We’ve seen no evidence, just talk of it. I want to see the evidence. The bone saw. Erdogan showed us nothing. I think he is message was: I throw all the real journalists in jail, not cut them up with a bone saw. There you have it; I’m the nice guy.
1
Erdogan with a failing economy propped up by the US and Saudi Arabia, with much internal discontent, with one foot out the door of NATO, and with more journalists in jail than just about any other country, is milking this for all its worth to distract everyone in Turkey and elsewhere of his own massive failures and to stick it to the Saudis as he is allied with Iran, Saudi's primary adversary, while harboring his own imperial, Islamist fantasies.
2
The little respect that Saudíes have for Turkey, has been demonstrated with the killing of Khashoggi in their territory. Obviously, he could have been killed in USA, although that could have been a paramount disaster for Trump. I tend to believe that Trump and CIA were consulted by Saudi intelligence, in how to approach this announced murder.
7
Show us the body.
3
Mr. Khashoggi was from what I've read cut to pieces while alive, an outrageous torturous execution. If I were king, I would clear all the civilians away from the consulate, arrest anyone who tries to escape from it, and drop a daisycutter on it. This should turn the consulate into a crater and send a loud stern message to Riyadh that such midieval savage actions are NOT OK. They believe in intimidation---they deserve to be intimidated so sternly that they soil their robes. And then removed from power---the entire Saudi royal family.
9
This is all very interesting, but it begs the question; Why is Erdogan poking his finger in the Saudi's eye. He is certainly deliberately being so aggressive in his comments.
I wish the NYT would enlighten its readers on this.
1
Erdogan with a failing economy propped up by the US and Saudi Arabia, with much internal discontent, with one foot out the door of NATO, and more journalists in jail than just about any other country, is milking this for all its worth to distract everyone in Turkey and elsewhere of his own failures and to stick it to Saudi as he is allied with Iran, Saudi's primary adversary.
2
@MIKEinNYC
Mike, you outht to take a trip to Istanbul and say that loudly and often to as many Turkish men as you can.
2
Very few Americans are admirers of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a man who has shown himself to be a cruel dictator, having side-stepped the European democratic traditions of Istanbul for the Asian autocracy of Ankara.
Erdogan betrayed the apolitical, peace-keeping role of the Turkish Army and has been merciless towards the Kurds, whom he regards as armed separatists.
That being said, Erdogan has logic on his side in arguing that the torture, murder, dismemberment and removal of the remains of Jamal Khashoggi to Saudi Arabia was a planned, premeditated crime committed with the knowledge and approval of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Erdogan appears to have a clear majority of Turks on his side for once, and he sees the actions of the Crown Prince as a slap in the face of Turkey.
Erdogan will not let this go, but clearly his motives are different than the moral outrage most Americans feel – unless they work for Donald Trump – and which Europeans feel against the Crown Prince. Those same Westerners also feel a genuine sympathy for the Khashoggi family.
Americans, regardless of political party, should be furious that President Donald Trump doggedly pursued a coverup for the Crown Prince, until doing so became a political liability. Normalcy and decency are in short supply in this White House.
19
President Erdogan as President Putin, are intelligent men that really care for their respective countries. Trump in the other hand is amassing personal billions, while destroying the USA and alienating the rest of the world.
5
But so far both he, you, the Americans, have presented no evidence. Only a story of a murder and dismembered with only pictures of some people. We need some proof the murder occurred. There’s been no body even, so in America under American justice, the so called perpetrators would walk free.
2
The Saudis have admitted that he was killed in the consulate itself. Shouldn't they be on the hook to produce the body? It's simple logic, is it not?
2
North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-Un, Killed his half brother, Kim Long-Nam, and his uncle, Jang Song Thaek.
For some reason, these crimes attracted much less attention than the murder of Khashoggi.
North Korea is a more dangerous country than Saudi Arabia is. It even built a nuclear reactor in Syria. Saudi Arabia, which has no nuclear weapons, has never done anything as dangerous as that.
@George Jochnowitz
How would you classify creating a cholera epidemic in Yemen?
7
Did you forget about the cover up involving the bombing of the Khobar Towers in 1996, which killed many of our Marines? From what I recall about that incident, the "perpetrator" was captured, then killed by the Saudis before he could be interviewed about the attack by us & our allies.
What about 9/11??? 15 of those terrorists were from Saudi Arabia, as was bin Laden!
Any questions?
8
Majority of the Hijackers on 9/11 (Never Forget) were Saudi’s... we attacked Afghanistan and Iraq. Saudi Arabia wasn’t even condemned. You really think 1 journalist will change our policy when the killings of many Americans did nothing to them. All about the $ and its a shame. As an American I’ll never forget and will always want retributions for their part.
12
Man, trump must be jealous that the Saudis get to do what he'd love to do to half the journalists in America.
14
What's behind this huge charade about the murder of a journalist?
I've seen no mention of the glaring fact that two of the three countries involved in this charade are among the very worst oppressors of journalists, and the US, the supposed First Amendment champion, blah blah, is all the way down at #45 out of 180 countries, behind Jamaica, Latvia, and 42 more. Trump calls journalists the "enemy of the people."
Turkey is 157th, with 245 journalists in prison, many for life terms. Saudi Arabia's down at 169.
So this hypocritical charade is just jockeying for position. Erdogan of Turkey doesn't care squat for Khashoggi as a reporter. Nor does Trump or the prince.
How come that obvious angle isn't getting play??
5
Seeing the Saudi Crown Prince shaking hands with the son of journalist who he had ordered killed rises to the level of cynicism displayed by the Nazis in staging a state funeral for Erwin Rommel who they had coerced to commit suicide.
15
Erdogan and other powerful people outside the Kingdom are clearly going for MbS.
Western business leaders vote against his continued rule with their feet.
But there has been almost no coverage of the power dynamics inside the Kingdom sixteen months after MbS' coup and a year after the shakedown at the same Ritz where his celebration party has just flopped.
Khashoggi was killed because he was the most prominent link between anti-MbS forces inside and outside the country.
Could the NYT please publish something on the possible internal mechanics of demoting the new Crown Prince?
12
Wish the world could give up Saudi oil and bankrupt that nation
14
As Trump has already indicated his willingness to embrace despots, go along with the Saudi charade and squander the last of any American credibility, it's become clear that MBS will never likely be held to account and the question is then what the best deal the US can get out of this. If we're going to trade the last drop of our moral authority for MBS, we better be getting something for it. I'd say an end to Wahabiism would work for starters along with basically annexing Yemen with all of its problems. Somehow I don't the the ultimate dealmaker's interested in getting anything besides maybe a gold-plated and rhinestone-covered bust of himself, though...
1
At the risk of sounding insensitive, this is a moral issue and it should be viewed in that context. Yes, the U.S. should act, and our response should be tempered tempered with whatever it is to our national interest.
The U.S. has a long history of avoiding moral issues because there are not good guys out there. Everybody is bad. The Arabs and the Turks are bad people looking to be viewed as the reasonable.
Today's victims were last century's torturers. Serbia/Bosnia Herzegovina, Congo, Rwanda, Yemen, etc. and these are only for the last thirty years!
Er, how about 'em Turks/Ottomans? So charitable with the Armenians, weren't they?
2
@F1Driver, if this had happened under Obama, I hardly think we’d be calling him immoral if he called for anything less than a total cutoff of Saudi oil and not a penny in American arms sales to them like we seem to want Trump to do to preserve our imagined moral chastity.
1
DJT: “They had a very bad original concept, it was carried out poorly, and the cover-up was the worst in the history of cover-ups.” Am I interpreting this correctly? Murder is now a "bad original concept" and the true crime is that they botched the murder and botched the cover-up. Is this what the moral leader of our country has said?
6
Now that Trump has weighed in finally to call this the worst concocted scheme ever and human rights sanctions imposed and travel visa denied that should put an end to it, hopefully. I would hate to think of any of the world’s starchitects having to suddenly find a conscience and turn down any work on the lavish new megacities of the future MBS wants to pay them to design and build.
2
yes ERDOGAN playing the same game TRUMP is playing, which is they both have mutual benefits from Saudi Arabia, Mr, Khashoggi died because he wrote against to crown Prince, so justice or telling the truth is some thing at the pass, also there are not middle east people in this caravan , but we all see how Trump running his policy
4
If Agatha Christie has written this story her publishers would have sent it back and told her to rewrite it as the perpetrators were clearly bumbling buffoons who had given no thought as to how they might get away with such a dastardly act.
7
Turkey is making hay any way they can. They could release all their "evidence" but choose not to, because it suits them. The West is playing along.
Submit the evidence or be quiet.
1
Do not be fooled by Trump's mocking of the Saudi coverup, and willingness to take Congress' recommendations for the appropriate action action against he "Kingdom". The world is appalled by the murder and has found the Saudi response thus far as preposterous. Furthermore, Erdogan has dangled the smoking gun tape which will reveal the full horror of the crime.
In other words, even though Trump often fabricates his own reality, he cannot do so in this case without appearing idiotic and a Saudi puppet.
He is forced to admit reality. It is like his eventual acknowledgement of he reality of climate change, when Mira Lago guests have to swim to the dining room.
Trump has one goal in le'affaire Khossoggi: to distance MBS and the Saudi ruling elite from the folly of the underlings who will take the fall for this crime. He needs to preserve the Saudi alliance, the Kushner-MBS romance, and the Saudi -Trump, Inc. cash pipeline. If Erdogan's evidence implicates MBS directly, Trump will resurrect his "art of the deal"prowess, but Erdogan will get the better end of the deal. That is why Trump sent the CIA director to Turkey: to let him know what cards Erdogan is playing.
3
Oh what a tangled web we weave......
President Erdogan's no angel either. What I'm wondering is what other hidden objectives there are? While they've not been released the admission of audio implies some significant covert penetration of the Saudi property. Of course the Turk's could have done it. But we all know major players elsewhere may have a vested interest in interrupting the planned succession and also have the resources to have covertly penetrated the Saudi property.
1
Erdogan is playing the international harp strings MSB violated the most well respected rule of internationally diplomacy. You don't bring your dirty work into another nation's domain. The Saudi embassy exists at the courtesy of the Turkish government. The only reason Erdogan isn't calling for a complete closure is becuse the diplomatic relationship has mutual benefits.
There are certain lines you don't cross though. MSB crossed them all. The US is in trouble twice now because Trump placated Putin on the murders in Britain and now placated MSB on a murder in Istanbul. If you can take a bad diplomatic situation and make it worse, Trump has managed to do so at every turn. You may now understand the legitimacy behind attacks on Obama's international experience.
However, Obama chose a trusted hand in international policy as a running mate to back his decision making. The Trump talent pool on the other hand has mostly been fired, indicted, or both. The few knowledgeable figures who remain are constantly at fisticuffs with the Presidents. Damaging mistakes like these are the inevitable result.
15
Sadly, we've just got to watch and wait for this grisly story to play out.
This is no longer about a horribly murdered Arab journalist, it's a very complex power play between the 'untouchable' Middle Eastern patriarch and a politically turbulent - but regionally very important - Turkey, a semi-European player.
Erdogan is playing his cards close for several reasons; most importantly, he can't openly admit that Turkish authorities are covertly bugging the Saudi Embassy. That's a gross breach of diplomatic protocol and international law. This way, everyone knows it happened but Riyadh can do nothing about it.
Erdogan can exploit this foul deed for maximum political gain and leverage over SA - and he's going to. There's not the faintest chance he'll allow any other than token American intervention in the 'investigation' - firstly there's no need [1] and then, because it's a calculated snub to Mr Trump who started a fairly pointless spat with Turkey a month or two ago.
Buckle up and watch what happens. The West is sitting in the cheap seats on this one.
[1] Kashoggi was an American *resident*, not a US citizen. So what? Lots of Brits live in the US, I guess there'd be some raised eyebrows if London insisted that the FBI step aside for Scotland Yard to investigate a murder.
11
The sickest Saudi psycho stunt was making Khashoggi's son shake the hand of Mr. Bone Saw in public. Saudi's aren't civilized and we don't need their blood money, though obviously Trump and Kurshner want it, no matter what kind of body parts were wiped up with it. Just sick fascists, the Saud's, "same as it ever was"..
12
A murder to silence a critic. How many more critics are to come and will the Saudis murder them, too?
It surprises that the world still contends with kings and royal offspring. This is the 21st century. Why do some prefer to cling to the Middle Ages?
Why aren't the Saudi people (women, in particular) demanding change? The Saudi people outnumber the royals. What's stopping them?
18
If the Pope is responsible for crimes by Catholics, then why should be Saudis overseeing Mecca, etc be above the law?
Bravo for the following statement quoted in the news story:
"I do not doubt the sincerity of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz,” Mr. Erdogan said.
I am glad finally to be able to admire Erdogan for a firm stance.
3
A firm stance?? Seriously?
The Saudis just gifted this tyrant and murderer a distraction from his relentless persecution of anyone who justifiably fights his dictatorship. Yes it is just that. Democracy in Turkey went off the rail years ago and yet this toad is still tolerated in the international community.
What the Saudis did was a modern horror show. Was Erdogan complicit? Think about that.
1
So what.....
How would that change anything.
No one is going to to let this get in the way of millions of dollars in business.
Grow up, it's the real world and it's not nice.
Life goes on.
1
And the only thing Trump will say they did wrong - was do a bad job on the cover up.
Which makes sense - he advocates for violence against journalists, and all he is upset about is that he looks like a total idiot for backing their lies, when they are so clearly lies.
16
Both the Saudi's and the Turks consider Trump a Dunce as well as a horrendous businessman. Easily taken advantage of due to his inability to succeed in business.
15
‘‘Why was a team of 15 Saudi men, all with qualifications related to the incident, gathering in Istanbul on the day of the murder?
For comparison sake, I'd be interested to know how many of our Blacks Ops it took to rendition someone we deemed undesirable. We're all no different, maybe just more efficient and discrete at it if anything.
5
Erdogan accusing somebody of cold-blooded murder? With all due respect to Mr. Khashoggi, this a clear case of the pot calling the kettle black.
7
How uninformed can MBS be to murder someone in Turkey. Turkey has long been the spy capital of the world, where secrets are the favorite currency.
5
President more outraged by bungled cover-up than murder itself. Never mentioned Khashoggi by name or gave condolences to his family. Trump just called it a "bad deal". What? OK Whatever....guess that's a reversal....
8
Perhaps maybe the Saudis wanted it this way. To flip the middle finger at Erdogan at Assad at trump at the news media. To say in effect, so what. Too bad. What are YOU going to do about it? Money IS power and we have it. That’s the language the big players understand. And the language that seems to matter in the larger context. After all, Assad and the Russians and the Iranians have been butchering tens of thousands yearly and little is being done about it.
1
It is obviously very important to understand the truth of what happened to Mr Khashoggi. At least for those in world who treasure justice, especially when it comes to the freedom to tell the truth as a modern-day prophet. But trusting Erdogan, a thug promoting himself to be diplomat on world stage for the truth's sake, using the tragedy experienced by Mr Khashoggi .... Seriously? No way! Perhaps we ought to begin with Turkey's government first acknowledging responsibility for the Armenian Genocide of 1915, instead of punishing and even jailing when it can, those daring even to bring that topic up. In a way very much like Trump, Erdogan wants something for nothing.
3
Whatever comes of all this, one thing is certain, the Saudi’s will never forgive Turkey for this.
1
This calls to mind "Murder in the Cathedral" back in 1120, when King Henry II is said to have exclaimed to his courtiers about Thomas a Becket, "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?" Interpreting this as the king's command, four knights savagely murdered and mutilated Becket in Canterbury Cathedral.
I wonder if we'll ultimately learn that the Saudi crown prince made comments about the pestiferous Mr. Khashoggi that caused members of the Riyadh palace elite to overreact and perhaps mistakenly interpret MBS's comment as an edict to get rid of Khashoggi.
What a disaster! Murder in the Consulate"!
3
@Bob Orkand
Glad you find it entertaining.
@Bob Orkand The four knights took a ship from France to England to do the dastardly deed; MBS' henchmen flew from Riyadh to Istanbul. There are similarities. But the knights were free agents of a sort. No way that 15 people could fly from Saudi Arabia (with large suitcases and a bone saw) without a massive organizational effort directed by someone. Maybe MBS will copy Henry II by donning sackcloth and walking barefoot on the streets of Istanbul in penance for the deed?
1
Erdogan didn't say anything new here. He's playing some kind of poker game -both Turkey and Saudi Arabia are constantly pulling a fast one on each other.
5
Although irrelevant in the Hobbesian world that is the Middle East, does the Saudi state religion inform the Salmon regime how it should proceed in providing justice to the viciously slain Mr. Khashoggi and his family? For a supposedly pious lot, making many of their citizens miserable if not worse in the name of zealously enforcing a strict religious code, how about when the "tables are turned" on the rulers? Crickets.
3
And how many Turkish were on hijacked planes that destroyed the pentagon and World Trade Center? There were a lot of Saudis.
9
Absolutely!Why is this major fact always swept under the rug? The Saudis are a dangerous lot
2
With Saudi Arabia and Turkey, the USA have a beautiful pair of highly reliable allies. It will take all of President Trump's wisdom to sort which one is to be trusted...
7
He pressed the Saudis for an honest accounting of a killing that he pointedly noted occurred inside his country,
So with that logic, that makes the Pope Italian?
I would like to know: are this President's supporters so lacking in morality that they will stand by his side as he places a higher value on dollars derived from exports than the life of a journalist (and American resident) who was brutally murdered by a repressive foreign government? Whether you are "Christian-Right" or just "Right," how can such a stance be anything but wrong?
8
@David DeSmith 666 5th Avenue, not 666 Park Avenue
While we focus on CEOs who are not attending "Davos in the desert" as a Western retaliation against the horrible assassination of Mr. Khashoggi, let's not forget that Saudi Arabia is the land of the holy sites. Hajj is generating around US$8bn in revenues and making the hajj Saudi Arabia’s second largest income earner after hydrocarbons. Erdogan stated “I do not doubt the sincerity of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz,” so it is a very complex negotiation and the rogue element is MBS.
Saudi Arabia - what a wonderful ally. Really embodies the values we cherish.
How much have they donated over the years to American politicians?
5
If the hard evidence and the tapes Mr. Erdogan says the Turks possess is not forthcoming, it suggests that the evidence could include actions that would be embarrassing for the Turks, or even worse, suggest complicity in allowing the murder to take place.
Granted this kind of game playing allows Mr. Erdogan to hold the world stage and keep Jamal Khashoggi's murder as viable leverage for the Turks' position in the Middle East, but it has gone on long enough.
If there is evidence, let us see it.
1
With all the grandstanding by Turkish President Erdogan, Saudi Arabia and MBS will surely get away with the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. If Turkey has solid evidence, the time is now to reveal the evidence in it's entirety. The Saudis will not have any room for maneuver to suppress the truth. But seems like the Erdogan is just making token gestures of righteousness and threats of revelations.The wily Turk must know that Saudis will do anything to keep this murder under wraps. His main intention is to wring out billions from this rich kingdom. I doubt he is serious about the truth to come out.
2
Erdogan is proving to be more of a moral leader than Trump. The Prince has strong ties with the Trump Empire, especially Kushner whose 666 Park Ave project was bailed out by the Prince. God help our country.
9
@Philip W Park Ave? i thought it was 666 5th Ave
This affair is sadly an attack on the press even encouraged by President Trump, but that aside, when did Erdogan become a mouthpiece for freedom of speech or human rights?
2
I'm going to go rewatch that episode of Columbo
A Case of Immunity.
While it doesn't specify it's Saudi Arabia it's referring to?
It might as well be.
1
What about the Savage and Premeditated murder of tens of thousands in Yemen? What about the Savage and Premeditated support of terrorists in Syria? This is about more than playing dress-up with an Italian tablecloth and your mother's caftan.
The moral relativism is enervating. Don't tell me Erdogan (and the US) didn't know this guy wasn't walking into a trap. They caught too much footage of it. Is failing to stop a murder so you can get some political brownie points make you an accessory to that murder?
8
I'm wondering if Jamal Khashoggi didn't have more than an inkling that he would be executed too. After all he did start up his iwatch recorder and left his iphone outside, to capture & take away the evidence.
While he is at it, maybe Erdogan could also give us a detailed accounting, including video audio, of how his own army goes about massacring Kurdish civilians in Turkish Kurdistan.
16
Pots and kettles. Erdogan just needs to shut up! Some people's memories really are longer than a nanosecond.
8
The only time in history that whitewash is used to clean blood and bone fragments from an Embassy -- our dissembling monster in the White House conspires with the monster man-child of Riyadh in a concoction that simply cannot be swallowed. Our rallying cry cannot be snuffed out -- Justice for Jamal!
15
What an irony that America has fallen so deep into the muck and appears to tied at the hips of a murderous Saudi Prince that Erdogan (a dictarorial, murderous thug himself) appears to be taking a moral high-ground relative to the US President.
Alas, the naked truth is still wearing a veil even after Erdogan's statement.
The question the world needs to ponder is: Why is Saudi Arabia so indispensable to countering Iran?
Isn't it clear to anyone who is sane, has a double digit IQ and atleast an iota of moral conscience that Saudi Arabia is a far more devious villain, a far more destabilizing force than Iran can ever be.
Saudi Arabia nourishes bigotary and Islamic terrorism worldwide far more than the regional bit player that Iran is.
When will America wake up and say no to immoral hypocrisy?
46
@Francesco Assisi
Quite so. Iran could be a far more agreeable, useful ally for the West. Only... we'd have to compromise a bit and not insist on having everything our way. I reckon it could work. Oh, oops, wait a minute, didn't someone suddenly tear up a multipartite agreement on nuclear that had taken a decade in the making? One that all but one of the signatories thought was working OK?
Personally and anecdotally, I've never met an Iranian I didn't immediately like. Polite, calm, well mannered, educated and outward looking. The sort of people you want as friends.
6
@nolongeradoc, that's because Persians had a civilization unlike the Saudi Arabians who were a rag tag group of tribals who just got lucky because of oil.
Before the Iranian revolution (borne of unfair American interference), Iranians were the most cosmopolitan bunch. They still are except for the brutal mullahs in power.
In any sane country, led by any sane leader and government, the world would not have known of this until everything had been settled through diplomatic channels. Maybe not then.
Erdogen is taking his cues from Trump, creating a tempest in a teapot to hide his true motives and actions. I wonder when the next shoe will drop.
1
@Angelsea, you're wrong on that one. Erdogan is doing exactly what Trump wants him NOT to do--creating an international furor. Trump would have preferred to let the Saudis quietly cover the murder up, with the chief suspect himself in charge of the investigation. No doubt Erdogan opposes M.B.S. for his own reasons, but he's right about the cover-up.
I'm curious about one thing you said: How do you settle a gruesome murder probably ordered by a head of state quietly through diplomatic channels? Are you suggesting a cover-up would be preferable? You're taking a very strong Saudi line.
6
I'll take the Saudi's over Erdogan. He is trying to turn Turkey into an Islamist state.
Where was the uproar over the brutality in Turkey in 2016 and purge of 45,000? How about the slaughter and repression of the Kurds? Or working against peace in Syria?
It is a shame that the Turkish coup did not succeed and Turkey and the world are burdened with Erdogan, instead of a secular Western government.
4
I think what has been missing in this entire episode is that a kingdom like Saudi Arabia is entitled to do whatever it wants to its own subjects including murdering them in cold blood. That is just the reality. Just look at Great Britain and the countless victims who perished in the Tower of London, a modern day tourist site. Donald Trump, and by extension the American people, obviously looks like fools in the eyes of the entire world over this, but hey, that is who we elected.
1
@Patrick, so you don't believe in the liberal democratic values that our diplomats have always promoted in the past? You think we should be more like China?
My personal belief is that I don't want a world where the Kremlin poisons its former citizens in Britain and Saudi Arabia dismembers a Washington Post journalist in Istanbul. Neither regime is entitled to violate the safety of another sovereign country, and neither regime is entitled to murder legal residents of the United States or Great Britain.
I would go further and say that no dictator has the right to murder his subjects. The United States has legal and economic ways to punish leaders who commit these kinds of crimes.
4
@Patrick
Er, not many people actually perished in the Tower of London. It was symbolic, it was a statement of political power [1] - not a killing field. The Norman English Guantanamo Bay ... 'if you mess with us, you'll end up here'.
The last people to perish in the Tower were four German spies, executed by firing squad in 1941. That was all about sending a message.
[1] That you still perceive that reputation, in the present day, confirms the enduring power of the symbol.
2
@nolongeradoc
I was being somewhat flippant in my comment suggesting that the rule of law does not apply to kingdoms. [1] Modern day, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland does not have a constitutional bill of rights that protects its subjects from being murdered by its own government including children. Just reference the “shoot to kill” policy that the British Army officers were caught on tape ordering the execution of two children they had mistakenly injured in an operation. The ensuing investigation which became known as the Stalker Affair was basically shut down by Prime Minister Thatcher because, well, she could, declaring the right of her government and Kingdom to murder its own subjects at will. I think I was suggesting that there is something very wrong with that picture, not the opposite.
If this was 20 or 30 or 40 years ago, US outrage whether real or fake would have been thru the roof.
This time the US is literally supporting the killer directly (i.e. MBS) - it's not so much as Trump doing what Trump would do but the end of the US as a moral authority and as a super power.
4
The deceased Presidend of Turkey Mr.Ozal said; " The Middle East is like a dinner party. You are either on the guest list or on the menu". Ironically, intrigues and assasinations have been a common practices of the leaders and governments of the divided region that has been ruled with rudimentary political systems. Sadly, the innocent and outspoken ones have always been on the menu.
4
It is absolutely abhorrent that the children of murdered Jamal Khashoggi be forced to shake hands and be photographed with the murderer of their father. Of course the family did it to protect themselves and the rest of their family. However, it just goes to show how individuals live in a totalitarian state. It also shows how drunk with power despots behave in front of the world and seemingly without a care or regard of how the pictures are viewed.
14
Somewhat surprisingly, Erdogan seems to have rejected taking a payoff from the Saudis in exchange for his silence..
It's not surprising.
Erdogan is a life-long mafiosi who has tossed Mustafa Kemal's secular legacy to the wind in his attempt to consolidate power for himself firmly under an Islamist umbrella.
Turkey was once the epicenter of the Islamic world, with a somewhat moderate caliphate in Istanbul. Kemal dissolved it when as he sought to build a staunch, secular Turkey, lest it influence or stand in his way, and what remained reverted to Saudi Arabia. Erdogan wants nothing more than to recapture the leadership of the Islamic world for himself and his biggest obstacle is not necessarily Saudi Arabia but its particular uncompromising and intolerant brand of Islamic fundamentalist Whabbism and all the havoc that accompanies it that the Saudis have successfully exported worldwide, and he is gladly seizing this opportunity. He is furious that this murder happened in Turkey without his knowledge. Had be been aware, he may have given it allowed it to proceed. He may have even been aware, but decided this was an opportunity to try to sideline the Saudis. Nothing Erdogan ever does is unplanned. Nevertheless he feels he is safe, as long as he stays in Turkey. BUT, when crossed, Arabs are notorious for revenge.
2
All of this jib er jabber by Erdogan is keeping people from focusing on what terrible shape Turkey is in.
10
@MIKEinNYC, you're engaging in deflection. No one supports Erdogan as a political leader, but the issue here is whether M.B.S. was behind a brutal murder in Istanbul.
What do you think?
3
@SandraH.
I think the Clown Prince is complicit, as I have said in previous posts.
This is all about their two distinct, clashing religions it appears. Sunni vs Shiite! Worse than Protestant and catholic. The reporter was pals with the Shiite dictator Erdogen and May have thought himself “ bullet-prove” under his wing in Turkey, so he tweeted his nose at the Prince and got clobbered big time!
2
Erdogan may just get what he wants. As Thomas Friedman says M.B.S. did a stupid, stupid thing.
4
Although the details are interesting, they are not important. Turkey wants to join Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Israel as the powers that control the Middle East, which has been out of control since the US, through the CIA, screwed everything up in the early 50s - esp. in Turkey, Lebanon and Iran. Special thanks to Zbig Brz. for making a bad situation worse in Iran. Many people, me included, have thought that this will not be resolved until after each of above countries (except Lebanon) engage the others in a short nuclear exchange. That's what Bolton and Israel want.
1
I just jeep getting more sick to my stomach. I read on KOAS that Kushner gave MSB a hit list last year.
2
And to think, just the other day Trump was in my hometown praising Republican violence against journalists.
30
It's astounding that the Saudi and Trump regimes are so terrifyingly and wantonly immoral that they make Erdogan appear to be a good Samaritan.
25
It is very sad to see an innocent man's brutal murder being played by all 3 parties concerned to their own advantage: United States, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Realpolitik indeed...
6
The Turks should be carful not to provide CIA Director Gina Haspel with any evidence. Disclosure to the defense is not required until a trial. We know that she is partial to the use of torture in interrogations so she is sure to be partial to the Saudis. Any evidence provided at this point would allow Trump and the Clown Prince to refine their next story.
15
Its pathetic the way Erdogan is using this for his own political advantage. By letting the Turk's version come out drip by drip, Erdogan is making sure that a story which would have probably died within a week, is kept alive while he is working to gain political ends. Remember TUrkey has jailed more journalists that just about any other country in the Middle East.
Erdogan is making sure he extracts a pound of flesh from the Saudis with whom he is in a struggle to prevent Saudi preeminence in the Sunni world. Look at how Erdogan's face is appearing almost daily in the NYT. Normally coverage of Turkey would not be on the front page above the fold.
The fact that we are dependent on Erdogan for the story of Khashoggi's death makes you wonder how much of the truth is being told. After all he would not even let our Sec. of State hear those tapes he keeps talking about. Erdogan is not known as a truthful individual.
We can hope the Gina Haspell, our CIA director, will be able to force some truth and real evidence from Erdogan
2
@judywellerm
Miss Gina favors torture as a means of extracting information... Unless you haven’t been reading the news for a while
5
@judyweller, I think we can depend on the story emerging from Ankara, and I believe that our intelligence officials have seen those videos.
I appreciate cynicism as much as the next reader, but I think it's misplaced here. While Erdogan is no friend to journalists, the Saudis have stepped into this tar pit all by themselves.
@judyweller
You can hope. Erdogan is not going to offer anything but token co-operation to Ms Haspel.
Why should he? Mr Trump started a fairly pointless spat with Ankara a couple of months ago. Payback time.
Bet money on it.
The several NYT articles I've read about this terrible event stated, as here, that Khashoggi went to the consulate "to request documents to allow him to marry his Turkish fiancée." Elsewhere I read that he went there to get final divorce papers for his marriage with his Saudi wife. By the vagueness of the NYT explanations, I'm guessing that the "documents" were indeed divorce papers. Needless to say, divorce doesn't justify even a little dismemberment. I just don't like it when this paper spins news to create a singular opinion among us without complexity or dissonance - especially when the narrative is about how manipulative others are.
2
I don’t understand your complaint. What does it matter what types of papers he went to the embassy to procure? He was murdered. Period.
7
@Carl Potato, potatoe. The crux of the matter is the barbaric act that resulted, which should never be warranted for anyone - in a sane world.
4
@carl bumba
The papers were to get married - for which you need to document that your divorce did happen.
This is a miniscule matter - he wasn't murdered over papers, nor was being divorced an issue to anyone at all, he was murdered because he was a journalist that wrote things the Saudi's didn't like.
2
When Erdogan is the relative humanitarian in the room, you need to take a step back.
Trump is acting exactly the way you would if you wanted to tell the world you value money over human life. Instead of marshaling every resource he has for a US resident and member of the press, he's mincing around with the press and holding "Face in the Crowd" style revivals with avowed enemies. That rookie sensation Jared Kushner has had the most to say about it (measured by quantity, certainly not by quality) is scary stuff.
Trump is more worried about the rumored middle easterners in Mexico than he is about the actual dozen plus who murdered someone, unimaginable without KSA government approval.
Meanwhile the alleged calming influence in the WH, Gen. Kelly has now had three anger management moments.
Please can we have some actual adults in this room?
8
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan let ISIS recruits enter and cross Turkey to the Syrian border where they joined the terrorist organization. He also did nothing to stop the sale of oil and other basics across the Turkish Syrian border to ISIS representatives.
The media should be asking Erdogan to explain his previous tacit support for ISIS, and discussing how much it contributed to the crimes ISIS was able to (and still aspires to) commit.
@ann, Erdogan is a bad man. MBS is a bad man.
Now the question before us is whether we can publicly support MBS after this killing.
I don't think MBS killed Jamal because he was an outspoken critic. Don't believe he was a big enough thorn in MBS' side for that. I think Jamal had something on SA, and the more I think about it, on Kushner and Trump as well.
3
@Art, he killed Khashoggi to send a message to all his critics--that he can get to them regardless of where they live and who they work for. He sent a message that he can even torture and dismember a columnist for the Washington Post.
Some readers have wondered why the Saudis didn't do a better job covering up the murder, but the whole point is to be obvious about it. MBS' miscalculation was that he didn't expect the world to be outraged, and he expected the Trump administration to support him regardless.
1
What does it say about the state of the once most powerful and well respected Democracy in history , the United States of America, that it takes the leader of a third tier Republic to explain to the rest of the world how shameful it is that a journalist -who was under the USA's protection- was openly lured into a foreign embassy and butchered? But worse ,what does it say to the rest of the world that both our business and political leadership is seemingly poised to give a pass to the offending country for such a ghastly crime, based ostensibly on an improbable (if not entirely unbelievable) story that it was only 'rogue elements' of the Saudi monarchies servants and retainers who planned and executed the crime?
7
Erdogan is exploiting this for all it's worth I order to sideline MBS, his real goal here. Erdogan isn't a paragon of human rights leadership. He's an opportunist. This is a dangerous part of the world. These are not Westerners, yet we insist on viewing the whole situation through a Western lens. Killings like this are not unusual in the Middle East. There have been far worst killings with far less press coverage or interest. Erdogan is playing the press. Our national interests don't align with his in that we need MBS for our Middle East strategy. How we finesse public condemnation of human rights violations while keeping our national Middle East strategy on track---play the game. Play the press like Erdogan is doing.
@sf. we don't need MBS. We need Saudi cooperation, but there are about 400 heirs to the Saudi throne. Surely we can find a less bloodthirsty alternative. We've done it successfully in the past.
We're viewing this incident through the lens of our values, as we should. There's no way the U.S. can continue to support MBS without sinking into moral relativism.
1
@SandraH.
You're advocating US led regime change in the Middle East?
That didn't work out too well last time, did it?
Sheesh...
@nolongeradoc
No, not regime change. Man-change. MBS is not the regime, just one of many princes, all identically dressed like little penguins. Let's just encourage the Saudis to exchange MBS for a less extreme, more rational prince. There are hundreds of them; how hard can it be to find a better one?
1
When President Trump calls the Press, the enemy of the people why should we be surprised if one of his strong allies murders one of them. First he parrots their first ridiculous talking points, then he puts the financial argument out that this huge, wealthy economy of ours would be devastated if the Saudi's are upset with us. Then he has his "genius" son in law mumble his support for the Saudi regime.
Trump maintains that the United States has never been held in such esteem as it has since he became POTUS. The opposite is the truth.
15
In that part of the world, it would be difficult to know who to trust, as the harsh, and brutal nature of societies that suppress anyone who disagrees with them, or would stem the flow of either oil, or money, would land in prison, or worse. I wonder how the two sons and two daughters see their father's death? He came from a very wealthy family, and was connected to a number of famous people in that part of the world.
3
It appears that Turkey has evidence, but wants something for it: from the U.S. to show it, or from the Saudis to not show it. How long can we wait? It's like "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" without the good.
2
Somewhat surprisingly, Erdogan seems to have rejected taking a payoff from the Saudis in exchange for his silence on the details of the Kashoggi murder. Surely that option was on the table. He instead is trying to drive a wedge between MBS and his father, the king, a more delicate and risky gambit. He is likely trying to convince the king that shifting his grant of authority from MBS exclusively to a wider cohort of princes can operate to restore the legitimacy of the Saudi regime. He is probably emphasizing the duty of the king, as the guardian of Mecca and the shrines of the Prophet, to uphold at least minimum standards of propriety. It might work, but it presupposes that the old king is still retains some capacity for astute royal maneuvering.
What this also tells us is that, while the dour Erdogan may have Islamic authoritarian tendencies, he is not totally devoid of principle. In that respect he is more deserving of our respect than Trump or Prince Jared.
7
Evidently, Mr. Erdogan didn't take heart to the lessons on unintended consequences that saturate this whole incident. Trying to force a middle line out of an extreme situation will generate unintended consequences.
2
Two important questions raised by President Erdogan need answers from the Saudis. Where is Jamal Khashoggi's body? Who is the local collaborator in Turkey who is supposed to have disposed off the body or parts of the dismembered body?
Unless these two questions are addressed satisfactorily Muhammad Bin Salman and President Trump can be assured that Mr. Khashoggi's brutal murder will be front and center of the media's focus.
In other words, President Erdogan will not let this go until those guilty are punished one way or another. For Erdogan this is not just about his leverage in the region as many Times' readers cynically assume, its personal.
11
@Iqbal Sky News is reporting that his body has been found in pieces, with his face mutilated, buried 500 meters from the Consulate. I strongly advise news media to check this out.
1
Erdogan is treading a fine line with wanting to look tough at home yet remaining friendly towards MBS. I wonder if the White House has offered Erdogan something to act the bad cop. One thing I'm certain of, KSA, Turkey and the US are all working together to bury this, and have KSA pay the Khashoggi some blood money.
3
Erdogan is obviously exploiting this incident for his own ends, which in no way implies that his account isn't true.
13
@Captain Bathrobe But it makes you wonder how much of Erdogan's tale is really true. After all he has let no one hear these tapes he keeps talking about.
@judyweller
One presumes the audio recording is from some kind of surveillance, which would be difficult for the Turks to air for the whole world since the murder took place on Turkish soil but in a Saudi consulate.
Turkish authorities have been extremely consistent in their story. Most US intelligence officials seem to believe that the Turkish account of what happened is basically accurate. They knew a lot and they knew a lot early on, by some means.
@Captain Bathrobe-- Yes, the question I hadn't heard anyone else ask is "what's in it for Erdogan?" Why is he making such a fuss about the death of an American journalist? Out of a sense of moral outrage? Please.....don't kid a kidder!
When you have the leader of the free world proclaim the news media as public enemy #1, lending support to those who have physically assaulted said media, you de facto condone such behavior by other nations.
It's no surprise this happened.
Nor is it any surprise that Trump will simply shrug it off and move merrily ahead with lending money to Saudi Arabia so they can spend it on buying arms from the US.
It's a win-win-iwn
11
\@confounded, as a european I strongly objekt your wording "leader of the free world", maybe this applies for noplace. This is history since we have much better leaders arround.
7
@Klaus
That phrase may be out of style at the moment, but it is useful to help preserve a certain world order that might allow us to live out our lives without being barbequed. Even the bad guys rely on it, really. Hopefully, the next president will fit the image.
I'm just glad we can count on Trump to crack down on the murdering dictatorial Islamists, because he's "so rich he doesn't need money" and "won't be corrupted.*"
*Literally right-wing claims: https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/12/trump-transition-going-great-econ...
8
Back to my previous comment: just wondering why the mixed reaction of President Trump to the killing of Jamal Kashoggi, after all President Trump used to have deals with Jamal's uncle, the infamous arms dealer Adnan Kashoggi. As an example. let's remember that the Nabilla yacht that used to be Adnan's playground for the world's richest and famous was sold by Adnan to Donald Trump. A quick view to Wiki's page of Adnan, will show us how Jamal's family has been well entrenched in caring for the interest of America's wealthiest, and, no doubt, that is the reason for the actual international furor. In the end, more than about values, and human rights this scandal is about the current struggle for power in Saudi Arabia, and it is a trouble river in which all want to fish, include the very correct and liberal west.
4
What does Islam say about the taking of a human life? Aren't the Saudi monarchs religious leaders of their country also? Let us reflect on the value of any nation's leaders claiming moral authority based on their religion, whether it be Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, or other. We don't have to look too far to know that proclaiming one's faith in an election campaign does not guarantee that a leader will govern by the moral and humanitarian principles of that faith. Let us remember that some politicians use their faith to get and keep political power.
10
@abigail49
No, they're not religious leaders also. They're the ROYAL family. The CLERICS are the religious leaders.
Whabbism dates from the early-mid 18th century. It became the dominant sect of Islam in Arabia. The House of Saüd dates from the 1920-30s, and is only in power because of a deal they cut with the Whabbi clerics: The clerics bestow legitimacy upon The House of Saüd as the political rulers of Arabia, and in turn, this "royal" family leaves all matters of religious and social life to the Wahabbi clerics.
I guess CIA Director Haspel staved off the airing of the dismemberment recording.
13
@Dave T.
I'm just hoping she doesn't make it disappear - which is one of her talents.
5
@Dave T., somehow I have a feeling they're saving its release for the weekend before November 6, probably leaving it to Diane Feinstein to leak.
Erdogan is also playing games. There was nothing explosive in his speech. Perhaps after talking to Trump and the CIA chief, he agreed to withdraw key information, as this would precipitate a hughe diplomatic crisis that would endanger the planned US-Saudi cooperation against Iran. So Erdogan is playing chess and trying to use this situation to his benefit.
10
Jamal Kashoggi is (was) a powerful figure enlisted in keeping the old Saudi order, and that is why the whole scandal is happening now... interesting no media talks about his family connections, specially those he enjoyed with the former king. Also, people tend to forget that "Jamal Khashoggi was the nephew of the high-profile Saudi Arabian arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, known for his part in the Iran–Contra scandal, who was estimated to have had a net worth of US$4 billion in the early 1980s (for more, just a quick view to: Jamal Khashoggi - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamal_Khashoggi )
An let's also remember that uncle Adnan was well entrenched in the European and American establishment as the best arm merchant, always, protecting the interest of SA former king's family and that of hte wealthy of both Europe and the US. Besides, we could also speculate that he was also close to the English royal family as Adnan's sister is the moder of Dodi Al Fayed, Princess Diana's lover. in the end, if it wasnt bc of his power, $, and connections, no one would be making such a huge deal on the disappearance of JK.
1
@Jorge
and Adnan's putative daughter Petrina turned out to be the product of his wife's affair with a senior British Conservative Party politician.
That politician got caught in the murky web of favours and kickbacks, exposed by a newspaper, lied in order to sue the newspaper for libel and ended up serving jail time for perjury.
Funny old world isn't it? For us ordinary folk...
"The White House sent the C.I.A. director, Gina Haspel, to Istanbul to help the Turkish government with its investigation..."
An appropriate choice. If the Saudi hit squad tortured their victim, she's the one to figure it out.
4
Erdogan is no choir boy either and it appears the global affiliations is coming down to a matter of which despot and brutal regime is least offensive, including the United States under Donald Trump's role. But Erdogan does possess explosive evidence, and I believe his nation's security apparatus has the audio of Jamal Khashoggi's arrest, interrogation, torture, and the silence that follows up and to that point when the transmitting devices were destroyed, perhaps through the dismembering.
And as heinous and gruesome as these sounds of a human being is tortured, the world must listen. Otherwise, we are all left to more lies and the role of the Trump Administration's white washing of a sickening crime. I suspect Khashoggi was on a story of epic proportions as to the deeply rooted financial ties between MBS, Royal Saudi Family, and Trump/Kushner. MBS, and Trump/Kushner, had an obvious reason to want this information never seeing the light of day. It was massive corruption on an international scale; the selling of policy decisions to another nation as the "payback" in transactional terms for earlier financial favors. That's my opinion; I believe Khashoggi would have shown how the dots are connected to an extent that a reasonable person would have come to the conclusion of thick the world of the elite and wealthy live their lives above the rule of law - because it's their sense of entitlement.
The screams must be heard, and Congress must listen.
12
@Peter Vander Arend Are you sure the tapes exist? After all this time, Erdogan has had plenty of time to have the tapes doctored and they may not contain any real information, only what Turks want you to see. A loft of Middle East political and power games are going on over this case.
1
There seems to be premature celebration of Erdogan's strength and transparency here. I wouldn't be surprised if he reverses course and proclaims MSB (as Stephen Colbert translated: Mr. Bone Saw) honest and innocent once he leverages his advantage and gets whatever it is that he wants from the Saudi leadership. Erdogan is not a benevolent leader who cares deeply about justice. He's as heartless and opportunistic as trump and MSB combined.
10
We can only hope that Trump’s supporters will recognize that Trump’s friend MBS is a vicious monster. They laughed off Putin admitting that he wanted Trump to be President and that he ordered his government to help, and Trump’s love for Rocket man Kim, and dictator for life Xi whom Trump envies.
Maybe the torture and dismemberment and murder of Khashoggi and the lies from MBS, and evidence of pre-meditation will waken some remnants of moral revulsion? Erdogan is no prize but America owes him a debt of gratitude.
6
It is a shame what happen to this man and it should never have happen and people need to be held accountable, but for Erdogan to act the way he is acting is like "The kettle calling the teapot black" Ever since coming to power Erdogan has thrown Journalists in jail some sentence for 35 years on trumped charges so yes, it is most definitely the Kettle calling the teapot black
11
He has cracked down, yes but last I checked, he did not order the murder and dismembering of any Turkish dissidents at home or abroad. So no, no pot is calling any kettle black here
2
But...but...but...Trump is the master of the Art of the Deal! He is going to win so much that we are going to say “Please, Mr. President, enough of the winning! We are so tired of winning!”
So, let’s see.
In exchange for the hemming and hawing and outright cover up of the murder in behalf of the House of Saud, Trump got...
(Drum roll please)
...Absolutely nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero.
The 110 B arms deal is nothing but a piece of paper titled “Memoranda of Agreement.” To this very second, not a single dollar has been injected into the US and not a single American job was created to earn that dollar.
Oh wait, Trump danced to the Saudi’s own tune holding a kiddie sword and touched the glowing ball of the King.
The laughter from the Kingdom and the Kremlin must be free-flowing as the champagne while they celebrate yet another day of making a fool out of Trump for all the world to see.
“We are the laughingstock of the world.
Everyone is laughing at us. Everyone.”
—Donald J. Trump
The 45th President of the United States
14
you mean the Suadi's are flying F-16 and dropping American made ordinance on Yemen. Somebody should tell the Yeneni's it's an illusion.
3
@mkm
There are a dozen 1st world countries lining up to sell the Saudis their own brand fighter bombers and ordnance.
I think Trump gets this....
No question that the Saudis, Traitor Trump, and his little boy prince Jared, march to the same tune.
It's unfortunate that Sultan Recip, whose security thugs beat up Turkish protesters in Washington, DC (yes, it is part of the U.S.) and then claimed that the video was "faked," is leading the band.
Welcome to the world of real politik.
18
Erdogan said that the “savage murder”. But there is no dead body right now. How does Erdogan know about it?
3
yeah he just disappeared into the ether after the princes men cut him into little pieces.
5
@Abdullah Köktürk, I guess we'll have to assume that that conclusion was based on the audio tapes which we'll never hear either. We have to take an awful lot strictly on faith.
This is a challenge for the Turkish investigators and police. Are they competent enough to find the body or the cooperator?
The United States has obstructed justice with Trump's phone calls, CIA visits to Turkey, and Mnuchin's visit to Saudi Arabia.
A hallmark of the Republicans. Pervert Justice in the judiciary and leverage power in the world to do the same globally.
Shame, yet again, never ending.
10
The role of Mr Trump is always in favour of his personal interests, never of his country nor it's partners. The Saudis have committed massive crimes against the US ( 9/11), their totalitarian regime stands for islamic fundamentalism - Daesh. Thank you NYT for documenting their inacceptable financial involvement in key technological areas important for national security among others. Accepting huge investements from such a nation is incompatible with fundamental democratic values. Turkey (another autocratic regime) should be allowed to carry out all investigations in this crime without the blockade of Mr Trump. He is no more than the caricature of a statesman, destroying whatever consensus and goodwill exists among nations.
4
And the audio tapes the world has been waiting for? Not even a mention of the tape in this article..
what awhitewash and the Turkish morality trip is to say the least .. hypocritical. The protectors of free speech. hmm
3
How ironic and infuriating that bin Salman gets a standing ovation at the Saudi business conference on the same day as Erdogan's statement on the murder.
4
I'm hearing breaking news that Khashoggi's dismembered and faced body has been found in the garden of the residence of the Saudi consulate. If true this means the Saudis were also lying about the disposal of the body where they said it was rolled up in a carpet and handed over to a local "firm" for disposal.
Lie after lie.
3
The sooner we make petroleum obsolete, the sooner we won't have to continue pretending to care about the Middle East or the people who live there. Oh, well, maybe we not. We'll still need to use their strategic locations for our thoughts and plans of world domination.
6
Big money greed is overwhelming humanity at an ever increasing rate with selfish bureaucrats at the helm in much time f the world.
Great leaders serve those who they represent. Autocrats suppress and serve themselves.
3
The picture of Mr. Kashoggi's sons shaking hands with his presumed murderers is very chilling to me.
3
Saudi Arabia murdered an American Journalist. 18 Saudi men involved; a bone saw and a body double. This murder was planned. Why is Donald Trump lax in stopping Saudis. Why is Donald Trump pushing to keep selling arms to Saudis? Investigate Donald Trump's relationship with Saudis. NO arms sales to Saudis. Ray Sipe
6
Kashoggi was not an American. He worked for an American newspaper and was a U.S. resident. He was going to the Saudi consulate because he was a Saudi Arabian citizen.
Surely we have a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Erdogan is no better in the way he handles journalists is he. Terrorism will not abate until the Saudis stop funding it.
1
Crown Prince got a standing ovation yesterday; Mnuchin from Trump Administration was there.Kushner on tv yesterday saying White house will soon decide . Trump is so tied up with this Saudi murder of an American Journalist they are bound with Saudi money and power.We will never know how deep Trump is in this cesspool until we vote out GOP and investigate. Ray Sipe
3
Mnuchin is morally degenerate.
Haspel the torturer is morally degenerate.
Why are these morally degenerate people in positions of authority representing us?
Is Haspel there to protect Mbs? I suspect her job is to stop Erdogan from releasing the evidence he has which implicates the prince.
Mnuchin was there to let them know this administration has no truck with moral decency.
1
MBS now means Mr. Bone Saw. Yet Trump, Kuchner and Mnuchin continue to defend the despot.
8
There will be conspiricy theory explosion. Jamal Kashoggi' uncle, Adnan Kashoggi was an international arms dealer and businessman. Adnan has done business with Trump for over forty years including participating in a bail out of the Taj Mahal casino. Jamal Kashoggi's cousin, Dodi Al Fayed, was killed with Princess Diana in the car crash in Paris. Yikes! The tabloids will go nuts!
1
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/saudi-crown-prince-talks-to-60-minutes/
Norah O'Donnell: What did you learn from your father?
Mohammed bin Salman: Many, many things. He loves history very much. He is an avid reader of history. Each week, he would assign each one of us a book. And at the end of the week, he would ask us about the content of that book. The king always says, "If you read the history of a thousand years, you have the experience of a thousand years."
...... Just as American society transformed during the 1960's, the Saudis are in the midst of their own cultural revolution. The kingdom, the Middle East, and the Islamic world may never be the same.
Apparently MBS didn't get the gist of American 60's--Sad, Isolated, Barbaric Creature.........
I often wonder if there is any point that will make anyone who support Trump to say enough is enough. Anything??
5
From all the lies, empty rhetoric, and cowardly inaction, it would seem that Mr. Khashoggi’s goulish murder will soon be forgotten and his death expendable. This is what we have come to.
3
Oops! THAT's unfortunate!
Mr. Erdogan of Turkey calling for openness and honesty in government activity is about as appropiate as Maxine Waters asking Kanye West to stand in as the White House press spokesman, or a Barack Obama calling for more public displays of Christianity and patriotism in local gov't.
Erdogan is such a sneaky leader that I wouldn't trust him to tell me it was raining if we were both standing out in the middle of a hurricane. That supposed uprising a year or two ago may well have been an operation of his doing from start to finish.
NATO woul be better off without him. I know some Americans near there and I'd give the Poweball payoff to get people like them out of there ASAP.
4
Hooray for President Erdogan for upholding America's values and sense of morality since our President hasn't!
8
Trump behaves like a chump to secure Saudi money for his families’ businesses and abandons U.S. role as diplomatic moderator. His advisors abhor diplomatic solutions with allies to world conflicts because they think a super power can have whatever that it demands better than when attempting to gain the consensus of allies. Instead, Turkey with previous conflicting interests with Saudi Arabia presents the narrative and the facts to the world. Erdogan appears to be the statesman representing the human craving for justice.
So we see the true nature of America First and Bolton’s aversion to our country working through alliances and international organizations. Behold the seeds of another deadly conflict in the region.
3
Maybe I shouldn’t laugh but I can’t help but chuckle when I read comments by readers asking for Republicans in Congress to “do something” about this killing of a journalist.
These are the same “men” who support a President who calls for and cheers for violence against citizens and violence against those in the press in particular.
This is what happens when you elect a gangster to be a President. The people of Russia and Turkey know all too well about having a gangster as a President. Now we are learning what that means to our Republic, just a little too late.
Should have gotten those tax returns.
18
Erdogan, the ally of Iran an adversary of Saudi Arabia, is having a good time with this!
5
@MIKEinNYC, speaking of good times and mugging for cameras, I'm surprised we haven't heard a peep from Michael Avenatti about this yet.
@John Doe
Has he been disbarrered yet for owing IRS a ton of money?
It should very disheartening to all of us to see the politicalization of a human beings’s brutal murder. It is disgusting and shameful and should give us pause.
40
Erdogan is a new-fascist who is using this episode in an effort to win over public opinion. That NYTimes would help him in this effort is disturbing.
1
Things may be edging towards the old familiar “I didn’t order it or do it, but I take responsibility”.
Have we heard this before in American politics? A variant is “it happened on my watch, so I take responsibility” [but not, note, direct responsibility].
I believe Khashoggi feared there could be danger for him inside the consulate. If so, he deserves to be celebrated as a hero martyr in the cause of bringing needed reform in Saudi Arabia.
1
I’m glad Erdogan and Turkey have taken the position they have. Otherwise the Saudis may easily have gotten away with this blatant atrocity unscathed. I can’t help but to be suspicious, however, of what kind of game Erdogan is playing. There must be more to this than just righteous indignation and a desire for justice, but what?
5
I never thought I'd say this, but thanks to Turkey we are having light shed on MBS and Saudi Arabia.
Seeing Jared Kushner laughing at the thought of an incompetent fist fight and capture of Mr. Kashoggi tells us all we need to know about him.
I still haven't heard an explanation from the Trump administration as to why the nation of Saudi Arabia isn't on Trump's 'no-admittance list'.
I know that the Saudis claim no knowledge of Osama bin Laden's plans. That Saudi 'hit team' had fifteen members who flew in to perform a 'mission'. After this current exposure to their prevarication their official claims (past and present) aren't worth very much.
4
The victim and the alleged killers are Saudi citizens and the killing took place in the Saudi consulate, which is considered sovereign Saudi territory. I see no justification for the Turks to claim any jurisdiction over the case or to demand that it be tried in Turkey.
I continue to hope that a full investigation reveals who knew what and when they knew it, and leads to criminal prosecution of the killers. That does, however, need to take place under Saudi law, not Turkish.
1
When will President Trump show an iota of integrity by denouncing and taking action against the Saudi prince and his regime, instead of sending his treasury secretary to discuss arms deals among other matters?
I'm glad he's doing this, but I really want to know what's in it for Erdogan. What's his beef with the Saudis?
3
@Joe
Turkey occupies the interesting position of being both a Western country and a Middle Eastern one at the same time. Erdogan is playing the long game for a top spot.
Turkey's reach has been enormous. Have you heard of the Ottoman Empire? It lasted 600 years - and into the 20th century.
Erdogan's beef? MTGA, I expect.
Well, SOMEONE is willing to stand up to the Saudis in the name of decency.
3
Decency, politics, Erdogan? C'mon man! My take? Autocrats, one caught in foolish killing, pay off negotiation. No honour there.
@Francis
Uh, we get it. But my comment was not in reference to Erdogan.
1
Since the whole world left it up to Erdogan to sketch the result of the investigation he found himself in the bright spotlight again after a long period of neglect and a collapsing economy. His instinct of bluster and tendencies toward high stake gambling took over.
The gesture he’s making with his hand represents the failed political Islam of the Muslim Brotherhood. He’s asserting his leadership of the organization and dreaming of recreating the long-gone days of the Ottomans. He wants this to be his legacy, ignoring the high price and consequences.
On Oct 2nd Erdogan was on top of the suspect list as someone who stands to gain great benefits from this tragedy. But instead, the world seems to have handed him the narrative.
2
As one commenter expressed "Erdogan is using this incident for his advantage". Indeed, he is playing this incident for all he can get. Ertogun is no friend of journalists or of democracy. He, himself, is a manipulating tyrant. We must be cautious. Saudi Arabia is too valuable an ally.
2
Agreed with everything but your last sentence.
2
Murder is murder. Murder by edict indicts the autocrat.
There are no secrets is such matters. All will talk.
Should the Saudi King come clean, he may save Islam. Not otherwise.
Morsi is favored by some. Not by me. Assisi is favored by others. Not by me.
I favor the children. Emile by Jean Jacques Rousseau is worth the time.
The Greeks knew. Plato and Aristotle knew.
We must read the Greeks again. Thucydides was brilliant. Sparta won.
Athens requires conscience, knowledge and trust.
1
Black Jacobins by CLR James. About recent tyranny. I like the writers on your list but honestly know little about the region.
Nothing new. I am honestly disappointed at the info so far.
With all the gaudy glitter of oil wealth, the primitive savagery of Saudi rulers indicates a country that fails to meet the human values of civilized nations.
1
It is a shame that the world is only now beginning to realize what an immoral regime exists in Saudi Arabia. It is a shame that the use of American made and provided weapons being used to murder Yemeni school children and create a humanitarian crisis in Yemen does not draw the same condemnation for our President. (I wonder how much money the Trump enterprises are making from the Saudis.)
There must be punishment and of the right people for this atrocity, but Erdogan is game playing. He revealed little not already leaked, and without his disclosing the recordings or whatever Turkey has, there is no way to know details. This seems to be more about Erdogan taking down MSB who it seems was a rival in the Muslim world. The US is over a barrel on this. We need the Saudis for oil, to counter- balance Iran, and to possibly help in the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. It is hard to believe the Saudis could have so stupid to have for all intents and purposes killed this man in plain sight. They badly hurt themselves and the US and shocked the world with their savagery.
13
@Bian
What is this myth of needing the Saudis.
Is Iran really as dangerous as we think or just as dangerous as it's enemies?
For peace in the middle east only need US pressure on Israel (highly unlikely but...).
2
First off kudos to the Washington Post for keeping this front and center and demanding answers,I have seen them make similar aggressive moves on the Jason Rezaian case and get results,sadly it was too late in this case. Strange times when Turkey holds the morally high ground on human rights issues against the US,the purity of their motives should not matter,there is a clear wrong and someone is rightly demanding answers and accountability.
31
Turkey is making demands with their fingers crossed. They still defer to the King and are aiming low at the son. Something in this feud makes no sense to me.
1
Yes, and seems that there is some confusion among our current crop of leaders about why we have a democracy instead of kingdom.
In a kingdom, the king has absolute power over all his subject as an expression of his dominion. In a democracy, at least according to the aspirations of our founders, people in the democracy have freedom and inalienable rights, that no other person can take away.
Kings acts like kings because they can.
29
Heads of state usually act in ways that benefit their country and/or themselves personally. From 50 years of involvement in the Middle East, I found this to be especially true in this region.
So, why is Erdogan being so hard on the Crown Prince? After all, the killing took place in a Saudi government facility, and no Turks seemed to have been involved, nor hurt. Going after the Crown Prince as he has would seem to mostly benefit Iran, which is helping the Yemeni Houthis against the Saudi forces who are under MBS command.
Is there a useful Iran-Turkey relationship that Erdogan sees as benefiting himself and/or his country? There has been a significant rapprochement between the two, mostly involving the Syrian conflict. From a long term strategic assessment, this could be enough for Erdogan to derail MBS' influence in Riyadh.
8
@DonD All factions of Turkish society are extremely interested in the case, partially because Mr. Khashoggi has a Turkish name and was about to marry a Turkish woman. Also you have the nationalists who are incensed that the Saudis would conduct a murder on Turkish soil. And then you have Erdogan, who distrusts the Crown Prince and wants him out.
2
Erdogan has now officially become a participant in this international Kabuki theater featuring Dances of the Wolves but still no new nuclear missile to torpedo MBS. It's apparent he's leveraging for something from the Saudi or the Trump Regimes. Erdogan's "carefully orchestrated " moves are outsmarting the other two Foxes, Trump and MBS. Meanwhile, Trump's ever shifting reactions and pronouncements to the murder's unfolding is a sly but futile effort to sidle with whoever prevails in this two competing Middle East tribes.
In the end, Tales from The Thousand and One Arabian Nights will have to be updated and edited to a Thousand and Two Nights to include this 21st century gory narrative. Sheherazade's life may last for as long as this story dominates international news.
9
How about removing those nuclear weapons that are still in turkey at incirlik?
9
@David B. Are you sure they’re still there ? On that subject the Saudis themselves have also used Incirlik in the past to refuel aircraft.
As it stands now, the murder of Mr. Khashoggi will remain an internal Saudi matter outside the jurisdiction of the Turkish Government. This means that the Saudi Government will no doubt follow their standard mode of operation: give the eighteen (18) men already arrested a 'fair trial', and then execute them in a public beheading.
3
President Erdogan of Turkey may be playing for bigger stakes than we have imagined. Prior to the end of World War I, the crumbing Ottoman Empire was home to the Caliph of Islam, the spiritual leader of the world’s Moslem population. The empire was finally laid to rest by the revolution led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his Young Turks who overthrew the sultan and created the modern, west-leaning and secular Republic of Turkey in 1923. He also moved Turkey’s capitol to Ankara from Istanbul. Since Erdogan came to power, he has shifted his country back toward a religious government with elements of Sharia law imposed through press censorship and the imprisoning of thousands of Turkish citizens who are regarded as traitors rather than dissenters.
So why is Erdogan making such an effort to implicate Saudi Arabia’s Prince Mohammed as the instigator of Kashuggi’s murder?
Perhaps it is because, by exposing Saudi Arabia as planning this murder, he also calls into question Prince Mohammed and the Saudi family’s moral leadership as the custodians of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Improbable as it seems, Erdogan may be attempting to restore the caliphate to Istanbul and—who knows?—even proclaiming himself the new sultan. Turkey could thus become the spiritual center of the Muslim world with Erdogan as its leader.
In the 100 years since the signing of the Versailles Treaty and the Sykes-Picot Agreement, stranger things have happened in the Middle East!
31
Erdogan is better at this than either the Saudis or Trump. The Saudis and Turkey have had major political/religious differences for decades, and prior to this incident Turkey could reasonably be viewed as one of, if not the worst, offenders against journalists in the world. Erdogan is using this incident for his advantage. The 48 hour warning was clearly an invitation for the Saudis and Turks to talk behind the scenes. Erdogan's position...give me something I want, and the announcement can be benign and include only what the world already knows. Otherwise, the grim truth will be made public. He has the Saudis over the barrel because he almost certainly has evidence backing the Turkish leaks.
Sadly, Trump (and thus, the US) is stuck in the middle. For a number of reasons (Trump/Kushner personally beholden to Saudi financing? False claims about greatly exxagerated Saudi arms purchases? Reliance on the Saudis to temper Trump's Obama-based vendeta against Iran? Delusional faith in the Saudis providing key assistance to Jared's apocryphal Mideast Peace Plan?), Trump cannot be seen to be pushing the Saudis on this issue. This leaves the US in a very unenviable position.
When are we, the US citizenry at large, going to finally ackowledge that Donald Trump is a complete stooge and is simply not capable of leading or representing our country in any legitimate way?
70
You’re last question is a good one. Hopefully we begin to recover from this nightmare of a presidency with a Democratic House majority in two weeks. Trump can’t be left unchecked anymore. I don’t recall a more important mid-term election in my long life.
4
Hopefully on November 6th we will clip the stooge's power!
2
@hhhman . You were doing just fine until you ran off the rails regard Trump. He is playing his cards like always.
Erdogan can try to separate the king from the prince, but in the final, the prince is his son. This story has to be twisted some more, there will be some other fall guy, and Erdogan will cave to the king and the US.
Meanwhile, Saudi gets away with murdering a dissident journalist, and Trump continues to praise a congressman for body slamming one.
10
The Saudis' arrogance and hostility toward to world evidences the fact that they believe that they are "too big to fail."
Their explanations from the get go reflects thinking that "falls somewhere between self-delusion and insanity;" more toward the latter.
9
It is astonishing that MBS would be so fearful? Hateful? Arrogant? Reckless? - that he would have Jamal Khashoggi killed in a foreign country, particularly a political rival, and that it would warrant so much effort to do that. It could never have gone unnoticed. Is it possible that MBS could already have seized so much power in Saudi Arabia that he could simply not care? Maybe his success in shaking down his rivals, kidnapping the leader of Lebanon and taking away the political power of the Wahhabi religious leaders convinced him that he could get away with anything. And what about the war in Yemen and the assault on Qatar? Does he think that there is no foreign policy disaster large enough to bring him down? And all of this before he is actually the king. It makes you wonder that, if he gets away with this, what he will do next, and next and next. It appears that it makes Erdogan wonder that as well.
Meanwhile, back here at home, it looks like Trump is floundering around trying to figure out who will win and who will lose so he can take a position and then claim he was right all along. It must have seemed so easy when he was seeing his image projected on those tall buildings and watching the sword dance. Jared must have sounded so smart. But not to worry, except for tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Yemen, there will be life after MBS, the kingdom will go on and the money will still flow.
12
WaPo does not seem to learn from its past costly expeditions. The dastardly nation of Pakistan beheaded (what a barbaric act!) WaPo reporter Daniel Pearl. But why was he there in the first place? More recently, didn’t another WaPo journalist and bureau chief Jason Rezaian enjoy free Iranian food in Evin prison for what appeared to be an indefinite period? Why was Khashoggi in Istanbul or Riyadh instead of swimming in the Washington swamp with his fellow fakers?
When do the US media learn that getting away with impunity for relentless abuse of POTUS in the US doesn’t translate well to foreign soil? These countries have solid borders. In the Middle East, caravan has a different meaning. When you are inside the borders, you obey their laws not ours.
The consequences of forgetting where you are in the world could be deadly.
5
@Appu Nair
Mr Khashoggi was in Turkey for personal reasons, to visit his Turkish fiancée. A Saudi citizen, he went to the Saudi consulate to obtain Saudi issued documents. He was not there to investigate nor report. It is unusual for a consulate to engage in violence against its own ccitizens under cover of diplomatic immunity.
2
@Appu Nair: Are you saying that Jeff Bezos' Washington Post should only print nice things about despots?
@Appu Nair because real journalists are willing to pay the ultimate price in their noble quest of exposing the truth. This is something that should be honored.
This is like taking sides between two entities neither of whom you like or trust. That the Turks have exposed this crime is laudable but these are the same folks who murdered lots of their own people not long ago for demonstrating against Erdogan. As far as the Saudi's go, without the oil, can anyone imagine this kind of relationship with the US after 9/11? That the current admin keeps throwing shelter at the Saudi's is par for the course as the current POTUS has shown a repeated fascination and respect for autocratic and murderous leaders and regimes.
12
Glad to see The NY Times still fully covering this. I was perplexed when it fell off the front pages over the weekend. This is one of the worst incidences of our time. Reverting to identity politics as usual just bolsters Trump, and is exactly what he wanted you to do when he released the transgender policy. He is trying to change this conversation with something shocking and shiny for Democrats and the press to focus on.
16
@A, keen observation. I totally agree!
1
The GOP are such staunch supporters of the second amendment. Let's see how staunchly they support the first amendment. After all Khashoggi, though a Saudi citizen, worked for the Washington Post and resided in the US.
Still waiting to hear from McConnell and Ryan.
The US has lost its moral authority. A potential 110 billion deal, with just 14 billion contracted seems to be worth more than our first amendment to Trump and the GOP. Parkland students must wonder how much the second amendment would be worth to these spineless lawmakers.
24
I thought "your side" (the Left) doesn't believe in freedom of speech anymore? (Not that it ever really did.)
I found this in Wikipedia: Citing a report from Middle East Eye, the Independent said in December 2016 that Khashoggi had been banned by Saudi Arabian authorities from publishing or appearing on television "for criticising U.S. President-elect Donald Trump".
20
As one who was born, educated and grew up in a "former" European Colony/Plantation society, I now extract immense pleasure in watching European countries trying to eat one another over Brexit. My area of the world had many fighters for freedom whom were killed, imprisoned and banished for acts deemed illegal by the colonizers. Some were writers and reporters.
Mr Khashoggi's murder was an act of idiocy on the part of his killers. His was a sacrificial act.
Saudi Arabia and Associates are now in the post Khashoggi era. Nothing which follows should be surprising to anyone with even passing knowledge of the history of despots and their wannabees.
4
@Francis
The only European country trying to eat itself over Brexit is the United Kingdom. The other countries are watching with amusement, curiosity and pity.
Oh, and before the eating, the UK shot itself in the foot and then threatened to blow out its own brains if other countries wouldn't co-operate.
1
Perhaps while Gina Haspel is in Riyadh she can compare torture techniques with MBS and tapes of the torture sessions. Oh, that's right, she, like MBS, ordered torture but then she destroyed the tapes of the sessions, whereas those from his are yet to be released. If ordering torture didn't stop her from being the head of the CIA why should it stop MBS from being the crown prince? Just because his captive was decapitated doesn't mean we can't continue selling arms to Saudi Arabia. After all, the Middle East, unlike the US, is a "rough neighborhood" and we can't be concerned about the niceties of human rights and a free press, especially when there are so many US jobs at stake to make bombs to drop on the Yemenis.
29
In his quest to become Sultan and bless the Middle East with Pax Ottomana, Erdogan might accidentally discover his other callings; highest humanistic principles, unparalleled sense of justice and affording the greatest freedom of press known to man and - here we are - a prophetic call and aim for yet another function - being Caliph! Think about it; Caliph Erdogan! I bet he fancies that!
And I'm facetious!
10
This must be driving Trump crazy. Two of his best friends are telling opposite stories about a grotesque event. Whom to believe? Given his own propensity for lying I’m guessing he will come down on the side of the least amount of truth, especially if that side also represents the largest amount of monetary gain for him.
25
I was hoping for the audio and video evidence. It is not even discussed here.
11
I kind of hope we never have to hear/see it. Hopefully the guilty are brought to justice.
1
@dr. c.c. That was Turkey’s bluff. First it was supposed to be audio video evidence. Later it was reduced to audio only. Now it has descended into Erdogan’s call.
1
If Mr Khashoggi died accidentally, why not the body for the grieving fiancé? If the implicatory audio and video evidence exists, why not release it to the appropriate international authorities?
Clearly, the best concoction has yet to be cooked; but it would seem that no less than a US President is in the kitchen, oven mitts on.
89
@A. F. G. Maclagan
In addition, how about investigating his fiance? Seems like the only reason he went to the Saudi consulate was to get papers for his up coming marriage. What if the whole plot included his fiance as the Saudi's seemed very prepared for his arrival in Turkey.
True.
How many people has Erdogan killed, albeit more discreetly?
11
@R. R., not half as many as George W Bush did, most indiscreetly.
3
Any other US president would have handled this better than Trump, who has demonstrated that he is not worthy of reflecting the values of our country. But that is because he has always openly admired these guys: Putin, Kim, Erdogan, etc., trying to prove he's in their league. Americans and Europeans should be thankful he's not. But the GOP needs to make him understand that the bottom line is not about money. It's our dignity. And that's the difference between Trump and every other US president.
20
This from a guy who sent his security guards to beat up American citizens in broad daylight in downtown Washington, DC.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/14/world/middleeast/turkish-guards-washi...
37
@MR
Just because he is of the same ilk as Mbs and El Trumpo does not mean he is not in the right this time.
His true character is coming through very clearly here if you know that Khashoggi was his personal friend and he is still using this torture murder as a political tool to get something other than justice.
3
@magicisnotreal A broken clock is also right twice a day.
The fact that Saudi Arabia chose Turkey for this operation is significant. It betrays a massive disrespect for Turkey and for Erdogan personally. I bet the Saudis were shocked at the level of surveillance of their consulate was under. Erdogan, who is an authoritarian himself, knew exactly how to capitalize on this brutal murder and create maximum damage to MBS. This is not unlike a fight between a ferret and a snake.
78
MBS was so within his cocoon of privilege that he never thought Erdogan would dare expose it, nor the oil-crazy nations care much if he had. I can't stand Erdogan, but he has handled this beautifully; those slow leaks to the media have made this an international cause celebré. It's a sharp contrast to Trump's complete lack of self-control and inability to keep quiet about anything.
86
"Political analysts described two camps among political leaders: those who wanted a diplomatic arrangement to allow the scandal to blow over..." Scandal? This is a cold-blooded, calculated and viciously carried out murder! The idea that it should be allowed to "blow over" is simply outrageous.
53
Erdogan is no saint. Like the Saudis he too has laid the foundations of an autocratic regime designed to keep out dissent. For him to preach on behalf of Khashoggi is most strange. The tragedy is that the death of a decent man like Khashoggi is being played as a pawn in a game of tussle between Erdogan and the Saudis. Poor Saudis - who are trying to simulate a capitalist society's game of catering to a consumer society's wants. But what is the use of it when they have no desire to be kind or good or decent towards all, yes all, their citizens of whom Khashoggi was one? When these repressive societies end the jailing and murder of their dissident citizens, only then, can they look at more democratic societies in the face. And only then will their capitalist style promotions of satisfying consumer wants look less grotesque than they are at present.
25
@Camestegal I have read that Erdogan and Kashoggi were friends. They were both Islamists.
Erdogan probably also feels that it was disrespectful that the Saudis would carry out this hideous murder in Turkey. Say, shouldn't Trump be angry that a US resident was murdered by the Saudis? Just kidding, as long as there's money to be made he could care less about anybody not named Trump, in particular he couldn't care less about the USA.
2
The sad truth is that Erdogan's address was anything but the naked truth. What about the alleged recordings? When will they be released? How much did Turkey (and the US) know beforehand? What about the alleged calls between the consulate and the Saudi's and US? What is going on with the search for the body? Where is the proof of the bone saw?
Sadly, the Turks (no champions of truth or justice themselves) are playing as much of a game as the Saudis. We can only pray that some relevant actor will find it in its best interests to reveal what actually happened. Only then can there be a rational conversation regarding the appropriate response.
75
@TonyD "What about the alleged recordings? "
More than likely the US and Saudi Arabia (and other countries intelligence, government actors and probably even some press) have seen and heard enough of the tapes to know how much more explosive a reveal of them would be, especially if they are as gruesome and savage as has been alleged.
Turkey has a powerful bargaining chip, probably negotiations are in progress: what does Turkey want to keep the tapes secret or stop mentioning them and how many of its wants are interested countries willing to support and make possible.
1
Granted, the crime was committed on Turkish soil. But Erdogan makes a three ring circus out of the whole affair, and nothing new above what we already know has been revealed. It's not without irony that Erdogan, a self declared dictator, who does not care about human rights and imprisons or kills persons opposed to his politics, condemns the Saudis actions. Hypocritical!
14
@Marianne Pomeroy - Just a small, but important correction. The crime was committed in Turkey, but not on Turkish soil. Embassies and consulates are protected under the Vienna Convention, and thus the Saudi consulate in Turkey was effectively on Saudi soil. There can be no doubt the Saudis have used this protection to both obfuscate the facts and thwart investigations into the incident - which is part of the problem to the international community.
@Alex McPhail
It may be that the murder was technically committed on Saudi soil, but plenty of other offences - conspiracy to murder, unlawful disposal of a body, obstruction of justice and so on - occurred under Turkish jurisdiction.
Plenty enough to keep Erdogan on the case...
My sincere thanks to all the journalists who are diligently reporting this story. We are a better country because of you. This is for the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, and other organizations who report the actual truth. Note: I do not include Fox News, Breitbart, or any of the other right-wing publications in my thanks as they are the water carriers for Trump and his administration and are doing irretrievable harm to this country and world.
62
Gina Haspell is a great person to send. She will know exactly what to look for in the consulate.
She has a lot of experience in the destruction of evidence associated with torture and murder.
64
@WillT26
I do hope she will not assist in further destruction of the same.
@WillT26 You place too much trust in Trump and Haspell. It's clear that Trump wants this case to blow over. He has been ready to accept MBS and Saudi explanation from the beginning. He's not interested in the truth. Haspell may have been sent to Turkey to find out what Turkey wants to make this story go away.
In order to gain any respectability on the world scene the Saudis must replace the Crown Prince with another (untainted) member of the family. The Saudis must be made aware that what happened in Istanbul will not fade from view by itself in a few months.
Some steps required by the US government:
-Stop supporting the Saudis in Yemen by cancelling arms sales
-Appoint an ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Having Jared Kushner playing a central policy making role and who is definitely not an experienced area specialist, results in turmoil. KSA is a strategic country in a region of great importance to the US.
-Appoint an ambassador to Turkey. It is incredible that our policy in the region is just to “wing it”.
What has happened shows the results of our withdrawal from the world scene. As a symbol for this isolationist mentality, our national symbol of an eagle should be replaced by an ostrich.
37
@Jud Hendelman respectability, Impossible. Staying in power, possible.
I applaud Mr. Erdogan's vigorous pursuit of the true story of Mr. Khashoggi's death, and justice for the perpetrators. But... am I alone in appreciating the farce that Mr. Erdogan is acting out? Burning concern for human rights has not been Mr. Erdogan's burning cause until now. Wasn't it Turkish security that attacked protesters outside the Turkish embassy in the US? Well, I'll take situational ethics for $500, Alex.
16
The International Mafia Robber Barons got what they bought when they installed The Con Don in OUR white house.
There is another article in the NY Times today about the Robber Barons who do not care who gets killed - or how they are killed - by the Mafia brethren in their demented quest for money so they attended the prince's "conference". The link is below. Steve Munchkin attended and met with the prince - probably to tell him good job.
These cretins think WE THE PEOPLE are going to let them take over OUR world with their demented, morally bankrupt, socially unconscious, insatiable greed?
Not me. Not now. Not ever again.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/23/business/saudi-conference-khashoggi-k...
27
@njglea The Saudis have a long history of buying US presidents and politicians, it is not something that started with Trump. The Clintons received 100 million from the Saudis and Hillary top aid Hhma Abedin happened to be Saudi.
4
@alexgri And your point is? Also, how is someone born in Kalamazoo Michigan a Saudi?
I'm not disputing you basic point about Saudi money. Interesting that you didn't mention the longstanding financial ties with the Bush family.
And, of course, the Saudi money went to the Clinton Foundation, not into their own pockets
Why do this murder in the Consulate? The Saudis could have arranged for Khashoggi to meet with an unfortunate accident in the street. Answer: the Saudis want everyone to know who did it and thereby intimidate other journalists who might wish to criticize the Prince and the Saudi government.
61
And a consulate in Turkey no less. Was that a nod to the Israeli government’s anger with Turkey for supporting Gaza with humanitarian aid? Probably a stretch...
3
@PETER EBENSTEIN MD I was wondering about that very question. Your answer is quite reasonable. Seems like things ain't going according to plan for the Saudis. Of course it ain't over.
2
You wouldn't ever expect the truth from Donald Trump who himself may be implicated in the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi for not allowing our intelligence agencies who knew of the Saudi plan to "detain" him and did not honor their "duty to warn" policy, and then openly floated the "rogue killers" cover up. And, you certainly are not getting the truth from the Saudis. But, who would have thought that in this topsy turvy world we'd get the truth from Turkish President Erdogan? This is a major international crime committed by a Saudi death squad of an American resident in Turkey. Mr. Erdogan is right to demand that the investigation take place there or perhaps even before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
52
@Paul Wortman As much as I detest Trump, I don't see where he knew about this beforehand. We apparently knew the Saudis were gunning for Khashoggi, but it's a giant leap to go from that to foreknowledge of how it was to be done, where, when.
4
@HKGuy If we knew there was a plan to kidnap we could have warned Kashoggi even if we didn't have all the details.
The truth is supposed to set you free? Instead, in our world, we have a president and the “religious” talking about the bottom line, giving butchers every chance possible to come clean. Putin’s puppet has done well. We have turned on our allies, slam the door on people fleeing for their lives, cave to corporate greed. We have a very slim chance to turn this. Up against Citizens, gerrymandering, fear mongering, and apathy. Vote blue everyone. Your life does depend on it.
18
If the Saudis had not admitted the murder, Trump would have us believe that Khashoggi is alive, well and leading the caravan from Honduras.
45
Premeditated murder. Every day there is more evidence that the Saudi leaders committed premeditated murder of a journalist working for the Washington Post. Murder on foreign soil. What will Donald Trump do now that the evidence is so overwhelming?
15
Hold on a minute. The world is waiting with bated breath the words of Erdogan, the man who's jailed political opponents and who in 2013 in response to protestors to his regime ordered police to suppress the crowd, killing 22 people in the process? This is the guy who's crackdown on the press has led to more journalists being incarcerated in 2016 than anywhere else in the world? The media and the NYT is calling this guy credible? Are you kidding me?
6
@Kurt Pickard No, "the media" is not calling Erdogran "credible", the media is reporting the statements and facts of Trump, Saudi Arabia and Erdogran. For the objective observer looking at the facts, Erdogran is the only one who has exposed the events of that day and provided proof, and who has not been an accessory after the fact in the bungled Saudi cover-up.
14
@Winston Smith
What proof? Talking about proof is not the same thing as having proof. He has been talking for weeks about the supposed audio tape, and today he was supposed to reveal the "nakedness" -- where is that tape?
Turkey, Saudi Arabia, The United States, Russia. They're all the same. Erdogan has locked thousands of dissidents in prison. Donny is trying to do the same thing here. We love to act all moral and righteous, but our country pulls this same act all over the world on a regular basis. Hypocrisy at its finest!
4
@Michael C just the fact that you feel safe openly criticizing the US online makes it not “the same thing here”
9
An excellent point, Michael. Our self-righteous cries of “Democracy” only make Chileans and Iranians laugh … since we helped overturn their democratically elected leaders - and replacement with dictators - in living memory.
5
Wait, there are still Kings and Princes? Come on - it’s the 21st century. You’ve got to be kidding me!
7
Crown prince Mohammed bin Salman is undoubtably involved in the execution of Jamall Khashoggi. These actions have damaged Saudi Arabia's world standing and reputation. Our presidents policies towards Saudi Arabia contributed to the arrogance demonstrated by the Kingdom. Obviously the execution and silencing of critics of the Saudi Arabian monarchy is a regular occurrence. The crown prince meets the definition of despot. The world economy is highly interrelated and sanctions against the desert Kingdom would cause mutual harm. Despite extensive public relations many people have never forgotten that it was Saudi Arabia citizens who destroyed the world trade center, attacked the Pentagon and crash landed and a farm In Pennsylvania. The death of these thousands demands we never forget. The monarchy is supported and sustained by an extreme version of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism. This sect controls all aspects of daily life the country. Religion and politics are fundamentally entwined. The world is dependent on Saudi Arabia oil and its cash flow. Our only choice is respectful cooperation in business dealings but a mindfulness of the full realities.
9
@Jim McGrath. Thanks for the accurate historical account of the symbiotic relationship of extremism between the Saud dynasty and the Wahhabi sect: the original and on-going partner in the establishment of the House of Saud. The Kingdom has been the cradle of terrorism. I only take issue about choices. The world community has choices including an on-going strategy of containment. Containment that of course should not include arming them. As also has been proven over the history of the US, our foreign policy is all about money (did exercise morality in WW II-excepting two atomic bombs-and Korea). We have the perfect current US leader with his evangelical supporters as his Wahhabi partners. As an aside, China and Russia couldn’t be happier.
3
@Jim McGrath
"The world is dependent on Saudi Arabia oil and its cash flow."
It doesn't have to be. We don't have to be dependent on oil, and certainly not on Saudi oil. Can we understand now why Washington almost discourages investment in alternative sources of energy? Do we yet see that there might be more to the enmity between Saudi Arabia and Iran than religious subtleties? The more oil Iran is free to export, the less demand there is for Saudi oil. (Hence sanctions.) And if the world chooses not to buy so much Saudi oil, and turns its back on the cash that has been extorted from the world anyway, what will the Saudis do with their oil and money? Eat it?
5
The key point: the Saudis planned to kill him and then did so.
The warning: Any US business man or woman doing business with the Saudis needs to keep in mind that murder, within or without the kingdom, is now an acceptable form of dispute resolution AND that there will be no action taken by our new "nationalist," "conservative" (=greedy) government.
The question: is murderous greed really what America has become?
21
Perhaps if MBS gives an inflammatory denial, including blaming the Clintons for Khashoggi's death, Lindsey Graham will become his publicist and Trump and the Republicans will throw their full public support behind him.
23
Hey, MBS - nice job. Really smooth with this one.
6
The Saudis can subjugate women, violate guest workers, and impoverish and bomb its neighbors, but it takes the murder of one man who has friends in media to raise outrage.
12
We are at a very low point in our nation's history when a brutal dictator is more credible than the president of the United States.
32
It is ironic that Recep Tayyip Erdogan is going out of his way to take MBS to task for murder of a journalist when he himself has been shown to be ruthless and intolerant to his own critics. Perhaps he protest too much...
4
Saudi Arabia is a closed, controlled society. Both China and Russia seem to have more relative freedom. Why any country would consider them the center-pin of a foreign policy is beyond belief. They have told absurd lies, one after the other. Our president also lies on an hourly basis. The same people who would discipline their children each time they tell a lie somehow accept that the president can do it anytime he wants and vote for him and his friends. America's morality is upside down and it is in a dangerous period like never before in history.
12
@Frankster As opposed to, say WWII, when "uncle" Joe Stalin was our best friend?
If anyone ever had any doubt that Trump has no morals, this situation has proved it to be so. His son-in-law is BFF with MBS, and the Trump and Kushner families would be financially bankrupt (we know they're morally bankrupt) without the Saudi money. As with everything else with Trump, it's all about the money.
VOTE! VOTE! VOTE!
18
@Kathrine,
Our government maintained friendly ties with Saudi Arabia for years before Trump.
GW Bush maintained the relationship after Saudi Arabia murdered thousands of people on 9/11.
President Obama maintained the relationship even has Saudi backed terrorists were murdering our troop in Iraq.
You are a little late to the moral outrage party. But I suppose nothing bad ever happened before Trump.
1
Erdogan is deceptive in this cause. He's using Khashoggi's death for personal gains. Disrupting US/Arab relations benefit Russia and Iran for one. Focusing on Khashoggi distracts political issues at home.
4
It looks like Mr. Erdogan can save America. It is not a laughing matter. US's position must be solidified to push out this rogue prince. My honest request to all congressmen and senators develop some spines to tell a spade a spade. This president is making mess in all directions and spreading lies all over. Do you want these state of US position for your children and grand children? Please wake up and the sooner the better.
17
We are in such a surreal cycle. A fistfight? The president of the USA supporting such clumsy explanation for a calculated torture followed by assassination? The Secretary of State of the USA buying time for the assassins? Erdogan defending a reporter? Well not really, but you get the layered ironies.
And we went from Obama to this in one voting cycle?
People: On Nov 6 vote to return to some sanity in all affairs.
Press: stop airing any idiotic comment made by Trump as if there as a grain of truth. He is using you all. Just say: you lie!
35
How much will we compromise our morals to make a buck?
13
@Paul,
This is a country- not a church.
One Saudi Arabian journalist vs. 330 million American citizens.
The moral thing would be to do what benefits the citizens of the United States.
1
@Paul
The Republicans are in power. They believe that morals are for other people.
9
Might you consider that the well-being of our citizens is bolstered by knowing we did what was ethical, as opposed to purely economical??
2
Mr. Erdogan appears to have been given an offer he cant refuse. Where are the much ballyhooed tapes? The tapes that were supposed to have both video and audio recordings of the entire event. The “ revelations “ today are nothing more than has been known for days. What promises did the Holy Alliance of the Saudis, Israel and America make to keep his silence or hand over the tapes? The world knows Turkey was possibly the next domino to fall in the event of a physical crisis, Mr. Erdogan himself was under investigation for another set of tapes last year, how many of the very pleased looking men surrounding Erdogen as he approaches the lectern are already looking forward to taking their mistresses to their new secret villas in Dubai? The fix is in we are being served cold gruel, Mr. Erdogen appears to have cut a much anticipated deal, perhaps go long today on Turkeys Market. Sorry Mr. Khashoggi, sorrier yet for his bride in waiting and all free people, the death of one journalist in today’s world of Trump, Bibi, Putin and Erdogen doesn’t seem to command justice. Perhaps a new Mr. Snowden will arise and bring light on the matter, truth out of hiding and drag evil men from behind their false veneer of respectability, just not today.
8
I have even more questions, and they pertain to our country. What will it take for Mr. Trump, Bolton, Pompeo, and the equally unethical Jared Kushner to censure Saudi Arabia? How much longer do we have to wait for this GOP Congress to say to its leader, "Enough!" When will half of America wake up to the fact that Trump, his Cabinet, McConnell et al care not one whit for Mr. Khashoggi and for that matter you and me. It's all about greed. It's all about lining their own pockets and that of their rich donors.
To the above players of this game of deceit and perdition, the other 50% of this nation is on to you. Justice is at hand...
23
I don’t know what other facts we are waiting for. KSA admitted killing Khashoggi, we know most of the people involved, we know how close they are to MBS. If there’s anything anyone (US, EU or Turkey) can and wants to do they can do it already.
The problem is Turkey is looking for a bigger bargain with Saudis, EU doesn’t care beyond simple condemnation and US has interest in maintaining its relationship with KSA (not to mention that DJT doesn’t see anytime wrong in killing a journalist). The moral of the story: MBS gets away with this and as a result succeeds to silence dissidents.
6
15 men and a bone saw. Where's the mystery?
Erdogan must have figured out that he's low man on the International Mafia Robber Baron/radical religion Good Old Boys Cabal and very easy to knock off.
Sharks eating sharks in their destructive power struggle. Steve Bannon is grinning like the banshee he is.
WE THE PEOPLE - average people around the world - must stop them NOW. Before they make war fodder of all of us.
16
@njglea, if these guys had dispossed of the body using a Milwaukee Sawzall instead, we wouldn't even be talking about this just like we wouldn't any other construction site fatality. From many comments the sensation of a "bone saw" is all we care about.
@njglea We the people act through elected representatives in government. How else do you propose "we the people" take charge of this??
2
It would be useful for an independent group--say Interpol?--to coordinate an investigation. But, oh, yeah, the head of that operation has been abducted and perhaps killed by the Chinese authorities on the pretext of corruption. And what of other so-called "world leaders?" Putin has blood on his hands and Trump, well, perhaps the less said the better. If we ever see3 his tax returns we'll understand that he owes everybody accused of anything. He's focussed on that caravan full of impoverished people that he thinks are a threat because they are brown.
25
Trump is doing his best to make excuses for the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia who almost definitely ordered this murder. This is part of pattern of attacks on the First Amendment Freedom of the Press by Trump.
Just a few days ago Trump said, that a Montana politician who pleaded guilty to assaulting a reporter who's questions he didn't like, was "my kind of guy," BECAUSE, not in spite, of the fact that he body slammed a reporter, adding that he thinks it won the guy the election. (This means he thinks that a majority of Montana voters are against the First Amendment.) Those that claim this is comedy don't understand that Trump is not a comedian, but president of the USA, which makes this an attack on the Constitution by a sitting president, which its the opposite of funny.
There is also video of a different reporter being slammed to the ground by security at a Trump rally, for no apparent reason.
Trump has repeatedly said that "the press is the enemy of the people," which its exactly what Stalin said while killing 20 million Soviet citizens, including much of the press. At another rally he said of the reporters in their press pen, ", “These are just dishonest, terrible people. I’m telling you that.”
If a president makes one such statement it should send shivers down the spine of free people across the world.
Trump and his party regularly attack the press, and most of the Constitution.
Countries without viable Constitutions regularly kill of tens of thousands of citizens.
24
The more I read about this, the more I hear Benny Hill's theme music in my head.
4
In terms of particulars, it’s been a practice in Saudi Arabia to cut off the right hands of proof who steal. For starters it seems that cutting off a journalist/writer’s fingers when he was alive would fall under normal procedure.
5
If it is said 'naked truth' translate of an Turkish idiom, it means 'just the facts or truth itself' For instance, 'naked life' may mean 'bare reality of life', etc.
1
The NYT had a story on 10/14 about the close friendship between Khashoggi and Erdogan. For me this points to a story that the media are not telling. Khashoggi was not just an ordinary reporter doing an honest job. Remember that Turkey has imprisoned more dissident journalists than any other country in the world. Khashoggi was not only not bothered by this but owned a home in Istanbul. His stories in the Washington Post, which has engineered this outrage in this country, cannot possibly have been objective.
Khashoggi's family had intimate ties with the Saudi royal family. "His grandfather, Muhammad Khashoggi, who was of Turkish origin (Kaşıkçı), married a Saudi Arabian woman and was personal physician to King Abdulaziz Al Saud, the founder of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia." His father became "
The Richest Man in the World: The Story of Adnan Khashoggi Hardcover – June 1, 1986 by Ronald Kessler " through his connections with the Saudi royal family. Jamal was an intimate of the royal family in his youth.
And now Erdogan is reaping all kinds of benefits from Khashoggi's death. Are there no investigative reporters to follow these clues to the truth?
6
One well off man in a suit was murdered. Much outrage.
Meanwhile thousands of poor Yemenis have died at the hands of the Saudis. Erdogan imprisons political opponents at will. Israel kills unarmed protesters with impunity.
Does any of it matter?
10
We should note that Erdogan, mere weeks ago, was fast becoming a pariah to the West. His own rapidly evolving authoritarianism in Turkey, not to mention his inability to distinguish between “good” Kurds and “bad” Kurds, was attacking interests and sensibilities all over the free world. Indeed, his authoritarianism and the methods he has imposed to facilitate it, make the cynical among us smile at this new claim that “I’m shocked, SHOCKED that gambling is going on in here!”
This incident and its aftermath has been a godsend to the man as his country weathers a disintegrating economy and he needs to entice help in reversing that disturbing deterioration. But one must acknowledge that he didn’t engineer the matter and that he’s merely exploiting the pot of gold that unaccountably dropped into his lap, a gift from a Saudi Arabia that much of the world believes has gone off the rails.
As to Saudi Arabia, it appears that this wasn’t merely a clueless reaction to crown princely rage at the damage that a citizen and subject, a national apostate, an expat and an effective and damaging dissident was creating from his sanctuary at the WaPost: it was a calculated and carefully planned act of state murder that very disturbingly testifies to the ignorance of behavioral redlines regarded as existential by his closest allies. Ignorance that vast must be regarded as very dangerous.
There isn’t an obvious and handy solution to all this for King Salman. He took a lot of heat and …
6
… accepted a lot of personal risk for empowering Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to introduce reforms in the kingdom, a sunk bet that will be hard to simply write-off and begin anew. But if I were one of those thousand princes who basically own the kingdom, I might be whispering to the king how I could better manage wearable transition WITHOUT ticking off the entire free world … as well as a Recep Tayyip Erdogan who probably still is marveling at his phenomenally good luck.
3
B is for bone saw. An essential tool for reforming society.
2
@Billy Yes. MBS. Mr. Bone Saw.
4
"His death has badly damaged the reputation of the kingdom and Prince Mohammed, who had held himself out as a leader with plans to reform Saudi Arabia’s economy and society."
If Prince Mohammed's definition of reforming Saudi Arabia's economy and society includes "premeditated murder" and dismembering the body with a bone saw of anyone who continues to be a critic of the kingdom, well then the Saudi's are in worse shape than even they know or realize.
8
The speculations surrounding the dismembering of a human being of international status are by themselves an indictment of our societies: avidly consuming horror and eager to make sensationalism pass as noble search for the truth.
That being said,the Middle East seems to have a knack for the devious and the gruesome. Decisions there are always calculated to carry unintended consequences.
Therefore,my take on the murder is that it was probably miscarried in order to incriminate MBS and put him on the defensive.The question which demands answers :why was Turkey the country chosen for this execution? Mr Erdogan seems to be performing the dance of the 7 veils with the details of the murder. Why?
All of a sudden this psychopathic dictator morphs into the relentless Justice seeker for the world....Come on!
3
Saudi's are the problem in the middle East not Iran.
13
This is certainly a personal problem for Trump and Kushner because of their money ties to Saudi Arabia and new deals with MBS.
America has become a service industry under Trump. You grease the wheels of your foreign policy by greasing the palms of Trump and Kushner. Trump sees America as one giant corporation that needs to be run by him, alone, as its CEO.
MBS sees Saudi Arabia the same way. They have a lot in common especially since they want to accumulate billions for themselves to support obscene hedonistic lifestyles.
Trump is lawless. MBS is lawless. Trump is amoral. MBS is amoral. The list goes on but the bottom line is that Trump and Kushner will go along with the MBS rogue killers theory rather than sacrifice billions of dollars either those going into Trump Org deep pockets or meant to purchase arms to kill more civilians in Yemen.
23
In this pattern of slow release and denial, of hazy details and fabricated responses by parties enmeshed in political and economic webs, it seems to me that the only way to know the facts would be through an independent, unbiased international investigation.
6
@Charles Kaufmann
"the only way to know the facts would be through an independent, unbiased international investigation."
Really? Isn't it obvious.
I don't like Erdorgan before, but he showed more spine and morality than many in the GOP ! Time for them to abandon Trump and stand up to his lies and campaigns to silence the media!
15
The president and his enablers supported this cold blooded murder and now offer feeble cover for their Saudi allies. There is no atrocity of which this president is not capable if it serves him. There is much worse to come as he stays in office.
11
MBS Has money and he will buy every thing even politician
like TRUMP , TRUMP couldn't ignore money of MBS .
So MBS will Survive Despite of killing Khashoggi crisis.
2
Don't worry MBS, buy enough luxury apartments in Trump properties or book enough rooms at Trump resorts and Trump will say it was done by a 400 lb guy in his bed.
Dictators have to stick together, for a price.
16
Why is the president of Turkey asking tougher, smarter questions about the brutal murder of a US resident than the president of the United States? Why do we accept this?
16
And here I am this morning feeling respect for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and feeling embarrassment and shame for our so-called president (lower cap).
5
could the total of 15 relate to easily concealable carry on?
He walked out of the consulate. It was a rogue killing. It was an interrogation that was supposed to evolve into a kidnapping. It was a fist fight that escalated into a strangling. A liar has to have a long memory. Obviously the Saudis can't remember what they had for breakfast. The main piece of forensic evidence will never be found. He was either cremated or buried in various parts of the Turkish wilderness.
"I would love if he wasn't involved" POTUS He seems to have so much love for ruthless killers and dictators
8
After living and working in the Middle East for five years I learned two very important things that permeates Arab culture. And because of these two very deep beliefs I am not surprised by the puzzlement the Saudi's are showing at the global outrage. First, It's all about family and family does whatever is necessary to protect honor or what they perceive as honor. Look how widely accepted the practice of honor killings throughout the Muslim world was and probably still is. And secondly there is no level of lying that is considered unacceptable to achieve ones goals. From the earliest age one learns that lying is an effective and honorable tool. I personally experienced the "Arab Smile" countless times when I caught them in a lie. They don't change course other than to add another level to the lie. Tey'll never acknowledge it either. You just move on. They truly do not believe this is anybody's business but their own and that will never change.
23
“The speech made clear that Mr. Erdogan had no intention of dropping a case that has created an international furor, and that he would press the Saudis for an honest accounting of a killing that he pointedly noted occurred inside his country.”
How about this? Mr. Erdogan starts with an “honest accounting” of all the other killing that has occurred inside his country and we’ll go from there.
4
Aside from the moral imperative for our president to condemn the Saudi murder of a journalist, Trump's dithering has handed Erdogan a position where he can appear the defender of human rights.
192
@Teddy Robertson
Mr. Roberson, I appreciate your comment. Your brevity, clarity and conciseness paints the most accurate and equally alarming picture.
Well done.
7
The only more brazen than the Saudi's assassination of an innocent person, is Turkey's attempt to wrap itself in the flag of justice and human rights in investigating that assassination.
4
It took a little more than two weeks and tremendous international pressure for the Saudis to finally admit that Khashoggi was dead, a fact most of the world knew pretty quickly. So now, is this going to take another month for people to learn what really happened? Nobody believes the Saudi explanation. They killed their credibility the moment they denied knowing what happened. The biggest obstacle to getting to the truth is the Trump Administration. They want to keep the cozy financial relationship going, so this has to fall on the Turkish government to tell the world the truth. Erdogan is no great leader, true, but right now he's all we have to learn the facts. Let's face it, we will never get to the bottom of it if anyone has to rely on Trump & co. And that is almost as tragic as Khashoggi's murder.
9
The temerity of the Saudi's to commit this atrocity on foreign soil was a fatal mistake. Botched or not the murder has far reaching consequences for the stifling of free speech. While journalists are our valuable source of info for us to decipher it is our option to hear all sides. The focus here now is the mandatory security all journalists deserve to have.
7
like everything else funneled through the trump compulsive lie machine, an obscene tragedy will be so muddled, obfuscated and reinterpreted as to become recycled gobbledegoop.
yet what remains is the one sad truth that a journalist was horribly massacred by our "allies" as our government blatantly tries to cover it up.
There are no lows. America just keep sinking.
24
Erdogan is famous for saying about democracy "Democracy is like a bus, you take it to your stop, then you get off". He is not an ally of the U.S. and is moving ever closer to Russia. Saudi Arabia will give him some scalps but not all 18 and certainly not the Prince. He has a price, it will be paid.
The US betrayed the Arab Spring by allowing the unholy alliance of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Israel to launch the anti-democratic coup in Egypt and slaughter thousands. Turkey and Qatar were targeted for coups because of their support of the Arab Spring and the fact that they are much more democratic and liberal than their rivals. The US as usual backed the wrong side because of the Israeli, UAE, and Saudi lobbies which also subverted our 2016 elections.
4
@M.R. Khan
Spring this or Fall on that, Khan. If you want to know the story, you're hearing/reading it. This will essentially be the version of record. A conclusion cloaked in language deemed the mostly likely to be believed. While leaving justice to those (another alliance you wouldn't like?) with the wherewithal to lessen the disruption to the living.
"... Mr. Erdogan said that he would call King Salman of Saudi Arabia and ask that the case be adjudicated in Istanbul, not Riyadh or elsewhere in Saudi Arabia."
"ask"? There you have it Khan; this is a wrap! Print it!
1
@M.R. Khan, the US had no business interfering with Arab spring in the first place. I distinctly remember Nick Kristof on a tree top cheering the Arab spring and writing furiously, Obama do something, get in get in. So did Tom Friedman. They wanted American involvement from the start...
1
Erdogan is an authoritarian who has locked up scores of Turkish journalists to suppress criticism of his regime and also imprisoned an American minister, for two years, on trumped up charges to pressure the US to extradite an Erdogan critic living here.
Erdogan is making every effort to leverage this hideous Saudi crime. He wants Turkey, which aligns with Iran, to be the dominant power player in the Middle East.
Erdogan, who probably has all embassies in Ankara bugged, needs to show his evidence to US intelligence.
As horrendous as the murder of Khasoggi is, let us remember that places like Turkey, Russia, China and Egypt, silence journalists and dissidents on a regular and frequent basis.
5
Reading Mr. Erdogan's words makes me even more ashamed of Trump's groveling.
The Saudis will throw money into the wind by the bucketful in an effort to make this go away, and plenty of it will land on Trump. But Jamal Khashoggi had something Trump could only dream of. People who loved him. Real friends who cared about him simply because of the man he was. And that will never go away.
30
Seems as Jamal Khasoggis murder will be used to get MBS replaced by his younger brother Khalid bin Salman who has been the Saudi ambassador to the US the past year and half.
He is seen as more predictable and moderate - whatever that means for a Saudi prince...
The real way and possibly only way for SA to save face would be to replace MBS.
10
So Jamal was stripped of his clothing before his torture began, otherwise the body double would have been in blood soaked clothing?
A comment a week or so ago said that this hits us in the gut because we can identify with the suffering of one man and his family, but the thousands the Saudis have killed in Yemen are overwhelming to get our heads around. Maybe in the long run Khashoggi's murder will prevent many future murders in Yemen and elsewhere.
11
Mnuchin's meeting with MBS was as disgraceful as Pompeo's, making the Trump administration complicit in Khashoggi's murder and dismemberment. While Erdogan did not mention having audio or video tapes, I am sure he does. Turkey, after all, is a police state just like Saudi Arabia, meaning all diplomatic facilities in the country are probably bugged.
19
The more time passes the more convinced I am that humanity is doomed. Bin Laden and Saddam were the good guys all along. Compared to Putin, Trump, Erdogan , MBS, Xi, Assad etc etc.
1
There’s no “complexity” to our complicity. Trump knew of SA’s intent to abduct Jamal Khashoggi. Trump did not warn. Under sec 18-4 he is an accomplice before and after the fact.
Wake up, media. That’s the story. Trump has been in tweet overdrive since that rubicon was crossed.
Kidnapping, torture, dismemberment, murder, and conspiring to cover up these crimes are all prosecutable offenses that should be investigated and if probable causes demonstrated, prosecution to the full extent of the law is demanded.
8
Finally, an official report from Turkey, depicting the carefully planned assassination and dismembering of Jamal Khashoggi by the Saudis, under orders from it's crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman. Aside from Salman's deserving prison (or worse), the United States cannot stand complicit by standing by, as if nothing occurred, and in Trump's world of fiction and intrigue. Our bully in-chief must squarely face the facts, stop supporting a murderer, and break the false 'friendship' of two countries that really have only interests. The truth is in front of us, and demanding justice. This is a crucial time to prove U.S.' moral standing in the world...or not.
8
@manfred marcus
We have no moral standing in the world. 45 and his followers, supporters keep moving the line one should not cross over. There is no humanity to individuals whose only guiding light is financial.
13
Now that the evidence of a premeditated murder is pretty much a given, and given the preposterous lies that the Saudis have said about Mr. Khahoggi's torture, dismemberment and murder (order of events chronological) we, as a nation, must distance ourselves from the Saudis if we are ever, ever, to have a scintilla of self respect and moral integrity. But if money and arms sales and war with Iran are THAT important to us, then let's just drop this charade once and for all, and just admit that we could care less about freedom, democracy, rule of law, and the human rights and admit, and at least live with honesty, that true, we are just as despicable as the Saudis.
13
I believe the CIA chief must have pressured or persuaded Erdogan to hold off from revealing more and wait until behind the scenes negotiations will bear fruit and both USA and Turkey will get what they want from SA in exchange for letting MBS get away with this horrible murder and pretend to believe an alternative story. MBS surely works now with very experienced American PR and lobby firms to ride the storm.
6
MBS has to go. This is just the latest in a series of vicious impetuous acts that show he is unfit to hold the reigns of power. He has made many enemies. Thousands of Saudi students and their families have had their education disrupted because of his gross over reaction to Canada's Chrystia Freeland's tweet demanding the release of human rights activists who are still imprisoned by this vicious autocrat ; some have been sentenced to death. This over reaction has resulted in a number of Saudi refugee claimants who will have little difficulty gaining Canadian citizenship. His war crimes in Yemen also cry out for justice.
9
You write that the speech by the Turkish PM "made clear that Mr. Erdogan had no intention of dropping a case that has created an international furor."
Of course not. What we need to focus on our interests in this case.
I have a request to President Trump: "Please, please do not get dragged into the tiff between Turkey and Saudi Arabia. We have no dog in this fight. The US media and some politicians will goad you into taking sides and thus eventually antagonizing both sides in this fight. Please don’t. No tweets, no press conferences, no public pronouncements..."
The US media is portraying Mr. Erdogan as Mr. Mother Theresa and MbS as the devil incarnate. Let them duke it out; we must stay out.
In a few days, the media will move on to covering your victory parade after the mid-term elections. Khashoggi like Kavanaugh will be forgotten like last week’s catch and the media hounds will go after fresh kill.
We need to remember from the Iran-Iraq war. US should have let the two fight it out to the bitter end. Who cares who would win? Instead, we interfered and our interference made Iran win the war.
1
This underscores our continuing absurd policy in the Mid East. We will do anything to hold Iran accountable and nothing to hold Saudi Arabia accountable. Both are extreme Islamic states. One has a decadent ruling class that lives extravagantly and hedonistically when out of the country the other a ruling class that apparently holds themselves to the same absurd religious dogma as the people they subjugate. The difference is the Saudi’s are pragmatic enough to acknowledge Israel the other foolish enough to pretend otherwise. Both are dedicated to the spread of extreme Islamic beliefs and the conquest of western values. Oh! And the Saudi’s are expert at buying American politicians and the financial elite. Meanwhile the Turks are countering these two Islamic states with their own brand of conservative Islamic political power. We should be smart and play them all off against one another. We should have a long term strategic plan and routine tactics to keep them all off balance and wondering. That would take a US foreign policy that put our interests, the American people’s interest over those of monied interests. That ain’t happening.
9
@Al Cafaro...."The difference is the Saudi’s are pragmatic".....No. The difference is that the Saudi's sponsored the terrorists organizations Al Qaeda and ISIS and no doubt the Taliban as well. That Bin Laden and 15 of the 19 9/11 terrorists were themselves Saudi was no accident. Further, Saudi Arabia is Sunni while Iran is Shia. All of the terrorist attacks in the U.S. (and Europe) were carried out by Sunnis. The Shia (as in Iran) have not been involved in any of the suicide bombings. I am not saying Iran is warm and friendly, but they have not been involved in any of the terrorist actions we regard as attacks by Muslim extremists.
9
How many American military men and women were killed by improved IEDs which Iran provided to Iraq?
The Saudis regard human beings that have become a nuisance as disposable.
Just like Trump.
Is this really what we want for the USA?
7
Today is the day that the United States must step away from the Saudi government, threaten to break off diplomatic relations, suspend all arms and other deals, and demand that MBS be arrested along with all others complicit in this atrocity.
Failure to do precisely the foregoing will be an admission that Trump and the current United States government places more value on commercial and financial relations, than it does on the life of any and all who stand in the way of Liberty and Justice.
It's a sad day for America, and all Americans who helped bring us such shame should be afraid to have their children know that they put this government into power.
Trump needs to go, along with his gang of enablers, and if Mueller can't make it occur then that selfish self-serving bunch of incompetents in Congress, and or the Justice Department, must end this Presidency sooner than later.
Every passing day further diminishes us in the eyes of the world.
23
@Mel Farrell
So we'll stated
1
It is curious kabuki. Easy to understand why Trump and the Saudis want to instill fear in journalists worldwide, harder to figure out why Erdogan is playing this in a way to make his fellow despots squirm. A bigger slice of the pie, perhaps? Probably won’t end well for him. Mobsters don’t generally tolerate junior members acting on their own.
2
“It is clear that this savage murder did not happen at the drop of a dime but was a planned affair,” Mr. Erdogan said, challenging the official Saudi account that the journalist was accidentally killed in a melee inside the consulate.
I believe his premise rang true the moment "a bone saw in the consulate" was revealed. I highly doubt that tool is included in the nightly dinnerware settings.
8
Well, what a rogue’s gallery. Erdogan, Trump, MBS, they all deserve each other, not to mention Putin doubtless behind the scenes like a sleeping crocodile. Into the mix now step Mnuchin and Haspel. This is like the Capulets and Montagues, gangsters all of them. I wouldn’t trust Erdogan for a second, it’s merely a miracle that he seems the good guy here. I don’t believe that for a moment. His speech today was a major anticlimax and mere hot air. I wonder if the videos really exist. I assume that’s why Ms Haspel was dispatched to find out, plus she may have been seeking to rein the Turks back to protect Trump/MBS.
8
Erdogan more truthful than Donald? How ironic, especially about a journalist, people that Erdogan has been jailing.
8
I am also concerned about Turkey’s angle on this; they are obviously angling for something here. My best guess is that by disempowering the American Government they can strengthen their hand against the Kurds. But if the Saudis arranged the killing of an American journalist and we cozied up to them we have only our government to blame. And seeing as we elected them, I mean we have only ourselves to blame.
The only way forward from this is to accept that we have allowed the Saudi Government to exist for the last sixty five years at least because doing so seemed in our best interest. It has never been and the Saudis have played us for fools this entire time. We need to demand they either need to step into the twentieth century or find another benefactor. For ourselves I would say we should also be re-assessing our allies in the Middle East. I am no fan of the current administration in Turkey but if forced to choose between Erdogan and MbS I would say go with the country that allows women to vote. Well allows anyone to vote really. I feel that for all its short comings there is at least something to work with in Turkey. Not so much in Saudi Arabia.
4
From one murderer to the next. But keep it up, this naked butchery needs to be uncovered and exposed to the world
9
So once again, Trump, the self-proclaimed stable genius was shown to be a fool on the international stage.
• Rogue killers
• He could be a terrorist, who knows
• It looks like he’s dead and until a miracle happens
• Bad stuff, bad
• Not positive, not positive at all
Also exposed as fools:
• Kushner
• Mnuchin
• Pompeo
The best part in this despicable kabuki is that the so-called 110 B deal that would create millions of jobs is nothing but a “Memoranda of Agreement” as reported by Paul Krugman. A piece of paper that the Crown Price can easily tear asunder without the help of a bone saw. So much winning, indeed!
“We are the laughingstock of the world.
Everyone is laughing at us. Everyone.”
—Donald J. Trump
The 45th President of the United States
41
@Opinioned!BRAVO! Well said. Thank you!
5
I think it is possible that Fethullah Gulen will be returned to Turkey from the United States, if Erdogan gets what he wants, and the tapes that Turkey claim to show the brutal death of Jamal Khashoggi will disappear or show inconclusive evidence after Fethullah Gulen is in Erdogan's hands.
6
This illustrates how shaky and incompetent the MBS regime really is.
If the cream of their intelligence service can only produce this as product, what does it say about successfully countering a coup?
11
Saudi Arabia will potentially purchase 110 billion dollars worth of arms from US companies over the next ten years.
So far only $14 billion has been contracted.
"Potentially" is the word that will allow the Saudi murderers to murder again with impunity, thanks to Donald Trump and the feckless GOP. We need to hear more about the Trump family business and it's Saudi entanglements. Donald Trump said this in Memphis in 2015: "I get along great with all of them; (Saudis), they buy apartments from me," Trump said. "They spend $40 million, $50 million. Am I supposed to dislike them? I like them very much
Trump and the GOP will try to make this about whether the Prince was personally involved in planning the murder. That is not the main issue; It is that the nation of Saudi Arabia acted to kill a person that was critical of the government.
America became America in a revolution based on the right to criticize government and made it the very first of our Constitutional ammendments because it is that important.
265
@rich Beautiful Trump quote; he values the Saudi connection because they buy apartments from him. That's about it: good for Trump. So we're stuck with them – and him.
3
Whats Erdogan's plan? Erdogan has not held back on exposing the Saudis. His audacity will not go unnoticed and could result in a major shift in the dynamic of the middle east. Whatever is Erdogan's beef, my hope is that the civil war in Yemen ends and that misery and starvation of the Yemenis people ceases immediately. If KURDISTAN gets formed as a separate state and so does PALESTINE in any comprehensive middle east peace settlement it could be the much awaited stability of a life time in the middle east.
8
So as a magnanimous gesture, why doesn't Erdogan release all the many, many members of the press that his government has arrested? Or why does he not release (or reinstate in their jobs) the manyy, many, people he has prosecuted as enemies of his state who do not happen to be members of the press?
13
Everything what you hear is beyond words,
I hope this is not the new normal .
What I see here is a lot of political shifting around.
3
@Newscast2.
Everytime we ask is this is the new normal the answer invariably, and sadly, is yes.
1
World is eager to see what role America 'champion of human rights' plays in helping its petro-ally to maintain its old bonhomie.
12
It is rather head-spinning that Erdogan, who is a ruthless oppressor of opposition in general, and, journalists in particular, should emerge with information that stakes out a moral high ground related to the murder of Mr. Khashoggi in Istanbul. If the Turkish government has audio or other tape information that document the murder why not release it? One intriguing argument is that Erdogan may be playing for a Saudi financial bail-out of his tanking Turkish economy. Or maybe, IF Erdogan was friendly with Khasoggi, as reported, he takes this grisly murder of a friend on Turkish soil personally. Whatever the motivations, let's hope that the FACTS emerge and whomever in Saudi Arabia, all the way up to Prince Salman, should be held to account. And the US should certainly not be enabling this Saudi cover-up. Or selling arms to be used to massacre Yemenis.
159
@Sally Peabody
Or, by taking the moral high ground, Erdogan might be trying to smooth Turkey's acceptance into the EU.
Perhaps he's a sly tiger trying to change his stripes –– from ruthless oppressor of free thinkers to their truth-telling hero.
And where is US leadership?
Counting their 30 pieces of silver in the form of defense contracts and purported sales of weaponry ... which is being used and will be used against overmatched Yemenis.
Depressing and revolting.
1
The gruesome, premeditated murder of the journalist Khashoggi in the consulate of Saudi Arabia in Turkey warrants rejection of Saudi Arabia as an "important ally" of the US. Congress and the American public, by legislating and demonstrating, is advised to cease buying oil from and financing weapons production for Saudi Arabia. One is reminded of the portion in Genesis where Abraham rejects an offer to take the tangible spoils of war between two groups of bad, corrupt kings. The US is advised to preserve democratic values and reject pollution from Saudi oil and money. Instead, the US should promote development of energy from the sun and the wind instead of pollution from fossil fuels from all sources.
11
The audio and video tapes, presuming they do exist, should be shared with US intelligence. We need facts and the evidence, not more speculation or lies. Mr. Kashoggi's body must also be recovered and returned to his family in the US.
7
@CJ
Why only US intelligent? Why not with the other 200 countries in the world? Share it with the UNO.
3
It's comforting to know that there are leaders in this world like Erdogan, who are committed to truth, justice and - most important - the right of journalists to publish freely without threat of violence. I just wish the United States had one.
3
@BKLYNJ
You don't know who Erdogan is or you would not have written that comment. Google his name and read a little. Wishing for someone like him is sort of like wishing for a plague.
7
@BKLYNJ Don't kid yourself. Erdogan has imprisoned scores of journalists and dissenters himself.
5
@BKLYNJ I looked for some sign that this post was dripping with sarcasm. Erdogan committed to justice and the rights of journalists? You are either very knowledgeable and assuming others are equally so, or a bit naive. Which is it? ;-)
1. Trump lies routinely, almost every time he opens his mouth, and insults and mocks any unfavorable by much deserved criticism by the press.
2. Erdogan ruins the careers of critics, throws reporters in jail, and tortures people who want basic human rights.
3. The Saudis have been routinely murdering people for "treason" (e.g., free speech) ever since the House of Saud came to power. The main difference with Khashoggi's beheading was that it wasn't done in public.
3
Trump and Kushner, by their abject pleadings to MBS for military contracts and other financial support, their continuous groveling flattering of him plus their refusal to be be concerned by his many previous human rights violations, surely contributed mightily to the Prince’s perception of himself as a man who could get away with anything, so he did.
21
That President Erdogan is holding the press conference about Khashoggi’s murder gives the game away as a political pressure ploy. If Turkey were sincere in its declarations of criminal prosecution, wouldn’t a Turkish prosecutor or senior police officer announce the investigation’s findings?
3
Tom Clancy can't make this stuff up except in one of his novels it wouldn't be this clumsy.
If the Saudis really wanted to kill this guy, they should have given a call to the Russians who apparently are experts in killing critics in foreign countries!
21
Earlier, Khashoggi met crown Prince MBS's brother in Saudi Arabia. What if the brother is behind this brutal murder, on purpose, so as to put the blame on his brother, the prince MBS?
4
Nice try at diversion but Turkey's surveillance data point to MBS himself.
4
Why so much coverage of Khashoggi ??? Millions are dying or will die in Yemen and Syria. Is this exaggerated coverage because he is a protected species i.e journalist? Journalists are no more important than anyone else. The focus on him rather than the millions who are dying is just appalling.
3
@Gary - From the coverage I have seen in the US, the attention paid to Khashoggi has increased focus on Yemen.
11
@Gary
If we're talking in terms of impact, journalists are in fact more important than others. The free press is absolutely essential to a free society. Repercussions for their murder are key to democracy.
It is a shame people don't care much about the wars going on in the world. However, that's no reason to tear down the coverage of Khashoggi's murder, which is an undeniably positive thing.
5
@Gary
"The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic."
3
Of course, and as usual, Americans are unable to see the probable truth behind the cover-up. Donald, the genius, was the first to suggest the rogue murder team concept that
the equally brilliant M.B.S. quickly adopted. The American President conceived the rogue team idea with the help of one of his most trusted advisors known to the world as Mr. Vince McMahon, the President of World Wrestling Entertainment. Linda and Vince McMahon are well-known
around the world as wrestling promoters. Linda, in her spare time, also helps the President formulate foreign policy.
37
Oh no, we see it quite clearly. We understand he is actively plotting and threatening and still gathering power. It’s extremely dangerous here. None of this is lost on us. We are exercising muscles we never knew we had. We will rise up against him, we will no choice but to do so. It’s going to get very ugly, so stay in Canada.
3
@Santo Carbone Consider Jared Kushner and Stephen Miller as complicit in the embarrassing American reaction to this atrocity.
5
@Santo Carbone
Don't equate "Americans" to Donald Trump. You must realize there's a difference considering you're reading this article on a popular American new outlet. Speaking in these sorts of negative prejudiced statements only pushes nations apart when we need to be pulling together in opposition to our politicians' divisiveness.
2
Among the postings here several people question Erdogan's motives, and some think he is sold out. That primarily should reflect the "bad reputation" of Erdogan, who is not friend to journalists to say the least. Yet, some people blame the whole murder on the Turkish president.
I have the untested impression that the NYT readers understand why they read; whereas, one cannot deduce a rule out of limited sample sizes, it is very clear Erdogan's sins caught up with him and he could be the fall guy soon.
3
@Arctic Ox
I'm far from a fan of Erdagon, but his story has far more credibility than MBS' or Trump's shifting excuses.
6
No doubt remaining that he was murdered, but Saudis, and the Prince ordered it. All that will play out, but...
The larger questions remaining in my mind are :
a) Why is Turkey playing so slowly and purposefully with the revelations and evidence? What are they after from Saudis? And does this have anything to do with why they didn't try to stop the murder, even though they apparently were aware of the hit squad and document their arrival so thoroughly?
b) Why is Trump being coy, saying the Prince's denials sounded credible, and even promoting the "rogue killer" story. Normally he blathers out anything that comes to mind, often before he thinks about it much, and often without factual basis. Why is he so cuddly with the Prince on this? Is there some Kompromat that Saudis have on him, like what Russia has?
The plot of this story is not done unraveling.
34
I'm not sure about Erdogan's game, but whatever Trump is up to will have something to do with personal financial gains for himself and his family.
23
@Mark Miller Erdogan wants Fethullah Gulen back, who is living in the U.S. Perhaps Jamal Khashoggi and the Saudis' responsibility for his death is an opportunity to arrange this.
4
Erdogan may have motives, but what is a shame is that Trump is constantly talking about the $110B deals at stake. I’m sure that nobody wants this money, and those who are willing to sacrifice our western values for a few bucks should count on ethical politician to make the hard decision.
1
When politicians speak, it is rare for them to speak truth, unless the truth is to their benefit---makes them look better than an easy-to-tell lie.. We have seen so much obvious falsehood emanating from the Saudis that they are obviously fishing for some fairy tale version that makes them appear more like human beings than the most probable true story paints them. Trump and party have long lost and continue to lose any trace of credibility that decency demands. Of all the different ways of looking at the truth , only Erdogan's version is reasonable---not because he is the only honest man in the bunch but because the truth suits his purposes of making Turkey look much better than Saudi Arabia.
35
While the audio and visual tapes depicting the brutal murder of Kashoggi have been referenced enough by the Turkish government, the reason they haven't been released is most likely because of ongoing negotiations between Mr. Erdogan of Turkey and Prince Mohammed of Saudi Arabia. If Erdogan gets what he wants from Saudi Arabia, the tapes may never see the light of day. Everything is political, even murder.
56
@Wally Wolf
Or may be they do not want to reveal the sources and methods used to collect the intelligence.
2
MBS and Erdogan are both as trustworthy as Trump and Pompeo.
But Edogan’s version is credible and has facts supporting him. And the Saudi varying versions are laughably not credible. In fact, the Saudi versions are so ham-handed as to be insulting.
The barbarism war against civilians in Yemen and the savage ambush and death of a dissident should cause the US to reassess its relationship with Saudi Arabia.
But the lies to Trump and Pompeo show profound disrespect for the US and shouldn’t be tolerated. What was Trump thinking when he sent Money Man Mnuchin to Saudi Arabia? Could that look any more craven? We should be recalling our Ambasador and sending theirs packing. At least temporarily.
The Saudis have their own agenda. They use us as we use them. Let’s not be naive enough to think that a sword dance and a couple of pajama parties with Jared and MBS change that equation.
160
@Rita Hear Hear Rita! Very well said, clear and concise summary. I could not have said it better and agree with your entire summation.
4
@Rita
In this gruesome murder case, Mr. Erdogan is actually much more trustworthy than both Trump and Pompeo.
The US doesn't even have a Senate confirmed ambassador in Saudi Arabia, only a so-called acting one. And yes, he should be recalled immediately.
As to Saudi ambassador to the US, he is the younger brother of M.B.S and left the US seven days after Mr. Khashoggi's for Riyadh and should be banned from returning to US.
8
@Rita
We do not have an Ambassador in Saudi Arabia to recall; nor do we have one in Turkey! Just another way that Trump mismanages American interests.
3
How amazing is it that strongman Erdogan is the hero of this story! There's no silver lining in this story. Even its hero is a mafioso-style ruler.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-25/erdogan-the-world-s-n...
42
This simple binary choice, which of his friends to keep, must be incredibly confusing for the US president.
5
The level of tradecraft employed in this incident is so amateurish that it leads me to believe that it wasn't a state planned hit but a rogue operation done to curry favor with MBS, a kind of palace intrigue. I also don't think the killing itself was planned, I think they wanted to grab Khashoggi and rendition him back to Saudi Arabia where he could be held indefinitely until he changed his tune.
I also think that the amount of Turkish surveillance and counter-intelligence against the Saudis exceeds what could normally be expected of Turkish intelligence. My guess is that the Russians, looking for cooperation with the Turks in Syria and also looking to disrupt the US/Saudi relationship tipped off the Turks to this operation which is why the Turks seem to have near real-time intelligence as it happened.
The net result is tsuris for the US and Saudi Arabia, Erdogan gets to win points of the Saudis, and the Turks and the Russians wind up agreeing on where the lines are in northern Syria -- the Turks gain a sphere of influence and free reign against the Kurds, the Russians a guarantee that Erdogan won't provide safe haven to anti-Assad elements as Assad regains control of most of Syria.
I don't see any other explanations accounting for the sloppy work of the Saudis, the brashness of the event, and the level of close surveillance the Turks pulled off on the Saudis, who otherwise have enough enemies to be more careful.
14
@Mobocracy
“I also think that the amount of Turkish surveillance and counter-intelligence against the Saudis exceeds what could normally be expected of Turkish intelligence.”
Bingo! Who other than the Russians could this be though? Hint: The other big regional player.
10
@Mobocracy
There is no evidence for anything you say.
2
@CJ To be sure, it’s all speculation but at the same time what “evidence” is there in this case at all? There’s not even good proof Khashoggi is even dead besides Turkish assertions and fumbling and ever shifting Saudi admissions.
I was mostly trying to provide a narrative that put extraordinary events into believable circumstances and fitting it into existing geopolitics.
Munchkin met with MBS to get the new, improved " explanation " and party favors for Trump. No problem. Right, GOP ?????
103
There were some very fine pathological liars, aiders and abettors on all sides Jamal Khashoggi torture and cold-blooded murder.
November 6 2018
Make America Sane Again
198
Make America Sane Again? I think it’s well past that. Globally things are going downhill fast.
7
These are important questions to be asking but let's face it. The prince has Trump and son-in-law Jared on his side and believes he can act with impunity, particularly when it comes to a meddlesome reporter. The sad thing is, he is right.
52
The report says Koshoggi's murder has "soured" relations between SA and the US. My impression is that the murder has not affected SA's relationship with Trump whatsoever and that Trump views the murder as a PR problem to be gaslighted. At a minimum, the US should be leading the international charge for an independent investigation. If US intelligence has confidence that MBS ordered the murder, as it strongly appears, the US should be pressuring for leadership change.
89
Okay one thing is at this moment.
Where is the body?
A man died in an embassy can be a news , a man disappeared in an embassy is a scandal.
I think the Saudi's should hire some undertakers to stich the body back and gave the family at least.
If there is no body , what would be the defense on their side.
So far everything can be explain with a simple mafia style butchery.
13
Erdogan is really milking this for all it's worth. And he's no humanitarian, that's for sure. I'm very suspicious of his motives, not to mention his sources of information. How much did he know even before the murder was committed? Saudi Arabia is beyond the pale. But Erdogan is not far behind. We should not be embracing him, he is someone to be wary of.
31
@CHN
So, some people fly in your country, kill a prominent person and leave, and you will say, "Oh well! That is too bad!" And you are the head of your country's government.
If you are questioning motives, question Trump's why did the Haskel woman went to Turkey? To stop Erdogan revealing the gory details! That appears to be the case, not your Inspector Clouseau questioning of Erdogan's motives.
9
The Saudis never act do anything without US permission or cover. Trump and Jared had to give permission or were informed that he would be murdered before it happened. That is why Trump is so nervous. He didn't think people would care about a US non-citizen and a journalist. Someone has Trump or Jared recorded discussing it with the Saudis. Wait until the shoe drops. Hopefully this will be the end of our long national nightmare and Trump will be gone.
64
@Axixic
I hope you are right. This might explain why the Saudis have come up with stupid stories, they are waiting for trump to save them. Trump probably gave them the different excuses as to where could the journalist could be.
4
This "revelation of the naked truth" that Erdogan had threatened the Saudis with, going so far as to give them 48 hours notice implying that they could take some unspecified action to prevent it, does not simply not make good on the threat, it sows doubt as to what "naked truth" the Turks are actually privy to.
The world was expecting a full blow by blow description of the murder, especially how he was dismembered with a bone saw by a pathologist, which is the "truth" that Turkish intelligence leaked they had audio of. Instead all we heard was how a 15 member team arrived on the day of the disappearance from Saudi Arabia and a question of what could their role possibly have been if not to commit a murder.
Now the Turks and the Saudis are competing over which of them should be accepted as having the authoritative Islamic view on the most important issues. And so the Turks do have a very strong motive and much to gain by discrediting the Saudis. This is after all why they are keeping this matter on the global agenda and not allowing it to fade.
After failing to reveal the truth we all assumed the Turks had irrefutable evidence it is now time for world leaders to demand that the Turks produce the audio they leaked they were in possession of, as this is the sole basis of the outrage of the world. And if they refuse to make it available some very serious questions need to be asked.
122
@Michael Stavsen The questions have been asked, Michael. Given Erdogan's failure to even mention the tape, let alone reveal anything further, is indicative that an "arrangement" has been agreed upon. Now you can expect that the "affairs" of the world will return to their usual deviant course, this horrid deed will fade from the front page coverage it has deservedly had, and the people of the world, whose dearest hopes along with their ideals which uphold the dignity of man will continue to clamor; tragically, to no avail.
5
@Michael Stavsen
he did not threatened, he simply said he would tell the truth and he did today. And so far only remaining truth is the MSB's acceptance, which will not happen.
3
Exactly. The Turks are masters of "enforced disappearance". Is it any wonder the body has not turned up? Erdogan will milk this for all it's worth.
1. Turkey - A faction attempted to overthrow Erdogan. Those same people still exist and pose an existential threat to him. Turkey's economy has been under attack lately, perhaps by those same people.
2. Saudi Arabia - Israel who backed the Iraq war have been pressing to replace the regime in Iran. They have enlisted MBS, who has taken out all opposition to his rule, in a plan to take over powerful Iran with the help overt or covert of the U.S.
3. U. S. - With the help of Putin Trump has taken us down a path of nationalism that severs us from our European allies and them from each other. He has the backing of the republican party and all their corporate wealth.
This gives Trump the ability to direct our foreign policy, and he has fallen into step with Israel and MBS' war plans against Iran.
4. Russia - Putin helped to defeat ISiS, as did Iran. So far he has upheld Assad; and he has not turned against Iran. He has Trump wrapped around his finger, witness the lack of real sanctions.
So we can't expect MBS to be replaced. He has eliminated all his competition. The war drums beat louder.
28
It was all one big mistake. On the video call at the consulate, the big boss was merely asking his team to bring him back the Dogs Head hunting knife. It was a harmless request and had nothing to do with Khashoggi. The henchmen misunderstood the dog to mean the applicant.
3
Awaiting President Trump's fresh comments that the evidence presented so far is simply not enough, and it could be just about anyone responsible for Jamal Khashoggi's murder - 'maybe the Saudis, maybe illegal immigrants, maybe someone else, NOBODY KNOWS'
48
No question that it was premeditated murder. Even the unbelievable store he was killed in a fight, presumably while he was being kidnapped is still felony murder. Lying and hiding the body only further proof of premeditated and guilt. So the net thing is not talking about the murder but what to do about Saudi Arabia.
35
Erdogan asking for independent UN investigation is good insurance. He knows neither MbS nor Trump can be trusted & so let professional, independent commission do this.
Smart, so he won't be blamed for shenanigans.
Also makes it more likely he does have audio plus intel pickups with bonus of watching MbS squirm longer +Trump too, exposing lots of other corruption. Win-win for Erdogan, not a strongman to be trifled with by murdering his friend on his turf.
40
And while this horrifying murder is another "We'll see" event for Trump, the real action is in Riyadh, where Munchkin is busy making more deals with MBS.
No, Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore. We are in Wonderland, where down is up and up is down.
105
Yes but whatever happened to the Armenians during and after World War I?
And what is and has been happening to the Kurds?
And what is happening to the secular plural civil democratic Turkish state of Kemal Attaturk?
Between the wannabe Ottoman Turkish Sultan Recip Tayyip Erdogan and the wannabe Arab Caliph Mohammed bin Salman there is no humble humane empathetic moral choice in accord with long term American values and interests.
27
@Blackmamba
Erdogan is trying to polish his reputation this is his moment and you are coming with these questions?
6
@Blackmamba
We know what happened to the Armenians. Many of them died. Whether you want to call if genocide or not doesnt really affect what happened.
Ironically, Erdogan has been the best thing for the Kurds in a long time. Look to your "secular plural civil democratic Turkish state of Kemal Attaturk" for the perpetrators of the most heinous violence against Turkish kurds.
And that "democratic Turkish state" was never really democratic. There were something like 4 or 5 military coups in the last 100 years. While certainly flawed, Erdogan presides over s democracy that doesnt let the military just invalidate elections it doesnt like.
2
“Saudis briefed on the matter confirmed the ruse.”
How absurdly reassuring, to know that a body double was walking around in the murdered Jamal Khashoggi’s clothes. After a “brawl” in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul went awry.
Truly, you can’t make this stuff up.
101
@Robert
Truly, they are making this stuff up - from the rogue killer crew to the walking dead.
2
So after reading this story what has jumped out to me is the flight to Saudi by Mr. Muzaini. He new that he could not communicate electronically. He new that he was being watched. The house of Saudi is as corrupt as the White House is now. So Munucian is on his way to communicate personally with MBS. My only hope is that the CIA is some how recording these communications. You may think I am a conspiracy theorist, but the hand righting is on the wall. Way back[ it seems like a 100 years] in 2016 trump declared that he does not communicate important information electronically he only uses notes. Hence the personal meetings with the Russian journalist and with Putin himself. This man has used the oldest form of deception, being so obvious in his deceptions that it can't possible be true. Well it is true and Mr Mueller is going to tell us when he is ready. Soon I hope!
This administration is beyond belief. I think that is why his minions just keep on believing him, because hay he can't be that bad rite. Well yes he can!
24
@oscar jr
When I first read your post, I saw "hand righting" but read it as "HARD righting". These spell checkers mess with us, obviously.
Although you meant to type "writing", perhaps our combined goofs makes it more correct as it seems more & more that under Trump's reign of error we are actually "hard righting".
Remember this from back in April? https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5575395/Saudi-crown-prince-brag...
I have to wonder if Mr. Khashoggi's name was in this list which we know MBS acted on immediately within Saudi Arabia's border, rounding up even the wealthiest Saudis. The first time after Jared's trip that Mr. Khashoggi was on Saudi soil (the embassy) he was killed. I'm speculating, but given all we know about the President and Kushner's desperate quest for Saudi funding, I have no trouble imagining them directly saying to MBS, "do what you need to and we will support you".
27
Let's see. A bit of irony here. Crown Prince kills Khashoggi because Khashoggi was undermining Crown Prince's packaging of himself as a reformer. Result: Crown Prince's reputation as a reformer of Saudi Arabia's backward ways is further undermined, the status quo barbarism re-affirmed and exhibited to the entire world. The Crown Prince simply took up where Khashoggi left off.
54
@Quetico Provincial It don't matter. trump has his back.
Have people not been paying attention to what has been occurring in Turkey? Erodogan's government is no better than Saudi. He is just happy to be pointing at someone else. Stop the applause.
43
@Landlord
If Erdogan is the only conduit from which the truth comes out what is wrong with that? If it's confirmed, which so far it seems to be, listening to what he has to say is not an acceptance or condemnation of how he runs his government. In fact, the questions that he is asking the Saudi's is what Trump should be asking them instead of aiding in the cover up.
40
@Landlord, who is the US resident that Trukey killed and dismembered since Erdogan is exactly like the Saudis?
18
@Landlord
Erdogans government is infinitely better than MBS's. For one, Erdogan nominally won elections in a country where women could already vote, much less drive. Secondly, there is no death penalty in Turkey. Compare that to SA with its own public "chop chop" square.
Three cheers for Erdogan!
2
Within 4 hours the Republicans will have their talking points in order about how we learned nothing from Erdogan. By noon expect a tweet from Cadet Bone Spurs saying there is nothing there in what Erdogan said, that it was just as we all knew all along, and that it it is time to move forward with our close friends in Saudi Arabia, who are buying $1.5 trillion of exports from us that support 3 million US jobs—and then another immediately following about the Democrats leading the caravan of M-13 and Middle Eastern killers coming from Central America.
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We all know the truth of what happened here but with leaders who have spines like jellyfish we are still left wanting.
Trump can have his base yell "Lock her up," from the cheap seats yet he remains stunningly mum on a matter of a murder.
The world has been flipped upside down and is in need of serious correction.
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Why was the Saudi plot so hamfisted? 15 thugs with a bonesaw? And why were the subsequent coverups so amatuerish? The body-double ruse isn’t exactly Le Carré material. For whose consumption was this B-movie produced? And who are its investors, its silent partners?
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@Rufus Collins:
Why was it "so amateurish"? Perhaps because they figured they could get away with it, like they always do.
17
@Lisa Simeone
Remember, MBS, Muhammad Bin Salman, king's heir apparent, is young and inexperienced.
And it is totally implausible to me that MBS didn't know about this in advance, or that he didn't indirectly order it (will someone not rid me of this meddlesome priest??).
If MBS didn't know about this, then he needs to be fired since he can't control his own people.
Nice to see that the schoolyard bullies of the world are prevailing. Not optimistic that anything will come of this.
23
What we are dealing with here is best described as a battle for turf between rival gangs. Whether it is the Crips against the Bloods, the Bonannos against the Gambinos, or the Turks against the Saudis, there are no "good guys" here. And our government is involved up to its neck, playing its own game for influence in the Mid-East.
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@John Graubard Thank you, Mr. Graubard, for defining this in the simplest of words. For our government's position in all this, sir, I would add on more sentence on French: "Argent fait le jeu" or Money plays the game. Everyone including the Trumps - ALL OF THEM - care only for the bottom i
line.
Thanks.
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@John Graubard
You left out the Israeli and the Iranian and the Kurds and the Shia and the Sunni gangs. The fight for ethnic sectarian supremacy in the Middle East is beyond morality and reason and anathema to America's proclaimed values.
8
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a man who jails journalists, has an ego. The Saudis have bruised that ego, and caused Mr. Erdogan to become a journalist. Demonstrating the complexity of foreign affairs, he gives us reasons to hate him, and gives us reasons to like him. I, of course, excluded the Donald and Jared from this assessment. They hate him with the fire of a thousand stars.
7
The more I think about this murder, the more I believe they are never going to find the body. Khashoggi was probably cremated,
Can you have a trial if a body is never recovered?
4
@Jean
Murder is a legal conclusion regarding individuals and the law of nation states. If the Saudi state killed this man there was no murder. There was justice. Sharia and Saudi law matter.
@Jean There is no rule in Anglo-American jurisprudence necessitating a body for a murder trial. (In some jurisdictions there may be a rule that a conviction cannot be based on a confession alone.)
2
All that Erdogan is doing is raising his voice rather than showing real hard facts. Perhaps the Saudis have evidence against him that the recent military coup against him was a hoax. Both countries are playing games.
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The murder was planned and the House of Saud including the Crown Prince would have been directly involved.
There should be an embargo placed on Saudi goods, travel of high ranking Saudis should be restricted and carefully monitored.
There are many sources for oil. Saudi no longer has a monopoly. The wealth of the Saudis is dirty and their human rights record is appalling.
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@E. Bucher
If the Saudi state killed him there was no murder. There was justice.
The Saudis have more oil and fewer nuclear weapons and colonies and territories than the Israelis. And unlike Israel the Saudis buy and pay for their American arms and ammunition.
3
@Blackmamba, keep speaking the truth! Thank you in advance.
When did the Trump administration learn that Mr. Khashoggi was targeted by MBS? If Mr. Khashoggi was brutally tortured during his last minutes alive as the alleged audio recordings detail, when did the Trump administration know that? Why were no warnings given, and why are we covering up now?
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Because once again our current president is getting his facts from his choice of simpleton cable news programs, and repeatedly (astoundingly frequently) this current president is a most unfortunate judge of character in those selected to work for him and those he chooses to befriend on the world stage.
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@MH
America kidnapped, tortured and indefinitely detained people. Before it targeted and killed them with drone fired missiles.
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@MH
Why no warnings,active coverup? Because we were in on the plan. Maybe not actively, but would the Saudis go ahead with this without at least a wink of "ok" from Washington? I don't think so.
2
Getting the truth out of the Saudis is like pulling nails.
Yes, the statement is at once in bad taste, but so apropos to this horrifying situation. It is absolutely clear to me that the Turks are sitting on a treasure trove of information on this crime, and will slowly release it to painfully shame the Saudi government. It is best they come clean, repent, punish whoever was responsible at whatever level they are, and possibly at least some of the world will forgive. And some will even forget.
3
Khashoggi must have known there was some danger in being outside the safety of the states. What drew him to Turkey? He could have obtained the documents in the Washington Embassy where he is familiar with it having been involved there. It's nagging me that a man critical of his home nation of which he left due to a crackdown on dissent would have left himself vulnerable.
8
@Shakinspear His wife to be was a Turkish citizen?
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@Here we go Good question but may not be as innocent as you think as the M.O. has been used before.
@Shakinspear Khashoggi's decision to obtain these documents from the Saudi Embassy in Turkey has puzzled me too. Is it true he could have obtained these documents from the Washington Embassy? Khashoggi appeared to be a thoughtful, wise and careful person. His concern motivated him to become a permanent resident of the United States. WHY would he give his fiancé his phones? If he had gotten in trouble, he could have used them to initially call for help. WHY did his fiancé wait so long to get help? How much time does it take to pick up paperwork... paperwork that was personally requested earlier in the week. Many aspects of this horrific tragedy do not make sense or add up.
5
Jamals planned abduction was most probably known to both the US security agencies and their Turkish counterparts.
The fact that neither the Turkish or US security agencies acted on this
Due to his US residency his status is a US person which would have prompted the intelligence agencies in the US to warn him and should prompt a thorough investigation.
Sadly his death is now used as a bargaining chip by Turkey and we already know the brutal facts.
He was lured to the consulate by the Saudi government with the full support of the Saudi Leadership. That the planned abduction then instead supposedly resulted in a murder still makes them complicit.
How he then was killed and what happened to his body is horrific but doesn't change the main fact that it was a premidated state-sanctioned murder in violation of the Geneva convention that should prompt a thorough investigation by the US.
30
Is this why Nikki Haley chose to leave the UN when she did?
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@Carl
The American invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq has killed hundreds of thousands and no one was held accountable.
The Saudis have been slaughtering and starving thousands of Houthi and no one has been held accountable.
Israel has slaughtered Palestinians in Gaza without any accountable consequences.
Murder is a nation state legal conclusion applied to individuals. Unless the Saudi state says there was a murder there was no murder.
MAGA!
1
@SC I have wondered about this too.
Wealth and power brings feeling of invincibility to many leaders. But if history repeats we can hope justice will prevail.
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Erdogan's deserves the Victory Lap he took today. When they first made this claim, most people dismissed Turkey's theory. He, without any interrogation, was able to extract a confession to murder from the Saudi authorities.
His demand for the trial to held at the "scene of crime" is reasonable, and should be supported by the USA & EU.
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@Gyns D
If the Saudi state sanctioned this killing there was no murder. There was justice. Just like what is happening to the dying and starving Houthi under Saudi attack.
Why does the life of a "journalist" matter more than any other life?
MAGA!
1
One thing is obvious, Saudi's did not expect to get caught. They planned well with a double. I think they planned to kidnap Khashoggi by drugging him and taking his to Saudi and "the double" walking away with he rqquired papers. Things would have come out since the fiancee would have exposed the Double as fake. But by that time Khashoggi would have been in Riyadh never to be seen again. And Trump would keep saying "no proof" and continue his support of Saudi lies.
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@Wonderfool
Nonsense.
The Saudis expected to get caught and get away with this killing just like the Israelis do.
Smiling and smirking with implausible denials is the ultimate act of impunity and terrorism with immunity.
@Wonderfool
But why pack a bone saw if the original plan is to kidnap Khashoggi and fly him out to Riyad?
1
The world will sit idly while the Saudi’s shift the blame to rogue assasins.
The Kingdom’s financial influence will enable it to evade any retribution for the murder.
The Prince was most certainly aware of the planned murder.
Saudi Arabia’s been murdering thousands of civilians in Yemen.
Why is everyone so startled they would murder one of their own.
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@JMS
Right on!
The Saudis are behaving just like the Israelis.
1
@JMS, did you keep count of how many civilians America killed in Iraq and Afghanistan? And the killings in Yemen are a proxy for the US because the Saudis are using weapons "Made in USA".
5
How disingenuous that Donald Trump would comment about the "lies" of a leader of another country. Nobody can keep track of Trump's lies - they are ubiquitous. For the American president to accuse anyone else of being a liar would be outrageously funny, were it not for these tragic circumstances.
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@Everyone's a Critic
The Saudis are slaughtering and starving the Houthi in Yemen by the thousands. That is the ultimate inhumane "tragic circumstances" Saudi crime against humanity. This journalist death is trivial by comparison to genocide.
1
Disingenuous only to folks that “Trump” could not care less about. He is single-mindedly pursuing despotism and is currently winning at this attack on us. Lying serves his interests quite well so far. You can ask Ted Cruz all about how this works. “Trump” could have totally gone thumbs down on him, but rather now Cruz will beat Beto and will become “Trump’s” #2 sniveling sycophant after Lyndsey. Machiavelli is pleased.
5
This is one of the most cold blooded responses by those in power that we have witnessed in recent times. The implications for journalists being prepared to report in difficult environments or providing future analysis or commentary on unethical or contentious matters must be significant. In these troubling times, the consistently objective reporting by the NYT is greatly appreciated.
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@margaret atcherley
Nonsense
America invaded and occupied Iraq killing hundreds of thousands without provocation or justification. America kidnapped, tortured and indefinitely detained people before targeting and killing them with drone fired missiles.
Journalists lives do not matter more than any other human life.
1
Erdogan's speech, belying the man's promise, did not give the world anything further. Even the alleged tapes which are evidence contrary to the Saudi account of Mr Khashoggi's death, were not mentioned in the man's speech. It is gravely sad that it now appears that "an arrangement" has been made between the Turkish President and the Crown Prince. Unless more is forthcoming, the discussion will wither and dark curtain will be tightly drawn around the truth. We can expect nothing further from the various players in the halls of power within the nations involved. Business as usual will proceed with some of the piles of wealth changing hands. The best we can do now is hope that something totally unforeseen will yet emerge, like a ray of sunlight breaking through the canopy of darkness which envelops and conceals this horrible and tawdry event, piercing it to bring to light the truth.
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@Daniel K. Statnekov
Apple watch video and audio footage is too blur to be use as evidence, and Apple also pay up, if footage were to be leaked, Apple watch sales would drop and its espionage potential for the product's design nation would be greatly diminished.
@Daniel K. Statnekov
I have been waiting for that "ray of sunshine" to break through in our own Government.
11
@Daniel K. Statnekov
Where was your compassion and concern for the thousands Iraqis killed by the Americans or the thousands of Houthi killed by the Saudis or the thousands of Palestinians killed by the Israelis?
2
Very interesting. It appears Pres. Erdogan made no direct reference to the "tapes" from which the Turkish authorities have been leaking very plausible details. Is the reason for silence about this a desire to protect "sources and methods," or is Pres. Erdogan attempting to use those tapes to extract concessions from King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. My betting is on the latter explanation. So long as the Turkish authorities have those tapes--if indeed they do--they are in a position to blackmail MSB for their own ends. Let's ask Sec. Minuchin what he thinks.
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@Skeptic Absolutely spot on. And I wonder whether the USA, under the beneficent rule of DJT, might also wish to make a few extra confessions in return....?
6
@Skeptic
Secretary Mnuchin thinks what ever Donald Trump and Jared Kushner tell him to think. And those two have the diplomatic IQ of an ice cube.
4
@Skeptic: treasury secretary mnuchin
highly treasures trade relations.
[he could not care less about a
carelessly coldblooded murder.]
2
When you pull back the veil behind a rogue nation, there is often an American consulting firm willing to sell its soul.
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@Q
Right on!
Plus an American politician.
But they have no souls to sell.
1
In this case it's the Administration.
6
Mr. Khashoggi went to the consulate to pick up a piece of paper. If this was not a planned murder then why have a body double?
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@Shim Why a body double or agents scouting the Turkish countryside, or not allowing the embassy to be promptly inspected, or having at least three different stories about what happened in the embassy, or stories about who authorized this 'operation'? All of this over the vanity issue of having someone out there who is critical of the Saudi regime. If this were a normal murder investigation, the 'prince' would be held without bail pending trial. Whatever may happen he is badly tarnished for life at a bare minimum.
22
I applaud Prudent Erdogan's calculated slow "leak" of the facts of this heinous, cold blooded murder exacted to eviscerate free press in the Middle East. He has learned well the fine art of news cycle control and media manipulation. If it wasn't harming Trump, old Donald might even tip his hat in admiration for its effectiveness.
So what should Donnie do? Exactly the opposite of every thought in his undersized head. Rather than kissing the ring of the murdering Saudis, Trump should be supporting Turkey and it's efforts to solve a homicide. Instead, we let Trump and Kushner help the Saudis lie through their teeth.
Donald and Jared have decided for us what the value of a man's life, a journalist's life is, and what value we should place on the truth. What we've found is unimaginable and wildly disturbing -- Anything that helps Trump become more wealthy and powerful is worth killing over.
Good luck to the Turkish government as they search for the truth. The corrupt wall Trump is building to protect the Saudis will crumble, eventually.
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@Sarah
Since Saudi law is applicable. If this was a Saudi nation state sanctioned killing it was not murder. It was justice.
Slavery and involuntary servitude were and still are legal and just in America.
@Sarah: what if the turkish government has decided
to search no further and to leak no more because
they obtained what they wanted from S.A. or MbS?
"no one knows what goes on behind closed doors",
unless ...
1
Keep in mind Erdogan is a dictator, so temper your applause. One imagines his interest here has nothing to do with justice or the truth. He’s just looking for an angle in the global jockeying of global despots.
4
It will be interesting to see how Mr. Trump and Mr. Kushner worm their way out of this. Rest assured that none of their business deals with the Saudis will suffer from this inconvenient murder. I was looking forward to seeing Louise Linton's latest trunk show during the Saudi investment summit, but I guess I'll just have to content myself with grabbing a glimpse of Lara Trump's fab frock when she visits Michigan this week. Consider me a happy serf.
35
At the top of all this are the economic and political interest of 3 Nations. Daily it seems the real truth, truth to power, truth to the power of people will come out. All 3 leaders need to be on the right side of truth. A king can fire a Prince, apologize and replace with an acceptable reformer. Mr Khashoggi can be honored and laid to rest in dignity and peace
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@Bob Not just fire the prince, imprison him and all involved in the murder.
5
"Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead." -- Benjamin Franklin
Truth is the Dance of the Seven Veils, revealed as layer after layer is removed. Each revelation may say more about the one who tells it as each of us consciously or unconsciously either shades the truth or remembers things differently. Erdogan's truth, MBS's truth and Trump's truth are all dissimilar and usually self-serving.
As long as we have one, a free press will continue to seek the objective and immutable truth about the death of their colleague, acquaintance and friend, Jamal.
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@Douglas McNeill
Was this done according to the Saudi version of Islam? Where are the Muslim leaders who should remove this gang of Saudis, the so called keepers of the Muslim faith and religious properties? Telling lies and murdering in cold blood is not according to any religion. The Saudis must hand over Prince Mohammed Bin Salman to the Turks to punish him.
6
@Douglas McNeill
Why not get the objective opinions and advice of Benjamin Netanyahu and Vladimir Putin on this matter?
After all Trump trusts and respects both men and their national intelligence services.
2
I wish Bush’s CIA had been as professional and impartial after 911 when the Suadis officials also debied knowledge of the attack, as they did now after this murder. The USA poses as the paragon of integrity but in this case Erdogan of all people proved to be the class act.
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@alexgri
Class act? I doubt it. I suspect instead, the consummate strongman, Erdogan, may be manuevering this entire sad affair to his own political benefit.
46
@Teresa, America has consistently fooled the world. From conducting and orchestrating assassinations abroad to toppling regimes in places that did us no harm, they have manipulated geopolitics in such a way that no one really can tell right from wrong, anymore. The rules and standards America has created, is now boomeranging back to us as a sample, in the form of a piece of character such as Trump, the chump, dare we call him that.
Erdogan classy? Oh please. This is strictly political opportunism. He is no humanitarian and certainly not interested in truth. In addition to the egregious actions other readers have pointed to here, this man has never acknowledged that over a million Armenians were slaughtered in a genocide perpetrated by the Turkish government in 1915. In spite of indisputable evidence, in the form of official government documents from Turkish archives amassed and published by respected scholars and the accounts of thousands of Armenians who managed to make it out alive, it is stunning that this truth has not been told.
2
The honor of our country, USA, hangs in the balance. Our President, Our Complicity.
215
How breathless can you be? Ask me if I really care about what Erdogan says or Trump for that matter... it's all lies just like "fake news" is all lies. We do it; they do it. It's the way it was, it's the way it is and it will always be the way it is in the future. WAKE UP!!
9
@Bill
So you are saying that guy is alive , this is a charade.
Erdogan has an incredible trove of surveillance following the killing of Mr. Khashoggi. He must have also had the same intelligence leading up to his murder. If Turkey has recordings of the murder taking place, then surely they have recordings of the conversations after Mr. Khashoggi's first visit to the consulate.
Is it possible that Erdogan could have prevented the murder, but instead let it occur in order to manipulate the situation for his benefit?
74
@nwsnowboarder The idea they only the Turks had the consulate under surveillance is laughable. The Americans are spying on the Saudis, the Turks and everyone else.
17
@nwsnowboarder Of course. Turkey is certainly not a paragon of honor and/or human rights; clearly Erdogan has an agenda.
21
Aramco valuation? Down by $100 billion. But that's okay, the Russians will buy it.
11
Of corse the Saudis deliberately killed him, unless all of the reporting surrounding this event, including 15 individuals one of whom was a forensic pathologist, is erroneous, it is clear the Saudis were there for nefarious purposes. Further, the Saudis have been unable to provide a cogent explanation for the events surrounding the death, including but not limited to, their initial assertion that the man was still alive and left their offices shortly after arriving. Given the complications of the political environment of the Middle East, we need to respond, but can not afford to completely distroy our relations with this quasi ally.
14
@TW Smith
What ways exactly have the Saudis proved to be an American ally? Buying our arms? They need them. Resisting Iran? The Iranians are their religious enemies. How about creating the climate that allowed Ben Laden and others to kill thousands of Americans and other people? A friend in need is a friend indeed, huh?
138