Thursday, November 15, 2018

Jamal Khashoggi Murder : Saudi Prosecution’s presser and the narrative that always changes "Updated"

Earlier Thursday, Saudi Prosecution general held its first official press conference to declare the latest findings in the Jamal Khashoggi’s murder investigation.

The Saudi prosecution announced that it was accusing 11 suspects in the murder of Khashoggi and that it was seeking the death penalty for five suspects in the case for ordering the murder of Khashoggi and killing him. We do not know the rest of the charges in the case.
The infamous doors of the Saudi consulate in Istanbul "Reuters"
The infamous doors of the Saudi consulate in Istanbul "Reuters" 
The prosecution added that there 21 detained person in the murder investigation above them the former deputy Saudi intelligence chief “Ahmed Al-Assiri” whom it did not name directly as the man who gave orders to “negotiate with Khashoggi to make him return back to the kingdom”.
The prosecution used the following expression in Arabic that amazes me “to restore Jamal by force !!”  literality.

The word “abduction” is bad but anyhow any good Arabic speaker would be astonished on the level of terms used in that presser to sugarcoat and whitewash a horrible unimaginable act.

A new narrative for the crime is presented this time too.

That team or rather three groups were sent by Al-Assiri to “restore” Jamal back to the Kingdom aka to convince him to return back but things developed in to fight and he was injected by a sedative agent then he was suffocated. The hit team then dismembered his body transferring those parts outside the consulate by 5 suspects with the help of local Turkish contractor.

The crime was planned on 29 September 2018 and that former deputy Saudi intelligence chief “Ahmed Al-Assiri” ordered the formation of that hit squad. He was aided by the media adviser aka Saud Al-Qahtani who believed that the victim posed a danger on the Kingdom because of how he connected to international organization aka "traitor".

Jamal Khashoggi’s body was dismembered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul then those pieces left the consulate through the help of local Turkish man, the prosecution shared a drawing of that suspect. “Turkish prosecution asked for his phone number and his name but got none according to Turkish press”.
It is worth to mention that the Saudi prosecutor general denied that there was a local contractor from Turkey as far as I remember.
KSA’s Prosecutor General made it clear that Crown Prince Mohamed Bin Salman aka MBS was not implicated in the Khashoggi’s murder and needless to say most people following the case do not buy it.

Except for Saud Al-Qahtani “who is under investigation and is banned from travel” and Ahmed Al-Asiri indirectly “Saudi deputy intelligence chief”, the prosecution did not disclose the names of the suspects once again in the case.

Officially and unofficially, that’s the seventh time the Saudi government changes its narrative and it is getting closer to what the Turks have been saying after denials.
Maybe next time, we will get a hit !!!

Boldly enough, the Saudi prosecution claimed that it would not disclose the names of the suspects because “the criminal procedures system in Saudi Arabia does not allow the disclosure of the names of defendants/suspect”.

I remember when women rights, human rights activist and critics were arrested in that campaign in the summer, nobody respected that system and their photos and names were shared everywhere.
Despite being suspects who have not stood a trial yet, those detainees were called “#The_embassies_agents” !!
Defaming Saudi activists
That design featuring detained activists
labeling them as traitors went viral online and offline 
Ironically all those hashtags and infographs, as well as media coverage in general slamming that detained reform and human rights activists in summer, were organized by one man, Saud Al-Qahtani.
Following the pressers of Saudi prosecution and foreign minister.

It took only a couple of hours following that presser and the bizarre presser of Saudi Foreign minister to find the US Treasury imposing sanctions on 17 Saudi citizens for their alleged involvement in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, who is a resident of Virginia.

Now the US Treasury released the names of those 17 suspects and now we have something official at last. Here are the names of the 17 suspects: Saudi al-Qahtani, Maher Mutreb, Salah Tubaigy, Meshal Albostani, Naif Alarifi, Mohamed Al-Zahrani, Mansour Abahussein, Khaled Alotaibi, Abdel Aziz Al-Hawsawi, Walid Al-Sehri, Thaar Al-Harbi, Fahad Al-Balawi, Badr Alotaibi, Mustafa Al-Madani, Saif Al-Qahtani, Turki Al-Sehri, Mohamed Al-Otaibi

Salah Jamal Khashoggi announced that “The absentee prayer”, which is technically the funeral prayer without a body will be held at Prophet Mohamed “PBUH” Mosque in Madina Friday Dawn and after the Friday prayer at the Holy Mosque in Mecca.

Jamal Khashoggi’s house in Jeddah will be opened for memorial service next week for men and women.
Just like anything in the world, there is a good side and a bad side for the Khashoggis’ announcement.
I will start with the bad news that this announcement means that the Khashoggis lost hope that there is a body somewhere.
The good news is that Jamal Khashoggi’s wish came true and his funeral prayer will be held not only at the Prophet Mohamed “PBUH” Mosque in Madina, his hometown but it will be also held at the Holy Mosque in Mecca, which is probably the highest honor any practicing Muslim can get after his death.
My eyes are bit teary honestly because that’s what he wished for.

By the way , the Saudi narrative asserting that Prince MBS has no knowledge what so ever with the murder of Khashoggi and its planning is actually insulting to him because it shows him inexperienced who let his right hand “Saud Al-Qahtani” and thus he can’t be trusted to be the next King of a kingdom with the size of Saudi Arabia.

Needless to say, some of the Western partners, especially in the US, think that his Royal Highness is one hell of a burden as everything he touches, he destroys and the evidence is what happened in Yemen as well in the Khashoggi-gate.
This is not the end. It is just another chapter

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