The killer on the (Saudi) king's highway

[unhappycamper]

http://atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-210814.html

There's danger on the edge of town
Ride the king's highway, baby
Weird scenes inside the gold mine
Ride the highway west, baby
The Doors, The End

The killer on the (Saudi) king's highway
By Pepe Escobar
Aug 21, '14

The killer awoke before dawn. He put his American desert boots on. He took a knife from the ancient gallery. And he walked on down the hall - bathed in desert sunlight.

The killer spoke with a British accent (London's East End?) Father (Saud), I want to kill you. Mother (Langley?) I want to... yeeeaaahh, c'mon!

Then the sartorially composed Man in Black beheaded American photojournalist James Foley.

This is not the end, beautiful friend. It's just a new beginning in the never-ending Global War on Terror. Now starring Papa Saud's brand new bag - The Caliph and his goons. This is the way Shock and Awe morphs into "Assad must go" morphs into Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, morphs into The Caliph's Black Britannia goon responding to "humanitarian" bombing. I'm my own baby now. Watch me work. Bring it on.

[LiberalArkie]

1. And wanted 132 million for his release.

They must really think that Americans are all billionaires.

[CJCRANE]

2. Apparently the killer is London born and bred

(according to the Telegraph UK).

I assume they deliberately asked for an unpayable amount. Which means they thought the propaganda value was priceless and/or they are not short of cash.

[LiberalArkie]

3. Or comes from a wealthy family and has no concept of money.

A poor person might ask for a million euros, but to come up with 100 million euros, to me that sounds like someone used to a lot of money.

[DetlefK]

4. Good article, with a flaw at the end:

Religious legitimacy is something the IS claims, but lacks. In Islam, believers have a more personal relationship with God. Less clergy and hierarchy than, say, Christianity. Nevertheless, religious legitimacy is still connected to the past in Islam, to the Quran or some historic fact. Unless IS can find a cleric willing to step forward and lend his credentials to them by issuing a fatwa, they have no religious standing. And even then, the cleric will see his fatwa picked apart by other scholars and himself made a target for assassination.

The IS claims to be the successor to the medieval caliphate, whose last successor was was the Osman Empire (disbanded after WWI, which started this modern islamic extremism in the first place). No muslim apart from them is buying that.

The IS will always be a bastard. A military power in the foreseeable future, but never a religious power. The arabic states brutally cracked down on the Arabic Spring. They will not accept a training-ground for revolutionaries right at their front-door. For now they hold back, and when it's too late, then they will strike with brutality and bribery.