SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
For Immediate Release
November, 20 2018, 11:00pm EDT
Contact:
Phone:,(202) 232-3317,Email:,info@winwithoutwar.org
Debunking the Claims in Trump's Nov. 20 Saudi Arabia/Khashoggi Statement
In respsonse to President Donald Trump's statement about the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi released on Tuesday, November 20, 2018.
CLAIM: "The country of Iran, as an example, is responsible for a bloody proxy war against Saudi Arabia in Yemen. ... Saudi Arabia would gladly withdraw from Yemen if the Iranians would agree to leave."
WASHINGTON
In respsonse to President Donald Trump's statement about the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi released on Tuesday, November 20, 2018.
CLAIM: "The country of Iran, as an example, is responsible for a bloody proxy war against Saudi Arabia in Yemen. ... Saudi Arabia would gladly withdraw from Yemen if the Iranians would agree to leave."
FACT: Saudi Arabia launched a war against Houthi rebels in Yemen shortly after the Houthis ousted the Saudi-backed government in Sana'a. Iran advised the Houthis not to take over Sana'a, but they did anyway and were able to, not because of Iranian backing, but because of their alliance with forces aligned with the late former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. While the Houthis were and have been only loosely aligned with Iran, having received some weapons and training, Iran's involvement in the conflict is self-perpetuating -- a low cost, high reward venture in which, by spending just pennies on the dollar, it can bog down Saudi Arabia in a drawn-out and expensive conflict without itself taking on much risk.
Iran, for its part, stated its willingness to help find a resolution to the conflict in Yemen six months ago - long before the coalition signaled it was willing to engage in peace talks this fall. Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition launched a costly offensive at Yemen's vital port of Hodeidah, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in an attempt to improve its military position before engaging in talks. Despite a short ceasefire, the coalition resumed bombing Hodeidah this week.
CLAIM: "After my heavily negotiated trip to Saudi Arabia last year, the Kingdom agreed to spend and invest $450 billion in the United States. ... It will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, tremendous economic development. ... Of the $450 billion, $110 billion will be spent on the purchase of military equipment from Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and many other great U.S. defense contractors."
FACT: None of these claims are true. Most of the $110 billion in arms deals "were defined as memorandums of intent, non-binding commitments to buy," according to Reuters. Trump himself has only inked $4 billion worth of arms deals with Saudi Arabia.
What's more, any future arms sales are more likely to create jobs in foreign countries and not in the U.S. and canceling any arms agreements, real or otherwise, with Saudi Arabia is unlikely to cut U.S. jobs.
And of this claim that Saudi will invest $450 billion in the U.S.? It's completely made up.
CLAIM: "If we foolishly cancel these contracts, Russia and China would be the enormous beneficiaries."
FACT: Saudi Arabia's military equipment is too wedded to U.S.- and British-made supplies that it would be foolish for them to turn to China or Russia as an alternative, and also economically infeasible. "It would take decades to transition from U.S. and U.K. aircraft, for example, to Russian or Chinese aircraft," one expert has said. "Same is true for tanks, communications equipment and other hi-tech equipment. And the Saudis don't have time given they are bogged down in Yemen."
CLAIM: "King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman vigorously deny any knowledge of the planning or execution of the murder of Mr. Khashoggi. Our intelligence agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the Crown Prince had knowledge of this tragic event - maybe he did and maybe he didn't!"
FACT: The CIA has actually concluded that Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman ordered the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. The Saudis have lied through their teeth about their airstrikes not targeting civilians in Yemen, so it is no wonder they are denying any role in the murder of Khashoggi.
CLAIM: Saudi Arabia has been "a great ally in our very important fight against Iran. The United States intends to remain a steadfast partner of Saudi Arabia to ensure the interests of our country, Israel and all other partners in the region."
FACT: Saudi Arabia has repeatedly tried to push American leaders to launch "a full scale military assault" on Iran. War with Iran would be more costly and deadly than the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and would likely spark an "all-out regional war" lasting several years. None of this is in the U.S. national interests. Rather it would only fulfil Saudi Arabia's desire to fight Iran to the last American.
Win Without War is a diverse network of activists and organizations working for a more peaceful, progressive U.S. foreign policy. We believe that by democratizing U.S. foreign policy and providing progressive alternatives, we can achieve more peaceful, just, and common sense policies that ensure that all people--regardless of race, nationality, gender, religion, or economic status--can find and take advantage of opportunity equally and feel secure.
LATEST NEWS
'Betsy DeVos 2.0': Trump Picks WWE Billionaire Linda McMahon to Lead Education Department
"During his first term, Donald Trump appointed Betsy DeVos to undermine and ultimately privatize public schools through vouchers," said the president of the National Education Association. "Now, he and Linda McMahon are back at it."
Nov 20, 2024
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced late Tuesday that he intends to nominate Linda McMahon, the billionaire former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, to lead the Department of Education, a key agency that Republicans—including Trump and the authors of Project 2025—have said they want to abolish.
McMahon served as head of the Small Business Administration during Trump's first White House term and later chaired both America First Action—a pro-Trump super PAC—and the America First Policy Institute, a far-right think tank that has expressed support for cutting federal education funding and expanding school privatization.
Trump touted McMahon's work to expand school "choice"—a euphemism for taxpayer-funded private school vouchers—and said she would continue those efforts on a national scale as head of the Education Department.
"We will send Education BACK TO THE STATES, and Linda will spearhead that effort," Trump said in a statement posted to his social media platform, Truth Social. (McMahon is listed as an independent director of Trump Media & Technology Group, which runs Truth Social.)
The National Education Association (NEA), a union that represents millions of teachers across the U.S., said in response to the president-elect's announcement that McMahon is "grossly unqualified" to lead the Education Department, noting that she has "lied about having a degree in education," presided over an organization "with a history of shady labor practices," and "pushed for an extreme agenda that would harm students, defund public schools, and privatize public schools through voucher schemes."
"During his first term, Donald Trump appointed Betsy DeVos to undermine and ultimately privatize public schools through vouchers," NEA president Becky Pringle said in a statement. "Now, he and Linda McMahon are back at it with their extreme Project 2025 proposal to eliminate the Department of Education, steal resources for our most vulnerable students, increase class sizes, cut job training programs, make higher education more expensive and out of reach for middle-class families, take away special education services for disabled students, and put student civil rights protections at risk."
"The Department of Education plays such a critical role in the success of each and every student in this country," Pringle continued. "The Senate must stand up for our students and reject Donald Trump's unqualified nominee, Linda McMahon. Our students and our nation deserve so much better than Betsy DeVos 2.0."
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, took a more diplomatic approach, saying in a statement that "we look forward to learning more about" McMahon and that, if she's confirmed, "we will reach out to her as we did with Betsy DeVos at the beginning of her tenure."
"While we expect that we will disagree with Linda McMahon on many issues, our devotion to kids requires us to work together on policies that can improve the lives of students, their families, their educators, and their communities," Weingarten added.
McMahon is one of several billionaires Trump has selected for major posts in his incoming administration, which is teeming with conflicts of interest. During Trump's first term, McMahon and her husband, Vince McMahon, made at least $100 million from dividends, investment interest, and stock and bond sales.
The Guardiannoted Tuesday that "in October, [Linda] McMahon was named in a new lawsuit involving WWE."
"The suit alleges that she and other leaders of the company allowed the sexual abuse of young boys at the hands of a ringside announcer, former WWE ring crew chief Melvin Phillips Jr," the newspaper reported. "The complaint specifically alleges that the McMahons knew about the abuse and failed to stop it."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Rahm Emanuel Made Alarming Stock Trades as Ambassador to Japan
A report on the "suspiciously timed" trading comes as the longtime party insider mulls a run for Democratic National Committee chair.
Nov 19, 2024
"Siri, what is insider trading?"
That's how one reader responded to Tuesday reporting by The American Prospect's Daniel Boguslaw that Rahm Emanuel, who is supposedly mulling a bid for Democratic National Committee (DNC) chair, made some concerning financial moves while in his current government job.
Emanuel is the U.S. ambassador to Japan. He was previously the mayor of Chicago, a Democratic Illinois congressman, and a key adviser to former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. While in the House of Representatives, he chaired the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and then the party's caucus in the chamber. He's also been an investment banker.
As Boguslaw detailed Tuesday:
Periodic transaction reports filed with the Office of Governmental Ethics over the past two years suggest that Chicago's golden boy may be better served returning to his roots on Wall Street, given the six-figure trades he executed at highly opportune moments in U.S.-Japanese trade relations.
Among the millions of dollars of stock trades Emanuel conducted between 2021 and 2024 while serving as ambassador, one purchase jumps out. On September 29, 2023, Emanuel bought between $250,000 and $500,000 worth of stocks in CoreWeave, a leading AI cloud computing service.
Emanuel's purchase took place one day before the Japanese government announced a $320 million subsidy to Micron Technology to manufacture storage components that are essential to the Nvidia chips which CoreWeave relies on for its AI computation services.
Emanuel "purchased between $100,000 and $250,000 worth of Ocient stock on March 8, 2024, before the close of the firm's series B raise," after the Illinois "data analytics company's CEO Chris Gladwin traveled to Japan in October on a trade delegation mission," Boguslaw noted. "At the end of July, Rahm also purchased between $50,000 and $100,000 worth of stock in Monroe Capital, a Chicago-based middle-market lender that specializes in collateralized debt obligations, the Frankenstein financial product that crashed global markets in 2008."
While Emanuel did not respond to the Prospect's request for comment, Jeff Hauser, executive director of the Revolving Door Project, declared on social media that it was a "MASSIVE STORY!"
Hauser told Common Dreams that "being ambassador to Japan is a big job, but normally owing to its importance to America's relationship with a key ally in a critical area of the globe, and not because of the access it apparently provides to actionable stock tips."
"Ambassador Emanuel's brain ought to have been focused on improving America's lot in East Asia, not maximizing his retirement account," he said. "We at Revolving Door Project have long argued that senior government officials should be limited to investing in diversified mutual funds rather than stock by stock. That Emanuel was making exotic investments in businesses he may have learned about on the government's dime only underscores the need for such reforms."
"If Democrats are to ever put a full and final end to Trumpism, they are going to need to develop a clear and consistent critique of why corruption by public officials is a bad thing. That would make Rahm Emanuel among the worst possible choices for DNC chair, especially since Sen. Menendez seems likely to be unavailable for the position," Hauser added, referring to Bob Menendez, a former Democratic senator from New Jersey who in July was convicted of taking bribes.
As Common Dreamsreported last week, progressive critics of Emanuel have called his potential leadership of the DNC—after various devastating losses for the party on Election Day earlier this month—a "sick joke" and "the worst idea in the world."
Noting Emanuel's consideration of the job in an email to supporters on Tuesday, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said that "there is a disease in Washington of Democrats who spend more time listening to the donor class than working people. If you want to know the seed of the party's political crisis—that's it."
"The DNC needs an organizer who gets people," she asserted. "Not someone who sends fish heads in the mail."
Martin O'Malley, a former Democratic presidential candidate and Maryland governor, and Ken Martin, the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party chair and a DNC vice chair, have both formally launched their campaigns for the position.
Other potential contenders for the DNC post include Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler and Chuck Rocha, a political strategist for the latest campaign of Sen.-elect Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) and the presidential campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
Sanders, who caucuses with Democrats, said after the elections earlier this month that "it should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working-class people would find that the working class has abandoned them."
According toCBS News:
Rocha said he's still waiting to see how the field develops before jumping in, and "if there's a better candidate that really stands for what I want to see done with the party."
But Rocha has set several action items he would take as chair: eliminate education requirements for senior DNC positions, mandating that state parties "be more inclusive" and diverse with consultant hiring, and to focus on building party infrastructure in all 50 states.
Asked about Martin's and O'Malley's campaigns, Rocha called them "names that are from the institution."
"I think we need somebody from the outside and a strategist to come in and rebuild the party," said Rocha, who noted that his non-college background and upbringing in East Texas could be an advantage as the party looks to reconnect with working-class voters.
Politicoreported Tuesday that another Sanders ally, James Zogby, "expects to formally launch his campaign in the coming days."
A longtime DNC member and president of the Arab American Institute, Zogby told Politico that he was motivated to run by his anger over Republican President-elect Donald Trump's defeat of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.
Zogby criticized Harris for campaigning with former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Okla.), said the Democratic Party was too "focused on suburban women and not on white working-class people," and called the decision to not invite a Palestinian American to speak at the national convention "unimaginative, overly cautious, and completely out of touch with where voters are."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Fund Housing Not Genocide': Arrests at Capitol Protest Over US Complicity in Gaza
Demonstrators called on Congress to invest in climate action, education, healthcare, housing, and jobs rather than arming Israel.
Nov 19, 2024
At least 44 people were reportedly arrested at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday for a protest over government complicity in Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip, as Congress prepares for key votes this week.
The demonstrators who descended on the Philip A. Hart Senate Office Building are "members of faith groups, moms, healthcare workers, educators, students, [and] veterans," according toZeteo reporter Prem Thakker.
Participants wore red T-shirts and unfurled banners—which footage on social media shows were snatched by police—urging Congress to fund climate action, education, healthcare, housing, and jobs, "not genocide." There were also messages pushing lawmakers to "stop arming Israel" and telling them it is "time to act."
Thakker reported that the protesters were calling on senators to support joint resolutions of disapproval (JRDs) that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introduced in September and plans to bring to the floor for a vote on Wednesday.
The JRDs would block the sale of U.S. tank rounds, bomb kits, and other weapons to the Israeli government, which faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for an assault on Gaza that has killed at least 43,972 Palestinians.
So far just six other members of the chamber—Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Peter Welch (D-Vt.)—have signaled support for the resolutions.
Even if the JRDs were passed by the Senate, they would need to get through the Republican-held U.S. House of Representatives to reach President Joe Biden's desk—and if the Democrat vetoed them, an override requires two-thirds support in both chambers.
Citing Capitol Police, ABC News reporter Beatrice Peterson said Tuesday that "all 44 individuals arrested were charged with crowding, obstructing, and incommoding. Two of them were also charged with assault on a police officer."
Meanwhile, in Illinois, 13 members of Chicago's chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) were arrested for shutting down Caterpillar's Business and Analytics Hub by blocking escalators and elevators.
"Caterpillar builds armored D9 bulldozers that the Israeli military uses in its genocidal campaign in Gaza and to demolish homes in the occupied West Bank," JVP Chicago said in a statement. "This protest comes at a historic moment: This week Congress is set to vote on legislation to block U.S. weapons sales to the Israeli government."
As the Chicago protesters were arrested, they called on Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) to support Sanders' resolutions.
The other upcoming congressional vote garnering attention from anti-genocide activists is H.R. 9495, which would empower the treasury secretary to strip organizations of their nonprofit status by labeling them terrorist supporters with no due process. Republicans are reviving the bill after it failed to pass the House via a fast-track procedure last week, despite bipartisan support.
JVP's national arm has called H.R. 9495 "dangerous and unconstitutional," and warned that it "would give the incoming Trump administration the power to unilaterally shut down nonprofit organizations it doesn't like."
"This bill is part and parcel of the MAGA assault on democracy and fundamental freedoms," JVP said, "and it must be defeated again."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular