From Glenn Reynolds, a few words of level-headed wisdom:
“When Saudis kill a Saudi in Turkey, it’s not hugely resonant. Sure, top American journalists care — because he was not just a journalist (the Saudis have killed plenty of those, as have the Turks, the Chinese, the Russians . . .) but one they knew personally. But hardly anyone thinks that the Saudis are nice people; they’re allies of convenience, not of sentiment. If they help us beat Iran, fine, but nobody thought they were our friends before.”
Exactly. Plus, this “journalist” (Jamal Khashoggi) was actually a Muslim Brotherhood activist more than a journo, so fuck him.
And in a related post, talking about media outrage at Khashoggi’s murder, Charles Martin adds:
Let me get this straight. Saudi Arabia sponsored the 9/11 hijackers, stones rape victims to death for being unchaste, hangs people for being gay…and NOW you’re upset with them?
Yeah, because the obsequious diplomacy as practiced by Barack Cocksucker Obama was totes different.
All that said, let’s be honest and admit that in aggregate, both the Saudis and the Turks are foul assholes and should they decide to kill each other for fun, spite or profit, nobody else should care. Ditto all the other Muslim regimes in the Middle East.
The problem is that they lied about Khashoggi’s death and they were caught lying about it. If they’d tried and executed him according to Saudi law, then people would be unhappy but they’d get over it. Now it’s a PR disaster. Of course, almost everyone will have forgotten about him in a year or so anyway.
Given the sub rosa rapprochement rumoured to be ongoing between Saudi and Israel I’d say offing someone with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, an affinity for al Qaeda and supposed connections to Saudi intel, I’mna not seeing why we should give a good dump about that loser.
Nations have interests, not friends and we have interests in Saudi being in opposition to Iran and getting along with Israel. Driving a wedge twixt us and the Saudi’s is likely what’s got Erdogan jumping up and down.
No one’s given a good damn about what goes on in chop chop square in Rhiyadh in forever and those executions are public.