It is now admitted that members of the Saudi government killed a person the government decided betrayed it. If Salman initiated it, that is probably his right as Crown Prince. If not there already seems to be a list of suspects reaching up to a high level.
Saudi Arabia’s legal system is based on Sharia Law, which bears little semblance to western legal systems. Making it worse is that, although some Islamic countries have codified Sharia Law, Saudi Arabia is just beginning to recognize the importance of codification. A guide was published in January 2018. The concept of precedent, fundamental to some western countries, is absent from Saudi Law. There are many issues not covered by Sharia Law that must be addressed by a modern country. These are controlled by royal decree, as it is the monarchy that ultimately is the law. Allowed Sharia punishments include beheading, amputation, hanging, stoning, and whipping. Punishable offenses we don’t recognize are adultery, witchcraft, homosexuality, and apostasy. Before you choose to impose your rules on Saudi Arabia, imagine them imposing theirs on us.
The Middle East essentially operates under the rules that were in place in Europe when William Wallace was drawn and quartered and eviscerated, while still alive, and then beheaded, in 1305, for treason against King Edward I. This happened not long after Edward I confirmed the Magna Carta as England’s statute law, in 1297. This was also 135 years after Thomas Becket was assassinated, for which the assassin’s suffered no civil punishment.
In light of the fact that what was done was most likely legal and business as usual, the hysteria whipped up by the media seems excessive. Why aren’t we at least as concerned about Chicago teenage athlete Anton Shaw’s death Saturday night? So far as we know, he wasn’t guilty of anything. The reason is that he is not politically useful to the American left. His death is, in fact, a political embarrassment, so you likely haven’t heard of him.
JAK was a journalist. 81 journalists and media workers were killed in 2017. One of them, killed a year ago this past week, was important in the release of the Panama Papers, which had a much larger impact on the world than JAK prior to his death. Do you know her name? The number killed this year will be about the same.
https://cpj.org/data/killed/?status=Killed&motiveConfirmed%5B%5D=Confirmed&type%5B%5D=Journalist&start_year=1992&end_year=2018&group_by=yearIs this incident, involving someone you likely never heard of before 3 weeks ago, really so important that the nascent attempt to move Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of the 9/11 terrorists and of Al Qaeda, towards western values and to join with the west to attempt peace in the Middle East needs to be aborted? The Middle East has been in turmoil since the fall of the Ottoman Empire 100 years ago. Calming it down would be a good thing from which millions, maybe billions would benefit.
So far as I can tell, media outrage only benefits the American left that looks to successfully abort one of the most important steps in resolving problems in the Middle East in my lifetime. But, it is only collateral damage to them. Its just another way to thwart Trump’s success. By the way, he still seems to be going along with it, in spite of what the media is saying.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2018/10/21/jamal-khashoggi-death-donald-trump-cites-lies-but-defends-saudis/1719586002/I sometimes forget some Americans don’t seem to understand presumption of innocence even though it is a fundamental aspect of US law (Coffin v US 1895), included in the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights article 11, and has historical precedents in Roman law and Islamic law. After the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century, feudalism did not accept this right, but it was generally restored in Western Europe around the 14th century. I would like to keep it and leave lynch mobs in the past.
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