Asia Times Online :: THE ROVING EYE : The House of Saud paranoia
The House of Saud remains the proverbial staunch ally of the Washington/London "special relationship" - its petrodollars ($300 billion in oil revenues in 2011, made possible by owing 12% of global oil production) buying everyone in sight from Egypt to Libya and Palestine, while Arab al-Qaeda-linked networks merrily bolster the uprisings in both Libya and Syria.
Yet - in this House of supreme paranoia - what if the day comes when they wouldn't be regarded as indispensable, staunch allies anymore? What if Washington/London are convinced that a more acceptable Middle East should have Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood as "models"?
On the crucial energy front, the House of Saud didn't fail to notice the fact that the US will prefer to concentrate its future energy needs on gas - and not oil, and this while Saudi oil reserves are declining and China is already Saudi Arabia's top trade partner (that's one of the key reasons China abstained from United Nations resolution 1973 on Libya; Beijing didn't want to antagonize Riyadh).
Washington/London certainly increased their own fears of a regional disaster when Prince Turki was very clear Saudi Arabia would go for its own nuclear bomb in case Iran did the same - although there's no evidence whatsoever, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, that Iran is developing a nuclear weapons program. By the way Prince Turki himself made it clear on a separate occasion; the only regional actor allowed to have nuclear weapons is Israel.
The House of Saud has used the great 2011 Arab revolt to propel Iranophobia in the Sunni Arab world to all-out hysteria. Iranophobia has been deployed as a Saudi-orchestrated psy-ops for years now - geared towards isolating Iran in the arc from Northern Africa to Southwest Asia.
While trying to depict Iran to Arab public opinion as the ultimate evil, the House of Saud may hope to obscure the role of the real profiteers - Western neo-colonial powers which occupy or control, directly and indirectly, the Arab world. Most of all, Iranophobia is extremely useful for the House of Saud, as well as the al-Khalifa Sunni dynasty in Bahrain and the Emirates rulers, to mercilessly repress their own people.
In the West, Iranophobia has been misunderstood as a cold war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. No; it's a counter-revolutionary pys-ops conducted by the House of Saud out of supreme fear of Iran's regional alliances - with Hezbollah in Lebanon or the Shi'ite-led government in Baghdad - as well as Iranian support, for instance, for the Houthi rebellion in northern Yemen in 2009.
There's also a running myth that Saudi King Abdullah, 86, illiterate and close to meeting his maker, has tried to integrate Saudi Shi'ites - especially via the King Abdulaziz Center for National Dialogue. There's no way to understand Saudi Arabia without examining its historical prejudice against Shi'ites. Saudi schoolbooks treat Shi'ites as non-Muslim infidels, or worse - evil "polytheists".
The heart of the matter is that the House of Saud is bound by blood with the Sunni Wahhabi clerical establishment. As long as the monarchy follows their medieval interpretation of sharia law, the king is incensed as the legitimate "custodian of the two holy mosques".
The power of the Saudi counter-revolution should not be underestimated. As much as the House of Saud was horrified by Egypt's Hosni Mubarak being "dumped" by the Barack Obama administration, they have been
clever enough to bribe the Tantawi junta currently in power with almost $4 billion. The House of Saud is furious that Mubarak will have to stand trial.