Posted on 08/19/2002 5:24:06 AM PDT by Sabertooth
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Why is America about to train yet another cadre of Saudi airmen!?
By Michael Freund
http://www.jewishworldreview.com |
Though less than a year has passed since 15 Saudi nationals joined four other hijackers in wreaking havoc on Sept. 11, America is now set to train yet another cadre of Saudi airmen.
I kid you not.
In a report Monday in the English-language daily Arab News, Saudi Arabian Airlines Vice President for Technical Affairs Ahmad Jazzar announced with evident pride that some 202 of his employees were being sent to the United States for what he described as ''advanced training in aircraft maintenance.''
The employees, said Jazzar, would study at various unnamed ''aviation institutes in the U.S.'' and would then receive ''international licenses for aircraft maintenance.'' (The text of the article appears at: www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=17697).
Call it an overdeveloped sense of deja vu, but doesn't this strike anyone out there as oddly misguided?
Although Saudi Airlines itself had nothing to do with the horrific attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, it does seem more than a tad bit strange to agree to hold such a training program. After all, the last time a group of the kingdom's nationals studied at American flight schools, President Bush had to be whisked away to a secret location to ensure his safety.
With all of the recent complications in the two countries' relations, including the debate over whether to label the Saudis an ''enemy,'' this hardly seems like the most appropriate time for Washington to be lending a helping hand to the Saudi airline industry.
But there is another little twist to this story--one that only further underlines its utter absurdity.
Ironically enough, on the same day that the news item appeared about Saudi Airlines employees studying in the United States, Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal made an announcement of his own. He declared that the desert kingdom would refuse any request from Washington to extradite 16 al-Qaida members recently handed over to Riyadh by Iran.
Speaking to the Arabic daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, al-Faisal said, ''If the involvement of any of the 16 suspects in terrorist acts is proven, they would be tried in accordance with Saudi laws.'' Tried, but not handed over to the United States, he emphasized.
And so it appears that the Saudis are eminently selective as to who they are willing to send to American soil and who they are not. They will gladly take advantage of American generosity to enhance their technical know-how and send 200 Saudis to study at American aviation institutes. But when it comes to turning over suspected followers of Osama bin Laden, the Saudis are suddenly no longer willing to cooperate.
Don't expect the Saudis' apologists at the U.S. State Department to raise a ruckus over this one, though. Since all of the 16 al-Qaida members just happen to be Saudi citizens, we will no doubt be told that we must take into account Saudi ''sensitivities'' about extraditing their nationals to the West.
The argument may be stale and facile, but it has worked well enough for Riyadh over the past decade, so there is little reason to suspect that it won't work just as well now. So much for Saudi cooperation in the war on terror.
202 Saudia staff being trained in US
By a Staff Writer
JEDDAH, 12 August — Saudi Arabian Airlines has sent 202 employees to the United States for advanced training in aircraft maintenance, Al-Watan reported yesterday. Ahmad Jazzar, vice president for technical affairs, said the Saudis, who will be trained at advanced aviation institutes in the US, would receive international license for aircraft maintenance.
LINK
Unbelievable.
What else have the terrorist-spawning and terrorist supporting
Saudis done since their attacks against the US on 911?
ANSWER: Telethons to fund more attacks on Western democracies.
How do they get away with this?
Saudi Minister: "Constantinople."
Have you read somewhere that our immigration policy is tight as a drum?
That our visa process is impermeable to jihadists?
All I am saying is that I have learned not to believe everything I read. And I am less inclined to believe something from an arab paper. (And the Jewish World Review is reporting what an Arab paper is saying)
Through the internet, we have access to all sorts of reports. How many of them have proved to be true?
So, before I get all up in arms of 202 mechanics from Saudi Arabia, I will wait to see if it is true.
Sabertooth is right. I have read his many postings about immigration. He is sounding a warning that needs to be sounded.
Because we're idiots?
Because we've just gotten a new "kick me" sign?
After addressing the media, President George Bush talks with his hosts during his visit to
the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C. Sept. 17, 2001. "And it is my honor to be meeting
with leaders who feel just the same way I do. They're outraged, they're sad," said the
President during his remarks. "They love America just as much as I do." White House
photo by Eric Draper.
It takes an idiot to raze a village?
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