The only thing that surprises me about this story is why it has generated so much attention. I suspect that the Saudis share the same confusion. It's not like this is the first dissident that they've murdered. Over the past 12 months alone we've seen countless princes, wealthy businessmen and officials tied to the previous king detained, tortured, disappeared and murdered. Qatar was overnight isolated and cut off from the rest of the GCC as the Saudis shamelessly tried to shift blame for the proliferation of terrorism onto them. Even the abduction of the prime minister of Lebanon didn't generate this kind of attention.
Then you have the forcible starvation and what can only be described as a genocide in Yemen, which is afforded five minutes in the news on a good month, and which generally tries to pin blame on Iran or the Houthis whilst abdicating the UK of responsibility for their role in supplying weapons. But one journalist gets murdered, albeit in a brutal fashion, and the media erupts as if they've only just realised that Saudi Arabia isn't Disney World. Never did I think that I'd hear Lindsey Graham talk in the way that he did about the Saudis, although I was settled when he subsequently returned to character in describing how awful it would be if genetic tests proved that he was Iranian.
Every good story has a comical element. The Saudis now admitting that he was killed - after "a fight broke out". The presence of an autopsy examiner, who must have carried the instruments required to torture and dismember his body, was no doubt a coincidence. The Crown Prince's bodyguard, likewise, was probably there for unrelated purposes without the knowledge or express permission of the Crown Prince. In fact, the totalitarian regime was totally unaware of the operation that occurred in the office of their Consul General. Saudi-state media were until this evening peddling a conspiracy theory that Iran and Qatar collaborated to stage a false-flag murder...
The reality though is that this will all blow over remarkably quickly. Trump will accept the Saudi version of events, regardless of how ridiculous they are, whilst announcing another Yuge! defence contract worth billions. The media will move onto some other story, probably directed at pantomime villain Iran. And the British government will shrug their shoulders and point to the jobs at stake. Jobs that only manufacture the weapons used to massacre defenceless and starving civilians in the poorest country in the Middle East. Those poor defence contractors...
