Staff Reports
A Wall Street Journal report published on Tuesday quoted anonymous people inside the Saudi regime as saying that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has little respect for liberal American President Joe Biden and privately makes fun of the elderly leader's apparent low mental faculties.
The rumor comes after years of steadily increasing tensions between the administration of former President Joe Biden and the government of Saudi Arabia, which is currently led by Mohammed bin Salman. These tensions began when the United States government removed the Iran-backed Houthi terrorist insurgency from its list of designated foreign terrorist organizations shortly after former Vice President Joe Biden took office.
The Houthis, who are participating in the civil war that is now taking place in Yemen, almost instantly viewed the delisting as a warning to target Saudi oil installations. Saudi Arabia backs Yemen's legitimate government, which the Houthis toppled and installed themselves in power.
Even though MBS has denied any involvement in the murder of Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi, the Biden administration has repeatedly brought up the incident in discussions with Saudi officials as a barrier to improving relations between the two countries. Khashoggi was killed by Saudi operatives in October 2018.
In spite of the fact that Joe Biden ran for president on a platform that pledged to make Saudi Arabia a global "pariah," Saudi officials and MBS himself were allegedly "shocked" at the delisting and several other measures that followed Biden's inauguration, including accusations made against MBS surrounding the Khashoggi affair.
According to an article published in the Wall Street Journal, To the Saudis, Mr. Biden's early moves were a smack in the face.
More recently, the decision by OPEC+ to cut production by 2 million barrels a day has strained the relationship. This is despite speculations, subsequently verified by the Biden administration, that the White House encouraged Saudi Arabia to limit oil production cutbacks before the U.S. midterm elections, as high gas prices will certainly sway votes against Democrats.
Officials from the Biden campaign have leveled the baseless accusation that Saudi Arabia is aiding Russia's invasion of Ukraine by supporting production cuts; however, this is an allegation that even the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, has publicly contradicted by expressing appreciation to MBS.
According to reports that were reported by the Wall Street Journal, the extremely public discord that exists between the two countries is being fueled by the straightforward reality that MBS and Biden do not particularly like each other.
The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people inside the Saudi administration, that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom's 37-year-old day-to-day ruler, privately mocks President Biden, making fun of the 79-year-gaffes old's and questioning his mental acuity.
According to the newspaper's sources, Trump has told his aides that he was never a fan of former president Donald Trump and that he favored former vice president Joe Biden.
When asked about the story by the New York magazine, the Prince Faisal bin Farhan of the Saudi Foreign Ministry categorically refuted it.
Our economic objective is very necessary to our continued existence. According to comments made by Saudi Arabia's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, in an interview, it's not just about energy and defense. That might have been the situation fifty years ago, but we can guarantee that it is not the case today.
It's been alleged that he said something along the lines of, These charges made by anonymous sources are completely false. Because of the importance that the kingdom places on having a relationship with the United States that is founded on mutual respect, the leaders of the kingdom have always shown the utmost regard for its presidents, who come from the United States.
Although it is an anonymous rumor, the Saudi government has categorically denied it. However, the Wall Street Journal has also reported that the Obama administration has asked the Saudis to halt oil production cuts until after the midterm elections. A spokesman for the White House, John Kirby, later confirmed that the Obama administration had made such a request.
In mid-August, Kirby issued a statement in which he indicated that Saudi Arabia had been provided with data showing that there was no market basis to lower production targets and that the kingdom could simply wait until the next OPEC meeting to see how things progressed.
It is not a new phenomena for leaders from other countries to make fun of or doubt Joe Biden's mental capacity. It is common practice in anti-American rogue governments like China and North Korea for cronies to poke fun at the 79-year-old president of the United States. In April, after President Joe Biden referred to Russian President Vladimir Putin as a "war criminal" for his invasion of Ukraine, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), which is run by the government of North Korea, referred to the comment as the work of an old man in his senility.
It is well knowledge that Biden struggles with his communication skills. Since he took office, he has used a wide variety of bizarre terms and idioms, according to the observations of a "expert" who was quoted in China's state propaganda publication, the Global Times, one year ago. Biden was said to be "weak in vocal expression" according to the publication itself.
Although many of our partners have voiced the same concerns, they have done it in a manner that avoids making light of the situation.
Leaders from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have reportedly refused to take phone calls from President Joe Biden during the Ukraine crisis, after he snubbed them repeatedly during the first year of his administration. https://t.co/rWIOz8qySr
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) March 9, 2022
Jair Bolsonaro, the president of Brazil, claimed in May of Joe Biden that he met with him at the G-20 meeting in October and he passed me by as if I didn't exist. Bolsonaro was referring to the G-20 summit that took place in October. However, he dealt with everyone in the same manner; I'm not sure if it was due to his age.
In another part of the report that was published on Monday by the Wall Street Journal, unnamed "people" told the publication that tensions between Riyadh and Washington worsened when President Biden visited Saudi Arabia this summer for what is now notoriously known as the "fist bump summit." This is because of an awkward greeting photo that was taken of Biden and MBS taking a photo together.
Officials in Saudi Arabia who were there for the July meeting between Biden and MBS claimed they got the impression that Biden didn't want to be there and wasn't interested in the policy discussions.
According to sources close to the negotiations, the Saudis also expressed their displeasure with President Joe Biden's insistence on quickly raising human-rights concerns, which included the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
It was previously reported that the Saudis canceled an increase in production that they had planned as a result of their irritation with President Joe Biden's visit to Saudi Arabia. This was despite the fact that Biden himself denied that the visit was intended to reassure the Saudis to pump more oil in order to lower prices.
The preceding is a summary of an article that originally appeared on Breitbart.
