Simon Henderson is the Baker Senior Fellow and director of the Bernstein Program on Gulf and Energy Policy at The Washington Institute, specializing in energy matters and the conservative Arab states of the Persian Gulf.
Articles & Testimony
The king has refused to be sidelined during the crown prince’s other recent instances of overreach, so he may intervene in this episode as well.
Quiet diplomacy appears to be the current remedy for a row that erupted on Aug. 3 after Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland tweeted expressions of grave concern for social activists arrested in the kingdom, calling for their immediate release. The quarrel seems better suited to some imaginatively bizarre two-day war game hosted by an earnest think tank at the request of an intelligence service. But it is for real. The Canadian tweets apparently outraged Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman...