<story><title>White House Veterans Helped Gulf Monarchy Build Secret Surveillance Unit</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-raven-whitehouse/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>BeetleB</author><text>&amp;gt; recall that Qatar was kicked out of GCC recently for aligning with rival ideologies like Muslim Brotherhood&lt;p&gt;This is a very narrow view of what happened. It has more to do with the worry of Qatar&amp;#x27;s growing influence and independence in the region, as well as their close ties with Iran and Turkey. And the success of Al-Jazeera. I mean, just take a look at the demands made of Qatar:&lt;p&gt;- Closing Al-Jazeera and its affiliate stations.&lt;p&gt;- Closing other news outlets that Qatar funds, directly and indirectly, including Arabi21, Rassd, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed and Middle East Eye.&lt;p&gt;- Closing the Turkish military base in Qatar, and terminate the Turkish military presence and any joint military cooperation with Turkey inside Qatar.&lt;p&gt;- Reducing diplomatic relations with Iran. Only trade and commerce with Iran that complies with US and international sanctions will be permitted.[228]&lt;p&gt;- Expelling any members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and cutting off military and intelligence cooperation with Iran.[229]&lt;p&gt;- &amp;quot;Qatar must announce it is severing ties with terrorist, ideological and sectarian organizations including the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Jabhat Fateh al Sham, formerly al Qaeda&amp;#x27;s branch in Syria&amp;quot; according to one Arab official.&lt;p&gt;- Surrendering all designated terrorists in Qatar, and stopping all means of funding for individuals, groups or organisations that have been designated as terrorists.&lt;p&gt;- Ending interference in the four countries&amp;#x27; domestic and foreign affairs and having contact with their political oppositions.&lt;p&gt;- Stopping granting citizenship to wanted nationals from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain.&lt;p&gt;- Revoking Qatari citizenship for existing nationals where such citizenship violates those countries&amp;#x27; laws.[228]&lt;p&gt;- The payment of reparations for years of alleged wrongs.&lt;p&gt;- Monitoring for 10 years.[226]&lt;p&gt;- Aligning itself with the other Gulf and Arab countries militarily, politically, socially and economically, as well as on economic matters, in line with an agreement reached with Saudi Arabia in 2014.[228]&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Qatar_diplomatic_crisis#Demands_on_Qatar_and_responses&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Qatar_diplomatic_crisis#Demand...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>vowelless</author><text>Unfortunately, not a surprise at all. Recall that Clarke was one of the guys who OKed the return of the bin Laden family on 9&amp;#x2F;11 [edit: 1]. Clarke had deep connections to royals and rich elites like the bin Ladens&lt;p&gt;See how they targeted Qatari individuals including Al Thani himself. They say the incentive was the fight against Al Qaeda. But I am skeptical. This is about the rivalry between the Qatari and other Khaleeji royals (recall that Qatar  was kicked out of GCC recently for aligning with rival ideologies like Muslim Brotherhood).&lt;p&gt;Also interesting to note is that until very recently, America’s Mid East command was in Qatar; so America was playing both sides of that conflict (as usual). I am, of course, assuming that Good Harbor &amp;#x2F; DREAD have deep federal ties. Not sure about DarkMatter — that seems Emirati.&lt;p&gt;———-&lt;p&gt;Edits:&lt;p&gt;[1] the commenter below corrected me. It was on 13th of September. But my understanding is that there was still an exception made for the Saudis (see the private aircraft ban extending beyond the time when Saudis were being shuttled around)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>616c</author><text>Spent a good amount of time over there. GCC states shitting on each other is real &amp;quot;pot, meet kettle&amp;quot; hypocrisy and nonsense. And yes, we have two massive bases in Qatar. We can play all of the GCC against each other, but I can say as bigoted as it sounds: all the GCC states are repulsive and US support of _any_ of them is yet another sign of the US government upholding the stability of its values at home by subverting access to those same values for others abroad.&lt;p&gt;It is like we are all in an ironic race to the bottom for who can be most ironic with &amp;quot;do what I say, not what I do.&amp;quot;</text></comment>
<story><title>White House Veterans Helped Gulf Monarchy Build Secret Surveillance Unit</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-raven-whitehouse/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>BeetleB</author><text>&amp;gt; recall that Qatar was kicked out of GCC recently for aligning with rival ideologies like Muslim Brotherhood&lt;p&gt;This is a very narrow view of what happened. It has more to do with the worry of Qatar&amp;#x27;s growing influence and independence in the region, as well as their close ties with Iran and Turkey. And the success of Al-Jazeera. I mean, just take a look at the demands made of Qatar:&lt;p&gt;- Closing Al-Jazeera and its affiliate stations.&lt;p&gt;- Closing other news outlets that Qatar funds, directly and indirectly, including Arabi21, Rassd, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed and Middle East Eye.&lt;p&gt;- Closing the Turkish military base in Qatar, and terminate the Turkish military presence and any joint military cooperation with Turkey inside Qatar.&lt;p&gt;- Reducing diplomatic relations with Iran. Only trade and commerce with Iran that complies with US and international sanctions will be permitted.[228]&lt;p&gt;- Expelling any members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and cutting off military and intelligence cooperation with Iran.[229]&lt;p&gt;- &amp;quot;Qatar must announce it is severing ties with terrorist, ideological and sectarian organizations including the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Jabhat Fateh al Sham, formerly al Qaeda&amp;#x27;s branch in Syria&amp;quot; according to one Arab official.&lt;p&gt;- Surrendering all designated terrorists in Qatar, and stopping all means of funding for individuals, groups or organisations that have been designated as terrorists.&lt;p&gt;- Ending interference in the four countries&amp;#x27; domestic and foreign affairs and having contact with their political oppositions.&lt;p&gt;- Stopping granting citizenship to wanted nationals from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain.&lt;p&gt;- Revoking Qatari citizenship for existing nationals where such citizenship violates those countries&amp;#x27; laws.[228]&lt;p&gt;- The payment of reparations for years of alleged wrongs.&lt;p&gt;- Monitoring for 10 years.[226]&lt;p&gt;- Aligning itself with the other Gulf and Arab countries militarily, politically, socially and economically, as well as on economic matters, in line with an agreement reached with Saudi Arabia in 2014.[228]&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Qatar_diplomatic_crisis#Demands_on_Qatar_and_responses&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Qatar_diplomatic_crisis#Demand...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>vowelless</author><text>Unfortunately, not a surprise at all. Recall that Clarke was one of the guys who OKed the return of the bin Laden family on 9&amp;#x2F;11 [edit: 1]. Clarke had deep connections to royals and rich elites like the bin Ladens&lt;p&gt;See how they targeted Qatari individuals including Al Thani himself. They say the incentive was the fight against Al Qaeda. But I am skeptical. This is about the rivalry between the Qatari and other Khaleeji royals (recall that Qatar  was kicked out of GCC recently for aligning with rival ideologies like Muslim Brotherhood).&lt;p&gt;Also interesting to note is that until very recently, America’s Mid East command was in Qatar; so America was playing both sides of that conflict (as usual). I am, of course, assuming that Good Harbor &amp;#x2F; DREAD have deep federal ties. Not sure about DarkMatter — that seems Emirati.&lt;p&gt;———-&lt;p&gt;Edits:&lt;p&gt;[1] the commenter below corrected me. It was on 13th of September. But my understanding is that there was still an exception made for the Saudis (see the private aircraft ban extending beyond the time when Saudis were being shuttled around)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Cyph0n</author><text>You are spot on with the true reasons about the blockade of Qatar. I also heard that the blockading countries offered to end the blockade if Qatar transferred the 2022 World Cup hosting rights to them, though I&amp;#x27;m not sure if that&amp;#x27;s even possible.&lt;p&gt;Regarding the demands on Qatar with respect to terrorist organizations:&lt;p&gt;1) The list includes organizations that are only designated as terrorist organizations by a minority of countries.&lt;p&gt;2) Qatar has regularly organized meetings between US government officials and terrorist organizations like the Taliban.</text></comment>