It is why we must read carefully.
New York Times
May 30, 2009
Justice Dept. Backs Saudi Royal Family on 9/11 Lawsuit
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is supporting efforts by the Saudi royal family to defeat a long-running lawsuit seeking to hold it liable for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The Justice Department, in a brief filed Friday before the Supreme Court, said it did not believe the Saudis could be sued in American court over accusations brought by families of the Sept. 11 victims that the royal family had helped finance Al Qaeda. The department said it saw no need for the court to review lower court rulings that found in the Saudis’ favor in throwing out the lawsuit. [The Justice Department did not believe - FEELINGS are not what you base legal decisions on. Either the writer chose his words incorrectly or the JUSTICE DEPARTMENT acts on FEELINGS not fact.]
The government’s position comes less than a week before President Obama is scheduled to meet in Saudi Arabia with King Abdullah as part of a trip to the Middle East and Europe intended to reach out to the Muslim world. [I am sure Obama is practicing his curtsey - this time only for the King in private. ]
Lawyers for the Saudi family said that they were heartened by the department’s brief and that it served to strengthen their hand before the court, which has not decided whether to hear the case.
But family members of several Sept. 11 victims said they were deeply disappointed and questioned whether the decision was made to appease an important ally in the Middle East. The Saudis have aggressively lobbied both the Bush and Obama administrations to have the lawsuit dismissed, government officials say.
“I find this reprehensible,” said Kristen Breitweiser, a leader of the Sept. 11 families, whose husband was killed in the attacks on the World Trade Center. “One would have hoped that the Obama administration would have taken a different stance than the Bush administration, and you wonder what message this sends to victims of terrorism around the world.” [What on earth would have given this woman that idea? Obama curtsying to the King of Saudi Arabia?]
Bill Doyle, another leader of the Sept. 11 families whose son was killed in the attacks, said, “All we want is our day in court.”
The lawsuit, brought by a number of insurance companies for the victims and their families, accuses members of the royal family in Saudi Arabia of providing financial backing to Al Qaeda — either directly to Osama bin Laden and other terrorist leaders, or indirectly through donations to charitable organizations that they knew were in turn diverting money to Al Qaeda.
A district court threw out the lawsuit, finding that the Foreign Sovereign Immunity Act provided legal protection from liability for Saudi Arabia and the members of the royal family for their official acts.
[It was not done through official channels as much as members of the Saudi government providing funding to al qaida directly, or Wahhabi groups who in turn funneled it to al qaida groups. This is very nearly proven beyond a reasonable doubt. The claim should be turned against the individuals in the private capacity, not as members of the government acting on orders from the government - which they more or less did not do.]
Solicitor General Elena Kagan said in the brief to the Supreme Court that her office agreed with the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit “that the princes are immune from petitioners’ claims,” although she pointed to somewhat different legal rationales in reaching that conclusion.
[Iran?]
[What a simplistic response and I suppose typical of the Obama administration. Intelligence our government has in its possession shows a clear trail for funding to al qaida. In some cases - it names names, people who help fund wahhabi causes or help to fund al qaida more directly.
Our government has no interest in seeing the light of truth shine through. I recall during the campaign the repeated attacks by Obama of Bush and his relationship with the Saudis. Obama has turned up the heat on the cozy relationship - he bows to the potentate of that land and aids in covering up Saudi royal family involvement in funding the Wahhabi movement.
So Prince 'A' provides $300,000 a year to the Wahhabi mosque down the road from his house in Mecca. This is the same mosque the bin Laden family attended when they all lived in Mecca and it is the same mosque out of which one hears hateful and visceral attacks on the Crusader states. The mufti of the mosque transfers nearly five million a year to al qaida cells around the world. The prince is fully aware of the sentiment of the mufti and the wahhabi leanings of the mosque, BUT he is required to give zakat (his religious duty) - hence the argument - he is giving his religious donation, not funding al qaida. The US media, too incompetent to understand the complexity of these issues and unable to grasp concepts unless they are connected by string and blood, do not even try. If they did, they would realize that millions in donations made by the royal potentates in Arabia end up in Wahhabi mosques and a significant portion of that goes to al qaida, and some of that (in the past) went to the cells responsible for September 11.
Our government knows this, why do you think Bush pushed to have greater monitoring of funds transfers, or banks notifying authorities when large sums of money are added or deleted from a bank account. We know how they do it and we know why ... and that information would sustain a lawsuit against the Saudi potentates. However, Obama chooses to protect them. ]
Justice Department officials declined to address the issue of whether the timing of the brief was related to Mr. Obama’s trip to Riyadh, but other lawyers involved in the case said the timing appeared to be coincidental. They said as a practical matter the department, which was invited to state its views in the case in February, needed to do so by this week if it hoped to influence the court’s decision on whether to accept the case before it leaves for summer recess in June.
William H. Jeffress, a Washington lawyer who is representing Prince Turki Al-Faisal, a former Saudi ambassador to the United States who is one of the princes named in the lawsuit, said the Justice Department came down on the right side of the law in supporting immunity.Any suggestion that the timing of the brief was influenced by Mr. Obama’s upcoming visit was “baseless,” Mr. Jeffress said, as were the accusations in the lawsuit itself about the Saudi ties to Al Qaeda. “Osama bin Laden is a sworn enemy of the royal family of Saudi Arabia, and the idea that they would be providing financial support to Bin Laden is a little absurd,” Mr. Jeffress said.
[This is really very simplistic. Bin Laden hates the Saudi royals ergo the Saudi royals would never support him. I explained above how it works and Mr. Jeffress is also well aware of how it works which makes him ... not only their lawyer, but for telling us something he knows is not truthful - he is a liar and an accomplice.]
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