Washington
\nUS President Donald Trump has defended his decision not to hold Saudi rulers accountable in the killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying maintaining strategic ties with the kingdom and keeping the global oil prices down were in the best interest of America.<\/p>\n
The death of Khashoggi, a onetime insider turned critic of the crown prince and a resident of the US, has spurred a wave of international anger against Saudi Arabia and its rulers.<\/p>\n
The US last week imposed sanctions on 17 individuals of Saudi Arabia for serious human rights abuse resulting from their roles in the killing of Khashoggi at the kingdom\u2019s Consulate in Istanbul on October 2.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause it\u2019s America first to me,\u201d Trump told reporters, adding that despite Khashoggi\u2019s murder, the US will remain a \u201csteadfast partner\u201d of Saudi Arabia to ensure its interests as well as those of Israel and all other partners in the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is our paramount goal to fully eliminate the threat of terrorism throughout the world!\u201d he said in a statement that immediately drew sharp criticism from his political opponents.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m shocked that President Trump said there will be no punishment for Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for the killing of Jamal Khashoggi,\u201d Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein said as she and several other lawmakers announced their plan to bring in legislations to block arms sales to Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n
Responding to questions from reporters at the White House before leaving for Florida to spend his Thanksgiving holidays, Trump said his decision was all about America first.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not going to give up hundreds of billions of dollars in orders and let Russia, China and everybody else have them. It\u2019s all about for me very simple, it\u2019s America first,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSaudi Arabia, if we broke with them, I think your oil prices would go through the roof. I\u2019ve kept them down. They\u2019ve helped me keep them down. Right now, we have low oil prices, or relatively I\u2019d like to see it go down even lower.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I think that it\u2019s a very simple equation for me. I\u2019m about making America great again and I\u2019m about America first,\u201d Trump argued.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, I\u2019m not saying that at all. If you look at Iran… and you look at what they\u2019re doing, they are a terrorist nation right now. Although, I must tell you, they\u2019re a lot better right now than they were when I took office. When I took office, they were heading in a very, very bad direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt some point, things very positive, frankly, could happen with Iran, but we also need a counterbalance. And Israel needs help also. If we abandon Saudi Arabia, it would be a terrible mistake,\u201d Trump warned.<\/p>\n
The President refuted The Washington Post\u2019s allegations that by taking such a decision, he was putting his personal and commercial interests ahead of national interests.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, I have nothing to do with Saudi just so you understand, I don\u2019t make deals with Saudi Arabia. I don\u2019t have money from Saudi Arabia. I have nothing to do with Saudi Arabia. I couldn\u2019t care less,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will tell you and as most of you know, being President has cost me a fortune and that\u2019s okay with me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll I do is focus on this country and making great deals for this country. I don\u2019t focus on making on great deals for myself because I don\u2019t care anymore,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Washington US President Donald Trump has defended his decision not to hold Saudi rulers accountable in the killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying maintaining strategic ties with the kingdom and keeping the global oil prices down were in the best interest of America. The death of Khashoggi, a onetime insider turned critic of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47882,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47881"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47883,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47881\/revisions\/47883"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}