(Washington Times) Arnaud de Borchgrave - The Saudi royal family is not a monolith. There are 7,000 princes (all on generous stipends from birth) plus their wives (many still have three or four) and sisters and daughters, for a total of 24,000 members of the House of Saud. Male princes get $500,000 a year for expenses. The Saud family budget is about $3 billion a year even though the kingdom is now in hock to foreign banks to the tune of $225 billion. Bin Laden remains an immensely popular figure in Saudi Arabia. Many Wahhabi clerics revere him as some sort of miracle man. As recently as July 27, Prince Amr Mohammed al Faisal encouraged today's enemies of the U.S. to study the strategies employed by America's enemies during the Vietnam War. Writing in Arab News, this prince of the royal blood, who frequently escorts high-ranking foreign visitors, said the U.S. Army "is so weak that Americans should fear an invasion by the Mexican army."
2003-08-01 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive