Robert Satloff
Saudi Arabia and the New Middle East
Robert Satloff | Saudi Arabia and the New Middle East | 06.22.22
- First of all, welcome to our family of Lockdown University. It’s a great pleasure to have you with us. Robert is an old friend and he has very kindly offered to give us a presentation today and I’m thrilled to have him on. So, Robert Satloff has served for nearly 30 years as Executive Director of the Washington Institute, America’s preeminent think-tank focused exclusively on Middle East politics and US policy. An expert on Arab and Islamic politics, as well as US Middle East policy, Dr. Satloff has written and spoken widely on the Arab-Israeli peace process, Iran’s nuclear and regional ambitions, and the challenge of political Islam. In addition, he has served for the past 18 years as host of the “Dakhil Washington,” “Inside Washington,” a weekly news and public affairs show on Alhurra, the US government-supported Arabic satellite channel. An historian by training, Dr. Satloff is the author of the best selling “Among the Righteous: Lost Stories of the Holocaust’s Long Reach into Arab Lands,” which was made into a documentary form and broadcast around the world on PBS, ARTE, and Alhurra. So huge thanks for joining us today, and we are looking forward to you being in conversation with our Carly Maisel, and I believe you’re going to be talking about Saudi Arabia and the new Middle East.
Absolutely, delighted to join with you today, Wendy.
Thanks. Thanks so much. Okay, over to both of you. Thank you.
[Carly Maisel] Thank you, Wendy. So, Rob, when we first scheduled this about six weeks ago, I certainly didn’t know that I would’ve just returned from Saudi Arabia as of four or five days ago. And I also didn’t know that you would be heading there next week. And, you know, really, the confluence of events in the last couple of weeks in the region either makes us seem like we have a crystal ball or an excellent planning team, but we’re going to try and get through as much as we can in the next hour, because day by day in that part of the world there is a conversation that we could take all day on. So at a high level, let’s kind of step back, and start from the beginning before we dive into the last few weeks. So for audiences who are not experts on Saudi Arabia, you know, we’re 20 years, or just over 20 years since 9/11, you know, which is probably a watershed moment for some people with what they do know about Saudi Arabia. And by eight years since Mohammed bin Salman has stepped in to be Crown Prince and Prince Salman has taken over. So for our audience let’s just give a kind of five minute overview of Saudi Arabia, I know that’s a difficult task, and where we were kind of up until 9/11.
Well, okay, so first of all, thank you very much, Carly. I’m really delighted to be able to participate in Lockdown University. Saudi Arabia is a young and old country. It is a country that whose roots date back to the 18th century, but whose modern history began in the early 20th century when a tribal leader, Ibn Saud, unified various parts of the Arabian Peninsula under his authority and created the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He did that partially through force of arms, partially through acclaim to religious sanctity and piety, and he fused these two together. And so religion and state, religion and power, have always been two pillars of the Saudi regime. Modern Saudi Arabia’s relationship with the United States was born in 1945 aboard the battleship Quincy in Great Bitter Lake in Egypt when FDR met Ibn Saud and forged a partnership, which, when you shear it away, is basically oil for security. That the United States would help provide for the defence of Saudi Arabia and the Saudis would do their best to be a stable and secure source of energy resources. And that basic partnership with all the shifting political winds of the subsequent decades stood the test of time. Saudi Arabia went back and forth over the years in its regional politics, sometimes working with the extremists, but most usually being a bastion of conservatism against the winds of extremism that blew through the Middle East.
So in the Fifties and Sixties that was Nasserism and Arab socialism. And then starting in ‘78 and '79, that became the winds of Islamic extremism, some of the Sunni variety and then some of the Shiite variety. The Sunni variety, and this was a cataclysmic moment for Saudi Arabia, was when Islamic radicals took over the Great Mosque of Mecca in November, 1978. And the Saudis came face to face with the forebears of Osama bin Laden and then just a few weeks later was the Islamic Revolution in Iran just across the Persian Gulf, which transformed this regional power, Iran, from a conservative pro-western state to a radical revolutionary Islamic state. So the modern phase of Saudi history is defined by these two events, the takeover of the Mecca Mosque and the Iranian Revolution. From that point on the Saudis sought security in being even more radical than the radicals. Heretofore they were willing to face down the radicals, but starting in '78, '79, they took a turn to pay essentially what was a protection racket toward the radicals. And the enormous increase in funding from Saudi Arabia to radical mosques, radical madrassa, radical preachers around the world began to take off, the terrible end result of which was 9/11.
Which is not to say that the Saudi leadership was specifically not, you know, knew about or was responsible for, except insofar as they helped leaven the entire universe of Islamic extremism after the late Seventies. Since 9/11 the Saudis have made a slow and fitful on again, off again course correction, eventually deciding in the last five years totally to get out of the extremism business because it’s bad for business, and to take a totally new path, which is where they are now under both a mercurial and visionary leadership of King Salman. Not so much King Salman but the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, visionary in the sense that he is dramatically transforming Saudi domestic life and Saudi Arabia’s relationship with Muslims around the world, all for the positive. Mercurial because, as we all know, Saudi Arabia has had a foreign policy which has gone off into all sorts of directions over the last five years. And there have been some terrible incidents, as we all know, of human rights violations, which characterise Saudi Arabia in the last few years as well. So we’ve had the good, the bad, the ugly, the hopeful, and Saudi Arabia encompasses all of it.
So before we look outwards to Saudi’s place in the world, let’s start internally and, you know, as you’ve just touched on, particularly post 9/11, but dramatically in the last seven or eight years, there has been notable change on the ground and, you know, putting the mercurial aspects to one side, if we can, walking around Riyadh, that’s clear to see, you know? When I was there last week the pictures that you would’ve seen 10, 12 years ago, you know, the rights and role of women, their opportunities in society, the role of the religious police has all but disappeared. You know, in terms of I was comfortable to walk around, you know, as you see me on screen tonight, 40% of the workforce are now women, 36% of managers are women and everywhere they went that was very visible. And you know even if you just walk around the shopping malls and see the Zara adverts of how people are dressed, that is all plain to see. But there is also the question of, you know, did MBS defang or dethrone ? You know, did they put these pieces to one side or has it gone into sleeper mode? So how do you really see the internal landscape at the moment?
So again, I think the way to look at what’s going on begins with, you know, what is the purpose? Why is there dramatic change inside Saudi Arabia? It’s not as though the leadership suddenly woke up and became feminists overnight. There is, I think, a recognition by the leadership of Saudi Arabia that the era of total reliance on fossil fuels is at some point coming to an end. We can debate, they can debate whether it’s in 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, doesn’t really make that much difference. But they know that the model of statehood, a model of governance, a model of society, which is based on the global reliance on fossil fuels, is eventually going to run out. And they had to make a decision, how do you prepare a Saudi Arabia which is not reliant on fossil fuels? And one of the key conclusions is that we need to nurture the human development of our people. All of our people. Not only the half of the people that heretofore have been allowed to do things. We need to lower our dependence on foreign workers, and we need to increase the ability of our domestic population to be productive members of society.
Well, that means putting women to work. That means getting rid of the millions of foreign labourers who actually were driving women around as chauffeurs because they were denied being able to work. That means taking advantage of one half of the skills, the brain power of their population. So I think the changes that you cited begin with this recognition of the dramatic goal which animates the thinking of the current Saudi leadership. And yes, so you’re seeing all these changes afoot. Changes in women’s role in society, changes in interaction with the sexes, entertainment changes, educational changes, employment changes, not quite yet going completely to a total legal restructuring, but significant, significant so that women can now travel without their male guardians. Women can have passports, these sorts of things, and progress is definitely being made on all these fronts. One thing I think it is fair to say, and it, you know, this long list of all the good things, what the Saudi leadership doesn’t really appreciate or doesn’t want people to think is that these rights are anything other than given top down as opposed to earned bottom up. So the activists who may have agitated for years in advance of these sorts of rights were punished and many suffered, whether it’s in jail or other forms of punishment and that occurred while these rights were being extended. And there the message is, you know, remember that this is still a monarchy.
This is still ultimately a family business of the Al Saud family. And so it’s important to recall that rights are not earned bottom up, but actually bestowed top down. For the vast majority of Saudis it’s a deal they’re willing to take because their lives today are appreciably, especially for the women of Saudi Arabia, appreciably freer and more open and more self-defined than they were in previous generations. Is it irretrievable? Are these changes irrevocable? My view is not yet. And so it is important, I believe, that the collective we have an interest in trying to help Saudi Arabia, to encourage Saudi Arabia to continue down this path. With the passage of time and with the passage of more laws, it will become much more firmly rooted. And I think we have a strong interest that the Saudi Arabia of the future is a far, far cry from the Saudi Arabia of the past.
Yeah and as we’ve seen in a not so far away part of the Middle East, if you take Afghanistan, you know, a change in regime can roll the clock back a hugely significant way in a very quick succession. So yes, as you say, it’s not yet irretrievable. Now the main initiative that is quoted everywhere you go in Saudi Arabia now is Vision 2030. And as you’ve touched on, it’s, you know, looking at modernising socially and economically by promoting Islamic centrism, women’s rights and diversification from oil. Now they’re obviously using trillions of oil dollars to do that and the infrastructure projects going on on the ground are actually, you know, have to be seen to be believed, whether it’s the financial district that is going to look like a cross between Canary Wharf and 50 times Hudson Yards, each building designed by a world-class architect, or the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Alula being built in the desert with a Michelin star restaurant, you know, right next to it or the cities kind of popping up to the side of Riyadh, you know, you can see the partnership between money and vision. How much of this do you think is kind of really going to deliver this risk, helping them come away from the dependency on oil, and how much is nice around the edges, but still for Saudi Arabia for a significant time to come, there is no replacement for oil?
It’s a good question, I mean, the Saudis are certainly, as you say, investing and they’re investing in, like, for example they’re investing in the idea of tourism as a major source of foreign income. I mean, I went to the Saudi pavilion at the World Expo for example in Dubai a few months ago and the Saudi pavilion was all about NASCAR racing, wonderful beaches with bikini-clad European travellers, a great scenery, you know, some of it lush oases in various parts of the country. There’s a real commitment that they think that they’re going to become a, you know, a stop on the global tour for world travellers. This huge investment that Saudis are making in this alternative golf association where they’re trying to pick off, you know, the world’s great golfers to join the Saudi-backed tour is all part of a marketing effort to convince high-end golfers to come and play golf eventually at one of the new courses being built all over the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. So, I mean, this is not just with play money. They’re investing enormous sums in trying to turn Saudi Arabia into a tourist destination. I think the sums that they’re investing in Neom are, you know, difficult to fathom. Neon being this futuristic, linear city that is being built in northwest Saudi Arabia, essentially in the middle of nowhere. You know, 2030, I wouldn’t focus on the date. It’s as much as anything. It’s an idea.
I think they all realise they’re going to miss the date. And some of the indicators are, you know, better than some, worse than others. The date isn’t so important. It’s the idea which is a transformation of this economy so that at least in the first stage it’s not totally reliant on oil resources, which Saudi Arabia has been for decades, and then eventually a transition. The Saudis, I think, are quite serious about this. You know, they’re blessed with, as you mentioned, a sovereign investment fund that gives them the cushion to be able to do this transition. Will they succeed? It’s a huge gamble. I don’t know if they’re going to succeed. I certainly hope they succeed because a failure would be catastrophic for Western interests. If Saudi Arabia were to become in the 21st century what Iran became in the last quarter of the 20th century, that would be catastrophic.
So we’ve now started to touch on Western interest. So let’s turn to that. And you know, as we jokingly said, you know, in the last month every day has been some kind of front page news around Saudi Arabia depending on where you are in the world, even if just the last 24 hours and MBS’s trip to Egypt, Jordan, and Turkey, you know, and he’s signing 14 trade deals with Egypt and Jordan, now Saudi Arabia is now the biggest investor, you know, and him and everyone standing next to each other for the first time in a long time. You know, it’s very clear that there is a concerted effort going on. How much is related to Biden’s visit and how much is related to the continuing rumours of his father’s ill health depends on which newspaper you read, but you know, there is absolutely a considerable effort to show that they are stepping forwards regardless really of what box people may want to put them in. So before we turn to the broader Western interests, their neighbours in the Arab world, how do they relate to this Saudi modernization and particularly Iran?
So yes, I agree very much with the, you know, the observations you just made. For the first few years of his Crown Princeship, Mohammed bin Salman was a divisive figure doing things which underscored sort of, you know, divisions within the Arabic-Muslim world. So he took on Qatar and made a deep breach in intra-gulf relations. You know, he got involved in Lebanese internal politics. The Yemen War. Now, certainly in advance of the Biden visit, but not solely as a result of that, as you intimated, I think he’s trying to project an image of a regional leader, a convener, somebody to whom other major countries in the region owe respect and gratitude and friendship. And that all, you know, creates the environment for the Biden visit and his eventual elevation to the throne. In terms of Iran, look, the Saudi Arabia and Iran are on opposite poles. President Obama famously suggested at one point that US interest should be that Iran and Saudi Arabia share the Middle East with each other. I think recent events have suggested that there is no sharing because there’s no meeting of the minds between these two fundamentally different regimes.
Iran was responsible directly or indirectly for hundreds of rocket attacks against Saudi Arabia from the Houthi insurgents in Yemen who have been armed with Iranian missiles and Iranian technology and have taken their war to Saudi cities. This is one of the least reported aspects of regional politics that hundreds of rockets have fallen on Saudi civilian areas over the course of this conflict, something that, you know, no American would ever put up with, and something which rivals, the Israelis, have had to deal with from Hamas, you know, sending rockets into Southern Israel. And that’s Iran’s approach to Saudi Arabia. And it’ll be very interesting to see what happens when President Biden comes. I think when, you know, I hope our officials in Washington remember that when President Trump visited Riyadh the day before, two days before the Iranians sent rockets trying to hit from Yemen into Riyadh just to remind everybody that they can and that’s what their intent really is. I think we should be on guard that the Iranians will do something again, because the Iranians have a very different approach to America’s presence in the Middle East, something they’re trying to end, something the Saudis want to see a lot more of, and to the regime in Saudi Arabia itself, which the Iranians view as heretical and they’re trying to replace it. They’re trying to undermine the Saudi role as the custodian of Islam’s two holiest sites, Mecca and Medina, and the Saudis, of course, value this as key elements of their legitimacy.
So digging in on the war in Yemen a little more, you know, a lot of the books you read about the last 10 years in Saudi, MBS’s rise, you know, say that that was a combination of both posturing, you know, wanting to send a clear message and seemingly a surprise to much of the rest of the world when the war started. What do you think is now the reading of that war? Is it, as you say, an opportunity to continue to push back against Iran? Or is it really a kind of strategic threat?
Well, I think if the Saudis had their choice, this war would be over. That was the decision the Emiratis made and the Emiratis tried to get out, they had to pull back in when it looked like the Houthis were going to close in and win an all-out victory. But the Saudis won house so the Saudis, you know, I mean, for the last year, at least for the last year, ask any American official, and these are American officials, most of whom, you know, have no love lost for Saudi Arabia. Ask any American official and they will tell you that the Saudis have been full partners in the diplomatic effort to reach a ceasefire and an end of this war. It’s the Houthis that have continually said no and continually violated previous ceasefires. And in fact, the ceasefire, which we all think is so wonderful at the moment, and it is indeed wonderful on a certain level, it is regularly being violated by local rocket fires from the Houthis against Saudi targets along the Saudi border. But since the Houthis are not attacking Riyadh, it’s not making any, you know, international headlines. Now, if it were up to the Saudis, this war would be over 'cause they have other, you know, as we say in America, they have other fish to fry and they’ve basically come to terms with, you know, more or less unhappy outcome in the Yemen conflict.
So we are now three weeks out from President Biden’s visit, you know, daily the exact nature of that visit is shifting, you know, it’s a GCC conference, you will see MBS, you won’t see MBS, you know, where exactly this will land. I think we’ll only know once the trip is taking place. You know, he’s heading to Israel beforehand. What do you think, and obviously we’re asking you to have a bit of a crystal ball, but as someone who has spent, you know, more than 30 years in this space, what do you think the US administration is hoping he comes out of from this trip?
Right, so, you know, the narrow way to look at this trip, and I don’t think it’s accurate, the narrow way to look at this trip is, oh, this is Joe Biden going to Saudi Arabia to convince the Saudis to pump more oil to bring down the price of gas, to limit the damage on Democratic party election prospects come our November congressional vote. For some people that’s what this is about. But I think it’s much broader than that. I think this is about a potential reset of the US-Saudi relationship after some very difficult times, difficult times that were partially born of the Khashoggi affair. Difficult times that were partially born of the mercurial leadership of the Saudis, difficult times that were partially born of sort of ideological turn by portions of the President’s party, the Democratic party, which some of whom view the Saudis as even worse than the Iranians or other bad actors in the world. And this mix led to a year of very sour relations between our two countries to the detriment of both.
And I’d like to think that this is an opportunity to repair that, to recognise areas where we have a commonality of interest, areas where we don’t, and to figure out a mechanism to manage the latter and to build on the former. That’s what leaders do. Now, clearly the president has some pretty palpable reluctance about this trip to Saudi Arabia, as we’ve seen from some of his comments. This is born of, you know, some of the comments he made earlier about Saudi Arabia. I’m going to treat them like a pariah that they are, which is unlike Joe Biden. A person who’s so steeped in international affairs realises, you know, you do business with all sorts of countries and one has to compartmentalise different aspects of our relationship, which doesn’t mean sacrificing one aspect or another, it just means how you fit them all together for an overall policy. I hope that we are on the same page as the Saudis in the sense that I hope that we have built an agenda and an objective of this visit, which is a reset. We need them to be willing to reset and we need to be willing to reset ourselves.
So if you saw the front page of Arab News today, you know, Israel’s defence minister is on it talking about, you know, potential strategic alliances. You know, the trickle for the last few weeks/months has been, you know, is there an opportunity as part of this trip for a multilateral agreement around strategic islands that Saudi needs, airspace, et cetera? And, you know, conversations on the ground when I was there is, you know, nobody seems concerned or surprised that there is an opportunity for a warming of ties with Israel and nobody seems particularly bothered. They think it’s good, it’s time and, you know, let’s get on with it. Do you think there is an opportunity for Israel or do you think it’s actually become tangled in the US piece and therefore actually may take longer than it might have done without?
So it’s a very interesting question and here again I think we need to step back a bit. The biggest change is that all this is possible, is that we’re all talking about it as though it’s a regular order of business. And whether, you know, is it going to happen this trip? Is it going to happen in six months from now, a year from now, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera? I mean, all the details matter of course, but let’s not, you know, lose sight of the forest here. The forest is that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, you know, home of the two holiest mosques of Islam, is basically on record, and the Crown Prince himself said so, is on record with being open to the idea of full peace with the world’s only Jewish state. Is it going to happen today, tomorrow? What are the logistics, what are the parameters all need to be worked out. And it may not happen, there may not be any significant public move during the Biden visit, but the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia has said that he not only views the potential for peace, but he said Israel is, quote, a potential ally of Saudi Arabia.
I mean, ally is a very strong word, and that’s because they share common interests, especially from Iran. Neither of them wants to necessarily say that, you know, so directly, but that’s what we’re talking about here. So I think that there will be, there is already a certain measure of cooperation that is, you know, under the table. The two of them work together under the military umbrella of the US Central Command, which Israel entered in the latter stages of the Trump administration, the US Central Command, the US military command, which covers the entire Middle East. There are Israeli officers and Saudi officers just as there are working with all the other Arab regional military officers and there’s a, you know, there’s practical cooperation, there’s practical cooperation on other areas, whether it’s maritime intelligence in the Red Sea, or whether it’s missile defence which, as you said, the Israeli Minister of Defence touted just recently the prospect of a Middle East Missile Defence Alliance. These things are developing. So on the big picture I’m very hopeful. Whether or not there’s a breakthrough next week, two weeks from now, it’s important, but it’s not as consequential as the fundamentals.
So somewhat ironically, Israel has maybe become the easier part of the conversation. While I was in Riyadh I spent time with your friend Dr. Issa, who, as the head of the Muslim World League travelled to Auschwitz in 2020, you know, in partnership with AJC and he, you know, felt strongly about the importance of that. While he was there he denounced anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial. He has continued to say the right thing since his return. And he actually told us over lunch about, you know, some of the clerics who joined him, particularly one from Lebanon who actually had to flee and now lives in Riyadh thanks to the risks he took to visit Auschwitz. But, you know, he was very robust and clear with us that for him he felt it was a risk worth taking. This was of real significance and importance. However, you know, that is one step but the antisemitism that’s still, you know, visible through some of these previously sponsored institutions that were funded by the Saudis or school textbooks across the region suggest, you know, whilst there is progress, there’s still a big, big way to go. Dr. Issa is the former justice minister, you know, he’s got 1500 employees at Mecca. The Muslim World League is an incredibly significant organisation. Do you think they are leading the way where many others will follow or are they out on a limb here on the combating of this?
So, you know, on the narrow issue, I’ve had a good fortune of knowing Dr. Issa and the Muslim World League for a number of years now. Actually, the story is that, so I met him in December of '17, and then a few weeks later, total Lark, I wrote him a note asking if he’d be willing to say something on the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is the end of January. And I figured he’d write a very stilted, you know, formal letter back to me. And instead he wrote a 600-word statement, which was the most definitive statement of Muslim denunciation of Holocaust distortion and denial that I’ve ever seen, and I spent much of the last 20 years focused on this stuff. And then it was off to the races. I invited him to Washington, went to the Holocaust Museum, and you know he’s been pursuing this agenda ever since. More generally this is part of, as I said earlier, the Saudis, you know, consciously and purposefully getting out of the extremism business. Not just not doing bad things, but doing good things. And so Issa’s broader message to Muslims around the world, which much more important than his message to Jews is his message to Muslims is you need to be first and foremost good citizens of the countries in which you live.
If your country says you can’t wear a hijab, obey your country, don’t fight it, but try to change the law legally if you can through whatever local mechanisms there are. But don’t fight it. The first order of business is to be a good citizen of the country where you are. And that’s a huge change from where the Saudis were in the Seventies, Eighties and Nineties when they promoted a transnational concept of Islam through this series of madrases and mosques and radical preachers, which said, you know, forget about the laws of your country. You need to owe fealty to this bigger ideology. His message to Muslims around the world today is no, be good citizens. Go to public school. Don’t go to Muslim school. You know, show people in your towns and cities what it means to be a good, upstanding citizen who happens to be a Muslim. You are a French person, German, American first, and a Muslim second. It’s a fascinating and important message. Now, this doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot of extremist money still swishing about out there in the world because there is. Enormous sums were put out there, you know, in years past. And there are still some private sources of very bad money that are running around the world, but it’s not official Saudi money anymore. And it’s not officially, it’s not coming from the Muslim World League anymore. And that’s an enormous step in the right direction.
Yeah, I mean, I will say from on our trip that that message came through loud and clear, it was very much one of, we want you to understand more about us and us to understand more about you. And you know the group travelled with a Torah, they gifted significant Jewish gifts everywhere we went. And one member of the group was actually saying Kaddish for a family member and there was 11 men in the group. And therefore, you know, everywhere we went around Saudi Arabia, a happened and when the group took off, you know, the members of the Muslim World League said their version of the and the Jews responded. So, you know, they certainly with open arms and both feet kind of were looking to.
Right, so I think what, you know, I think one of the next steps that will be an important thing to watch is when and whether the Saudis permit open expression of non-Muslim prayer, which still today, you know, not withstanding what you just said about saying Kaddish.
We were under invitation, yes.
Still today is not officially permitted. So there are no officially sanctioned churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia, let alone, you know, for other religions. But I say churches and synagogues because they’re people of the book recognised as such by Islam. Interestingly, the Saudi position on this is not that it is banned under Islam, that they can’t exist. It is merely custom that they don’t exist in Saudi Arabia. I would not be surprised if we see evolution of this before too long, which I think would be a very important step toward the sorts of religious tolerance that you and I would recognise as real religious tolerance.
So do you think the future there looks something similar to what the UAE have developed? You know, there is the acceptance of other religious institutions, you know, you have to abide by the rules of the land and, you know, within that comes some adaption to the way you would’ve regularly, you know, conducted your business. Is that the model they’re looking for?
You know, it’s an interesting question. I think we tend to see the UAE as the test case for Saudi Arabia as being, you know, a decade ahead of Saudi Arabia in these sorts of things. I think we should step back and realise that these are two very different countries and the most important difference being, you know, the Emirates is a country of approximately 10 million people, only 10% of whom are Emiratis. I mean, it’s a remarkable state. And I think that these sorts of tolerance that you see in the Emirates, while it has a sort of a global political strategic aspect, also reflects the fact that an enormous percentage of the residents of the Emirates are not Muslim. And the Emirates relies on those Christian and Hindu and Buddhist workers, you know, to make the system run. Saudi Arabia is different.
Saudi Arabia, the vast majority of people who live in Saudi Arabia are Muslim. And yes, while they have foreign workers, their pace on these things is not driven by the need to accommodate the sensibility of their foreign workers who are a much, much smaller percentage of the overall Saudi resident population and they’re trying to limit it. No, for the Saudis, it’s really more about their role in the world. And so it’ll probably take some time, but I do think that we’re moving in that direction and I’ve heard officialdom including the Crown Prince say that there’s, you know, there’s no particular reason, after all there were churches and synagogues here in the time of Mohamed, and if it was good enough for Mohamed, why isn’t it good enough for us today? That sort of mindset can bring you a lot closer to this level of tolerance that you and I would recognise as such.
And listen, that was certainly the mindset being quoted. In fact that that type of discussion was what was being drawn upon as we made our way around Saudi. Now we focused a lot on Saudi Arabia and how they feel about kind of engaging with the world. Do you think America specifically is kind of ready to move past the situation with Khashoggi? Do you think that will be a permanent blight when you add that to 9/11, or have America actually now started to adapt it’s view? I don’t know if there’s any polling, but you know, anecdotally.
Look, generally Saudi Arabia is the easiest country for Americans to dislike. Whether it’s 9/11 or Khashoggi or the difference in culture or whatever, it’s a very easy country to dislike. For many years one of the best things that Saudis had going for them was this huge supply of Saudi students that were coming to study in American universities. That number is now dropping partially because the Saudis are interested in them, you know, staying inside and getting education back in integrated universities back in Saudi Arabia. So I don’t think the Saudis, you know, I think it’s too much to ask that we’re going to totally transform their image to, you know, one of the countries that Americans just love. But would it be a country that we can do business with, that we have mutual respect for? Well, it’ll take some years.
There are certain parts of both parties which certainly the Democratic party and even a part of the Republican party that really views the Saudis as part of the problem, not part of the solution. And it’ll take some time and we’re seeing, you know, this part of the Biden reluctance is that part of the party which views Saudi Arabia as a litmus test for progressivism. I mean it was the first speech the President gave was on Saudi Arabia back in early days of his administration. The first thing he did was release the Khashoggi report and made remarks about Yemen. So there’s a part of the Democratic party for whom this is very important ideologically. But I do think, and I certainly hope it’s the case, but I do think that we are moving toward a greater recognition of how the change in Saudi Arabia serves American interests and how we want to be helpful and supportive and encouraging. And you can only do that if you’re engaging and I do think that sensible public opinion is moving in that direction.
So in our last 10 minutes, and I think we’ll have to have you back after President Biden returns from Saudi to do a wrap up, but we’ve been fairly optimistic I think probably 'cause I’ve just come off the ground and you are on your way, you know, we feel the history in the making. But you know, as we’ve said, certainly nothing is set in stone and, you know, these are good noises and good mood music, but you know, we don’t know yet that this change has really taken hold. What do you think are the signs to come either that the modernization and the continuation is going in the right direction or signs for concern as the years continue and internally, you know, amongst the broad ruling party, not just specifically the branch currently in charge from the house of Saud. How do you see that stabilisation taking place?
Well, first I think what’s going on is more than mood music, but yet not yet irrevocable. So it’s in between. It’s real.
Real, but could be undone.
Could be undone 'cause there are forces of, you know, powerful forces of conservatism which remain in this country, which at the moment are quiescent. But we have no good idea about their real potential power. So I think we should keep that in mind. Look, one of the key tests that you’re hinting at is the test of whether Mohamed bin Salman does transition peacefully and gracefully to the kingship on the passing of his father. You know, I think chances are likely, but it’s an unknown and that will be a hugely important moment for Saudi Arabia and for the region because, you know, for better or for worse top-down leadership means that whoever the king is and how he gets into that position matters. Whether does he have the fealty of the broad cross section of first of the royal family and then the political elite and more generally the Saudi people. He is where he is now. Will he be even more deeply entrenched as a leader after the passing of his father?
So I think that moment is really a key test. And then the immediate years following that, whether he continues on the path that he’s on now and whether the US-Saudi relationship strengthens over the next period of time, or does there become a perception that takes root in Saudi Arabia that Saudi security can only be provided with a more diversified security environment, namely more China and to a lesser extent Russia than we have now. I tend to think the Saudis are pretty realistic and understand that their security lot is intimately connected with us and I would hope to see even deeper cooperation in the future, but they will reflect, their decisions will reflect also how we approach them too, and our ability to respond to their security needs. This is a two-way street. I’d like to think that we’re going to repair some of the damage that occurred in recent past as a result of Yemen and not reacting adequately to some of the Houthi attacks, et cetera, and that this emerging relationship with Israel does provide a, you know, a new foundation or an additional pillar for the potential relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States.
So one of the pieces I was quite fascinated about, which I guess really touches on the long-term desire to move away somewhat from oil necessity is the Crown Prince’s interest in climate change, which, you know, as you travel around the country, comes up at every point. Now partly that’s, I think, just a reality of where we are in the world. How much of that do you think is Saudi kind of skipping some of the other stages that the rest of the world’s countries are in, which is trying to grapple with how you, you know, run an energy policy whilst also looking to be responsible on climate change and is there a possibility that Saudi Arabia actually comes out as a leader in this space despite its oil dependency?
I think an innovator perhaps more than a leader, but yes, I think they take this very seriously. Again, it’s not the year that matters, 2030, 2040, 2050. It’s the mindset that matters and the recognition that they and the world are moving to a post-fossil fuel future. I mean, there will always be some countries who will want to, you know, will still have fossil fuels in the mix, but when they conceive of the future of this country, they’re thinking about something far different than the last 50 years. And so yes I think that they’re investing huge sums in innovation and I think it’s real. I don’t think that this is just for show. I think this is a very real pillar of where the Saudis are building their future.
And one of the things that I think was a sticking point when we discussed it with those on the ground is as they look to welcome tourists and open up, there are some red lines, for want of a better word, whether that is around alcohol or some of the other things that are currently prohibited, that there isn’t a long-term current plan to change. You know, so you are going to end up with huge tourist opportunities, you know, this cruise line that they’re developing, and all of these things, alcohol-free for the short term. Do you think that’s a major stumbling block or something that people will learn to live without?
Well I think that, you know, here it’s not as though I’ve had any serious conversations with Saudi leaders about this. So this is just sort of Rob Satloff opining. I think it’s difficult.
That’s okay. We want your opining.
I think it’s difficult to imagine a totally alcohol-free successful tourist industry when one thinks about the long term of Saudi development. I don’t think that the world’s golfing community, for example, is going to spend a lot of time in Saudi Arabia if they can’t, you know, wash down a failed 18th hole putt at the 19th hole as we refer to it in American golf courses. So what does that mean? I think that there likely will be zones of foreign, you know, where foreigners can do certain things. Many countries in the Middle East have had sort of casinos that were open only to foreigners, zones that will be restricted for foreigners and where Saudis are employees but not attendees. I think we may see this, you know, in the cruise lines that might dock in Saudi Arabia, a different set of rules on onboard ship as opposed to onboard land. We’ll see.
I think this is all going to evolve over the next period of time. But I think, you know, the forces of reaction, the forces of conservatism are strong and I think we should recognise that. Less so that we need to recognise it. I’m sure this is being recognised by the leadership, which is why they’re moving faster in some arenas and slower in others. And, you know, they’re going to know their country a lot better than we are. They will know the potential pace of change a lot. You know what the country can accept a lot better than we are. And I think they know far better than anything that I could say that, you know, whether the world’s tourists are going to show up, if they can’t have a gin and tonic, you know, at the end of a long hot day, they will make those judgements and they’ll try to all figure out solutions which makes sense.
And as we touched on, it’s a very hot day. It was 115 in the shade when I was there and I think it’s crept up a few more degrees by the time you get there next week. So as a wrap up, you know, I somewhat naively like to consider myself generally well-read and well informed, but I will hold my hands up that the week I was in Saudi, each stage was a surprise and a big learning experience. Other than of course reading everything you write, what else do you think people who are like looking to understand more about that part of the world should be reading and should be using as an opportunity to learn more?
Well, it’s a very good question. You know, listen to Saudis themselves, whether it’s Saudi books or films, you know, follow a bunch of different Saudi journalists and political activists and the opposition, you know, follow them online on Twitter and whatever to get the full breadth of what’s going on, the culture, whether it’s art or music. All these things are available. Listen to Saudis and listen less to even people like me, the American, the western interpreters of Saudi Arabia. There was a time when we were the only people from whom one could get the story. But now there are a lot more openings to hear from Saudis themselves. And so I urge your listeners to make a little effort to try to get online and listen and hear and read Saudis themselves.
No, and I was fascinated while I was there that I could read Times of Israel, Twitter or anything else that I wanted completely, you know, uninterrupted, not necessarily unmonitored, but uninterrupted, you know, in a way that you can’t necessarily in some of their neighbouring countries. So, you know, even just the internet access itself and its openness was a surprise to me. Rob, thank you very much. As I say, we could have kept going for several more hours. I will hand back over to Wendy and I hope perhaps we can do part two in the coming weeks.
Okay, very good. Thank you.
Well, Rob, thank you very, very much. It was fascinating and what an about-turn.
Well, hopeful. Hopeful. That’s right. Keep our fingers crossed, but yes.
It certainly is looking much more positive than it was in years gone by, you know, with the isms in between, with the curve balls.
Yes, absolutely.
But I have to say it was thrilling when to hear Carly’s excitement when she was in Saudi Arabia and she had a great time. She came back very enthused.
Terrific.
Yeah, and certainly, you know, our Saudi friends are very inspiring. So, you know, and certainly in the art world, lot’s happening there and, you know, great relationships between Israelis and the Saudis and for us that is truly hopeful. So on that note, I’d like to extend a further invitation, thank you from one family to another. And Rob. great, great pleasure. Million thanks. And to you Carly as well. Thank you for an outstanding presentation today.