The
angst over the Jamal Khashoggi murder in the Saudi Arabian Consulate
General building in Istanbul is already somewhat fading as the media has
moved on in search of fresh meat, recently focusing on the series of
attempted mail bombings, and currently on the mass shooting in
Pittsburgh. But the affaire Khashoggi is still important as it
potentially brings with it possible political realignments in the Middle
East as well as in Europe as countries feel emboldened to redefine
their relationship with Saudi Arabia.
The
Turks know exactly what occurred in the Consulate General building and
are now putting the squeeze on the Saudis, requiring them to fess up and
no doubt demanding compensation. Some sources in Turkey believe that
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will actually demand recreation of the
Caliphate, which the Kemal Ataturk led Turkish Republic’s government
abolished in 1924. That would diminish Saudi Arabia’s ability to regard
itself as the pre-eminent Islamic state due to its guardianship over the
holy sites in Mecca and Medina. It would be a major realignment of the
Islamic umma and would be akin to a restoration of some semblance of Ottoman supremacy over the region.
To
be sure, the brutally effective Turkish intelligence service, known by
its acronym MIT, is very active when it comes to monitoring the
activities of both friendly and unfriendly foreign embassies and their
employees throughout Turkey. It uses electronic surveillance and, if the
foreign mission has local Turks as employees, many of those individuals
will be agents reporting to MIT. As a result, it should be presumed
that MIT had the Consulate General building covered with both cameras
and microphones, possibly inside the building as well as outside,
meaning that the audio of the actual killing that has been reported in
the media is no doubt authentic and might even be supplemented with
video.
http://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/jamal-khashoggi-died-for-nothing/
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