The Corruption of the House of Saud

This is something you don't hear about often; in the mainstream media at least. The reason is mentioned in Said Aburish's new expose of the house of Saud: The Rise, Corruption and Coming Fall of the House of Saud. Saudi Arabia controls most of the media outlets in the Arab world, even those published in European capitals such as London and Paris. The house of Saud have used their petrodollars to control what gets published and anything that offends them in the least gets censored. Even the Saudi controlled Al Hayat sometimes gets censored. I remember once I discovered that the second page of the newspaper was missing (I still don't know what the story was that offended the royal family). Unfortunately, the book is not without its shortcomings. It reads like a personal account; it's as if you are having a conversation with the author and he is trying to convince you of his ideas. There are numerous typos in the book and there are no footnotes or in-text citations but rather a bibliography at the end. Of course, the lack of material and the secrecy enveloping the house of Saud doesn't help an author who decides to tackle that subject and the material I have read on the corruption of the Saudi royal family usually reads like a fairytale. However, it is undeniable that a huge cover-up is in process everytime the Saudi royal family is involved. The roots of all this can almost always be traced back to the priceless commodity, oil.

I hope that more material gets published on the corruption that is racking Saudi Arabia and that opposition to the house of Saud rises before it is too late and before the US sees it in its best interest to change the regime itself like it did in Iraq.