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Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/middle-east-watch/why-is-saudi-arabia-abandoning-peace
Why Is Saudi Arabia Abandoning Peace?
(National Interest) Hussain Abdul-Hussain - Saudi Arabia is abandoning the pursuit of an integrated Middle East and dusting off the kingdom's old rhetoric against Zionism and in favor of the Muslim Brotherhood. Saudi Arabia went as far as lobbying President Trump to spare the Iranian regime, Riyadh's archrival since 1979. Saudi Arabia said it would be funding Sudanese Gen. Abdul-Fattah al-Burhan's purchase of $1.5 billion worth of Pakistani weapons, in violation of a global embargo on exporting arms to Sudan. Burhan is a holdover from Omar al-Bashir's Muslim Brotherhood regime, is allied with the Sudanese Islamic Movement and its militias, and is under U.S. sanctions. Saudi columnists, all of whom print the government's views, started arguing that normalization between Muslims and Jews is impossible. An editorial in the daily Al-Riyadh stated: "Wherever Israel is present, there is ruin and destruction. [Israel] pursues policies that disregard international law, do not recognize human rights, and do not respect the sovereignty of states or the integrity of their territories." The writer is a research fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.