Shortly after imposing a naval blockade in the immediate aftermath of the Qatar diplomatic crisis, one which left the small Gulf nation not only politically isolated and with severed ties to its neighbors but potentially locked out of maritime trade and crippling its oil and LNG exports, on Tuesday SkyNews Arabia reported that Saudi Arabia has given Qatar a 24 hours ultimatum, starting tonight, to fulfill 10 conditions that have been conveyed to Kuwait, which is currently involved in the role of a mediator between Saudi and Qatar.
Saudi Arabia gives #Qatar 24 hr ultimatum to fulfill 10 conditions that have been sent to #Kuwait https://t.co/OpWGvvDY7r #Iran #QatarCrisis
— Reza H. Akbari (@rezahakbari) June 6, 2017
???????: #???????? ????? #?????? ??10 ???? ??? ?? ?????? ?????? ???? 24 ???? ???? ?? ??? ??????
— ???? ???? ?????-???? (@SkyNewsArabia_B) June 6, 2017
According to media report, among the key demands by Saudi Arabia is that Qatar end all ties Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas.
Developing: Saudi Arabia issues ultimatum to #Qatar demanding it end all ties Muslim Brotherhood & Hamas pic.twitter.com/mIgWLsXfKg
— Dipatch2016 (@Daily_News_Wire) June 6, 2017
While there was little additional information on the Ultimatum and more importantly what happens should Qatar not comply, Al Jazeera reported that Kuwait’s emir, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Jaber Al Sabah, left Saudi Arabia on Tuesday after holding mediation talks with the Saudi King Salman bin Abdul Aziz to try to defuse an escalating crisis between Arab countries and Qatar. No details were given on the talks.
In addition to Saudi Arabia’s aggressive approach, Egypt’s Foreign Ministry accused Qatar of taking an “antagonist approach” towards Cairo and said “all attempts to stop it from supporting terrorist groups failed”. Qatar denied the allegations, with a Foreign Ministry statement describing them as “baseless” on Monday.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, analyst Giorgio Cafiero of Gulf State Analytics, a geopolitical risk consultancy based in Washington, DC, said: “I think the Kuwaitis as well as Omanis … fear the prospects of these tensions escalating in ways which could undermine the interest of all six members of the GCC.
“There are many analysts who believe that a potential break-up of the GCC has to be considered right now.”
“If these countries fail to resolve their issues and such tensions reaches new heights, we have to be very open to the possibility of these six Arab countries no longer being able to unite under the banner of one council,” said Cafiero.
He added that if tension escalates, some have warned of a “military confrontation”.
Cloggie on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 6:20 pm
Wow, now that’s a crisis! Trump has maveured himself in am impossible position if KSA does indeed invade, a blatant violation of international law… and Trump keeps backing KSA, which is probably what he will do. Trump probably gave the green light for this during his last visit.
An ultimatum of 24 hours and ten points… that is designed to fail. Tomorrow we will get news about amassing Saudi troops near Qatar.
Cloggie on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 6:28 pm
No MSM has reported the ultimatum yet.
shortonoil on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 6:36 pm
Next question: when do the Iranians and Russians show up? Saudi hasn’t got enough oil remaining in their 75 year old fields to make it worth fighting over.
Apneaman on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 6:38 pm
It’s always so obvious when cloggie’s vagina is getting all tingly by how giddy and chatty she starts to get.
Davy on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 7:21 pm
“Next question: when do the Iranians and Russians show up? Saudi hasn’t got enough oil remaining in their 75 year old fields to make it worth fighting over.”
Yea, Russians will pull up with their one aircraft carrier and the support ships will be some Iranian speedboats. LMFAO. If the Iranians show up it will be with missiles with a prompt reply from the US and Gulf Arabs. The Russians don’t have skin down in that part of the world. This will be between the Americans, Gulf Arabs, and Iran if it goes regional and hot. Don’t forget Israel also. Iran might lob a missile or two that way and they will get some back.
Sissyfuss on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 7:44 pm
Well, if you just bought $350 billion worth of weapons and low oil prices are making it harder to keep the natives from getting restless, maybe you would find a pipsqueak nation to stir up prices. Must be Tromp said go for it, I’ll put our base there on idle.
makati1 on Tue, 6th Jun 2017 7:58 pm
Sissy, yes, as wee get closer to that cliff, the natives will get more than restless. Chaos is engulfing the Western world today. The U$ is trying to spread it to other parts of the world with their ISIS faux army of compliant idiots. Any country that even thinks of standing up to the U$/Jew Empire is attacked. Even old friends like the Ps.
I don’t think this can go on much longer and the result will be either a world war or the collapse of the West or both. The destruction of the Empire and it’s way of life is certain any way the story unfolds. The sooner the better for the rest of us. Buckle Up!
joe on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 1:20 am
$110 billion arms deal is fake news
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/markaz/2017/06/05/the-110-billion-arms-deal-to-saudi-arabia-is-fake-news/
Saudi obviously wants to have a settlement of the Palestine question, so defunding Hamas as well as Lebanaon would spread the chaos all over the middle east even more, they want to draw in Jordan and then blame Iran cause they hope the US will do crazy things to save their precious oil.
Cloggie on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 3:14 am
Still no confirmation by the MSM or even sites like Breitbart and Infowars. It’s fake news.
$110 billion arms deal is fake news
A letter of intent is not insignificant. What did you expect? An order list to the tune of 110 billion?
joe on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 4:45 am
Now the insanity spreads. FBI says IT’S RUSSIAS fault! Trumps saying it was Saudi and thanks them, FBI says Russia, what’s going on?. Kinda puts a spanner in the works for the Iran angle……
Cloggie on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 4:57 am
No confirmation of ultimatums or troops movements. Trump apparently even paddles back as he calls for ‘Gulf unity’:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-40182599
Erdogan criticizes boycott of Qatar and denounces conflict as counter-productive.
KSA now comes with clear demands if Qatar wants to be let off the hook:
1. stop supporting Hamas
2. stop supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, a sort of Muslims grassroots socialism
It is clear what is happening here: the US and Israel and the ‘House of Saud’ want the ‘House of Saud’ (and Sissi-Egypt) to remain in power and remain a staunch vassal of the US and bulwark against Iran, that is still on the loose and not a member of the US empire.
You could see the Muslim Brotherhood as a religious equivalent of the secular socialist Baath movement…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba%27ath_Party
…that was oriented towards the USSR. Since the fall of Saddam the Baath movement is on the way out and is replaced by Muslim fundamentalism, like the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Quada and most radical ISIS. These movements were used to topple commies in Afghanistan, Qaddafi in Libya and now Assad in Syria. Turkey and Qatar are the (not so) secret backers of this Muslim populist movements and where the Baath wanted a sort of USSR for Arabs, Erdogan, Qatar and the movements mentioned want a sort of Caliphate, neo-Ottoman empire or an Islamic sort of EU.
So my original hypothesis that this Qatar stunt could be a Turkish-Saudi co-production was false. Instead it is clearly a USA-Israel-Sissi-Egypt-Saudi-Arabia deal with the purpose of keeping the ‘House of Saud’ in the saddle and KSA & Egypt in US imperial orbit and deal a blow against the Muslim Brotherhood and keep the KSA gun directed against Iran.
Erdogan, who wants to get rid of the West and has zero interest in a conflict between Arabia and Iran, doesn’t like this development at all.
At this point it is unlikely that KSA will invade Qatar, not even Trump can afford to back that.
Cloggie on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 4:59 am
Agree with joe for a change, the US now ridiculously tries to blame Russia for the Qatar standoff with their tired old ‘Russian hackers’ meme:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/07/qatar-fbi-says-russian-hackers-planted-fake-news-story-that-led-to-crisis-report
yoshua on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 5:11 am
The rivalry between two salafist regimes, Qatar and Saudi Arabia over the region. SA accuses Qatar for funding the wrong jihadists… Or just laying all guilt on Qatar. Everybody is funding their own pet project in the region, creating more chaos as the oil revenues are collapsing and the oil is depleting. Obama invited the Muslim Brotherhood to the White House. Trump is in office now and now the MB is a terrorist organisation. US IC is at war with the White House. GOP and Dems are at war. Interesting times.
Cloggie on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 7:20 am
Qatar ticker from Qatari point of view:
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/06/qatar-diplomatic-crisis-latest-updates-170605105550769.html
UAE says regime change in Qatar NOT intended, just change of policy. Also, saying something nice about Qatar in the UAE will be punished with up to $135k fines or 3-15 years imprisonment. That’ll teach ’em!
shortonoil on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 7:21 am
“GOP and Dems are at war. Interesting times.”
As the Saudi’s $750 billion SWF swirls down the drain hole of ever falling crude prices it should get even more interesting; if interesting is the right word. The decay and decline of the world’s petroleum industry may require some new innovative terminology?
yoshua on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 9:37 am
Paranoid times ? Apocalyptic times ?
No one trusts anyone anymore. No one knows which fake news media outlet to trust.
There seems to be a new conspiracy every day now, or a cyber attack, or a terrorist attack, or a leaked document, or something chocking.
rockman on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 9:46 am
“Traders are worried that Riyadh’s allies would refuse to accept LNG shipments from the Gulf state, and that Egypt might even bar tankers carrying Qatari cargoes from using the Suez Canal as they head to Europe and beyond—although Cairo is bound by an international agreement to let them use the waterway.
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain severed relations with Qatar and closed their airspace to commercial flights on Monday, in the worst split between powerful Arab states in decades.
U.S. President Donald Trump joined in the dispute on Tuesday, saying leaders he met on a Middle East trip had warned him that Doha was funding “radical ideology” after he had demanded they take action to stop financing militant groups. Qatar vehemently denies the accusations made against it.
Qatar is now unable to load crude oil onto supertankers together with other Gulf-based grades, and price agency S&P Global Platts said it would not automatically include the country in its Middle East price benchmark.
The agency noted that tankers usually combine Qatari shipments with crude from Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Oman before heading from the Gulf. “Restrictions on vessels calling into Qatar and associated uncertainty could impact the inherent value of crude loading from Qatar,” it said.”
joe on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 10:48 am
Wouldn’t worry about crude. Qatar is gas country, they are plugged into Irans pipes and the real issue is that they could do real economic damage to Iran if they split Qatar from Iran, but to make it worth while they need to cross Syria, and what’s been happening there?
http://images.energy365dino.co.uk/standard/128673_4c3bbda7ec1241198b0f.jpg
joe on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 10:54 am
To directly confront Qatar, a wahabbi nation signifies Saudi desperation and a tacit admission of defeat in Syria, since they cant beat Assad, they will stop gas by any means. Turkey wants to build a stream of gas through south eastern Europe, Germany wants it too and they want Iran to control the source because obviously if Saudi controls both oil and gas that will leave only Russia as a fall back if Saudi were to cut off oil and gas to Europe. Trump obviously does not care because he’s blind to the reality that if Germany is forced to invent pretexts to support war in the ME it will begin a new phase of European imperialism yet more competition for the US after China and Russia and the US ain’t doing so well with them.
shortonoil on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 1:46 pm
“To directly confront Qatar, a wahabbi nation signifies Saudi desperation and a tacit admission of defeat in Syria, since they cant beat Assad, they will stop gas by any means.”
Since the Saudis can obviously no longer pay the kind of bills for the Kingdom that they need to pay and stay in power with their depleted out old fields, Qatar gas revenues must look like pretty inviting to them. Unfortunately, for them, they have Iran and Turkey in the way. Russia doesn’t want anyone’s gas in Europe, but especially Saudi gas that would only continue to back the Petrodollar. The US is desperate to keep the Petrodollar alive because without it the Neocons dreams of global domination become more of a pipe dream than they are already.
Since the Russians are in no position to take on US military power, and visa versa this is boiling down to a Mexican Standoff with shotguns at 10 feet. There is a theory that intelligence never actually evolved inside the Beltway. It functions on hormonal releases that come about from sniffing political contributions. It looks like we are getting ready to test that theory!
http://www.thehillsgroup.org/
Davy on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 2:26 pm
The petrodollar is increasingly irrelevant in today central bank controlled world. The Petro states are not recycling dollars becuase their economies are today hemorrhaging dollars. Globalization has now changed the financial landscape such that oil and its trade does not have the impact it once had. Saying the peteo dollar is part of a neocon conspiracy to control the world is dated.
yoshua on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 3:52 pm
Trump claims that the leaders in the Middle East pointed out Qatar as the source of terrorism and chaos in the region after his state visit in the Middle East.
He also said after they cut ties to Qatar that now action against Qatar are taking place.
Obviously some plan has been set in motion now.
And Iran has pointed out Saudi Arabia as the source of todays terrorist act in Tehran… and promised to revenge it.
Trump pointed out Iran as the source of terror and chaos in the region in his Riyadh speech.
Looks like a war is about to start. How will Russia and China react if Iran is attacked ?
bobinget on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 6:53 pm
A person can gain good perspective reading these comments. Myself included.
Thanks all.
bobinget on Wed, 7th Jun 2017 7:04 pm
All the late night comics joke ‘Trump will kill us all’
But how? I inquire.
ww.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-iran-terrorism-blame_us_59385f43e4b0c5a35c9b8698?e1mhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-iran-terrorism-blame_us_59385f43e4b0c5a35c9b8698?e1m&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009