership of Saudi Arabia and our other Gulf allies, we would not be able to have the maximum economic pressure campaign that we have.
Obama has created a new world where countries ignore the U.S. without consequence. It’s so bad that Saudi Arabia doesn’t even want to serve on the Security Council with the U.S. because it might ruin their reputation.
The corporate right fires up the religious right against gay marriage and abortion and uses their votes to push their deregulation and tax cuts for the rich. It’s an old trick. The House of Saud has the same arrangement with the Mullahs in Saudi Arabia.
I will obviously exercise my freedom of speech because I live in India, not in Saudi Arabia and Iran; freedom of speech is an integral part of the Constitution of India and I believe in respecting in whatever is lawful in India.
I have never connected with ‘Gone With the Wind.’ ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ leaves me cold.
Saudi Arabia is a puritanical state that claims a monopoly of wisdom and virtue.
When Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen erupted in March 2015, there was widespread Saudi popular support for it – including by me.
Saudi Arabia operates according to the belief that God made young men and women so utterly and completely without self-control that they must be physically segregated every moment of the day and night.
Saudi Arabia has supported Wahhabi madrasas in poor countries in Africa and Asia, exporting extremism and intolerance. Saudi Arabia also exports instability with its brutal war in Yemen, intended to check what it sees as Iranian influence.
Look, I don’t think President Obama would have bowed to the ruler of Saudi Arabia if he didn’t have oil to the degree that the Saudis do. I think they and other producing states, almost all of whom, except Norway and Canada, are dictatorships or autocratic systems, have thrown their weight around because of oil.
The bicycle freed 19th-century women from their homes and from their dependence on men. I hope that in Saudi Arabia, the car will do the same.
I was a teenager in the 1970s and grew up in Medina, Saudi Arabia.
It is in Saudi Arabia’s best interest to allow women to fully participate in its society, and this includes the right to vote and run for office.
The mistake of the West was to put the Sauds on the throne of Saudi Arabia and give them control of the world’s oil fortune, which they then used to propagate Wahhabi Islam.
I was in Saudi Arabia on 9/11 and was part of the initial leadership team to execute the initial combat operations in Afghanistan.
We must apply the same standards to countries such as Saudi Arabia, Israel and Egypt that we apply to Iran, Russia and Syria.
The bulk of extra supplies that could be put into the market come from two places. One, they come from other Persian Gulf suppliers, of which Saudi Arabia is at the top of the list.
I want to state clearly that I am a humanitarian, not an activist. I do not follow any agendas – only that of humanity, not only in Saudi Arabia, but all over the world.
On the whole, it is the rights and freedoms of all citizens that are crucial in Saudi Arabia and from those the rights of women will emanate.
To allow the construction of places of worship other than Islamic ones in Saudi Arabia, it would be like asking the Vatican to build a mosque inside of it.
It is no secret that many Islamic movements in the Middle East tend to be authoritarian, and some of the so-called ‘Islamic regimes’ such as Saudi Arabia, Iran – and the worst case was the Taliban in Afghanistan – they are pretty authoritarian. No doubt about that.
I am waiting for the day when the German Bundestag debates the violation of human rights in Saudi Arabia.
If Iran and North Korea, by some horrible, devilish, nightmarish scenario, got together and went to war at the same time, one against Saudi Arabia and one against South Korea, I don’t know what we would do about that. I don’t know that we could stop them short of using nuclear weapons.
Saudi Arabia has proved to be the growth engine for Wipro.
The Taliban, broadly speaking, are Afghans – farmers, subsistence farmers. As I say, most of those people can’t find the United States on the map. Al Qaeda, traditionally, are much more educated, middle-class people, often from Egypt, from Saudi Arabia, North Africa.
I never met Peter O’Toole, but he one was of those rare actors whose success was defined by a single role. His incandescent performance in David Lean’s ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ is one that nobody who saw it will ever forget.
The death of Yemeni strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh shows that Saudi Arabia is paying for its betrayal of the Arab spring in Yemen in 2011.
Whether we like it or not, we don’t choose Saudi Arabia’s leaders. They do.
I was born in Karachi, where my father used to work in the sales department of a pharmaceutical company. The nature of his job required him to travel, so we moved to Athens, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, and Riyadh and then went to Manchester during the Gulf War, moving back to Lahore closer to my father’s retirement.
I can’t imagine David Lean justifying why he went to the desert to shoot ‘Lawrence of Arabia.’
