World to re-evaluate US support for Saudi Arabia: Analyst

Press TV has interviewed Mark Weber, director of Institute for Historical Review in California, about a high-ranking Human Rights Watch official criticizing the United States and Britain over their support for Saudi Arabia’s deadly campaign against Yemen through providing arms and munitions to Riyadh.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: You may have heard that the chief that is, the executive director of the Human Rights Watch for the Middle East that is, has been accusing and essentially slamming the West - that is the US and Britain - for supporting and turning a Nelson’s eye to the atrocities being committed by the Saudi regime over there in that impoverished Arab state.

Now what she has essentially and literally said is that the Human Rights Watch Middle East director is saying that it is undeniable that Saudi Arabia is violating the laws of war by carrying out attacks with no apparent military target and by using weapons that are essentially banned. Now how far do you think this call by the Human Rights Watch can really go, internationally speaking?

Weber: For the time being it is not going to have an immediate effect because the United States will protect Saudi Arabia in the Security Council of the United Nations and internationally.

This call is very important because it is a very lucid, well-written condemnation of a policy that people who are familiar with the region understand. What she points out in the statement of the Saudi role in Yemen and the US support for Saudi Arabia has been very under-reported in the US media and in the world media. It has not gotten anywhere near the attention that it should, but it highlights the hypocrisy of United States, which claims to be upholding human rights and so forth but in fact it has been backing or supporting Saudi Arabia in this, as she points out, illegal and really devastating campaign in Yemen.

Press TV: In terms of bringing voice to these voiceless people and shedding further light on the crimes being committed there by the Saudi government on a daily basis, the media that is the alternative, if not mainstream mass media in the West can really do in terms of shedding that light? I mean how far do we need to go to gain that critical mass as it said?

Weber: It is going to take a lot more. However, it is noteworthy that this statement appeared in The Los Angeles Times and slowly but surely there is more international attention being given to the Saudi role in Yemen and US policy of support for Saudi Arabia.

Really what is going on in a larger way is a real re-evaluation of the entire support and relationship of Saudi Arabia by the United States and by Europe. There is just an increasing chorus of voices that are very critical of the long-standing US alliance with Saudi Arabia, which is coming under evermore scrutiny and this call by the Human Rights Watch director is an important step adding to this, I think, rising choir around the world.

Press TV: And very briefly, in terms of bringing up a legal case and proceeding on that basis, how serious a legal case do you think this can be built up on so far as the UN, that is the UN officials as well as the Human Rights Watch director’s words can affect that?

Weber: That is more difficult because time and again when human rights violations are carried out by countries that the United States supports, notably with Israel, the United States will veto any real effective action in the United Nations through its veto power in the Security Council and that will probably be continuing the case with Saudi Arabia.

But having said that though, there is a ... move to re-evaluate US policy in the Middle East as exemplified for example by the campaigns both of Bernie Sanders and of Donald Trump here in the United States, and the increasing problems in Europe and the United States, which are putting increased pressure to re-evaluate this long-standing US policy of support for Saudi Arabia.

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