http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/us/politics/panetta-speaks-to-senate-panel-on-benghazi-attack.html?_r=0
deep divisions over what to do about one of those issues — the rising violence in Syria — spilled into public view for the first time in a blunt exchange between Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, and the leaders of the Pentagon.

Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta acknowledged that he and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, had supported a plan last year to arm carefully vetted Syrian rebels. But it was ultimately vetoed by the White House, Mr. Panetta said, although it was developed by David H. Petraeus, the C.I.A. director at the time, and backed by Hillary Rodham Clinton, then the secretary of state.

(. . .)

Neither Mr. Panetta nor General Dempsey explained why President Obama did not heed their recommendation. But senior American officials have said that the White House was worried about the risks of becoming more deeply involved in the Syria crisis, including the possibility that weapons could fall into the wrong hands. And with Mr. Obama in the middle of a re-election campaign, the White House rebuffed the plan, a decision that Mr. Panetta says he now accepts.

With the exception of General Dempsey, the officials who favored arming the rebels have either left the administration or, as in Mr. Panetta’s case, are about to depart. Given that turnover, it is perhaps not surprising that the details of the debate — an illustration of the degree that foreign policy decisions have been centralized in the White House — are surfacing only now. A White House spokesman declined to comment on Thursday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/us/politics/in-behind-scene-blows-and-triumphs-sense-of-clinton-future.html WASHINGTON — Last summer, as the fighting in Syria raged and questions about the United States’ inaction grew, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton conferred privately with David H. Petraeus, the director of the C.I.A. The two officials were joining forces on a plan to arm the Syrian resistance.

The idea was to vet the rebel groups and train fighters, who would be supplied with weapons. The plan had risks, but it also offered the potential reward of creating Syrian allies with whom the United States could work, both during the conflict and after President Bashar al-Assad’s eventual removal.

Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Petraeus presented the proposal to the White House, according to administration officials. But with the White House worried about the risks, and with President Obama in the midst of a re-election bid, they were rebuffed.

( . . .)

The disclosures about Mrs. Clinton’s behind-the-scenes role in Syria and Myanmar — one a setback, the other a success — offer a window into her time as a member of Mr. Obama’s cabinet. They may also be a guide to her thinking as she ponders a future run for the presidency with favorability ratings that are the highest of her career, even after her last months at the State Department were marred by the deadly attack on the American Mission in Benghazi, Libya.

“Secretary Clinton has dramatically changed the face of U.S. foreign policy globally for the good,” said Richard L. Armitage, deputy secretary of state during the George W. Bush administration. “But I wish she had been unleashed more by the White House.”

(. . .)

After Britain and France argued for intervening to defend Libya’s rebels against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, Mrs. Clinton played an important role in mobilizing a broad international coalition and persuading the White House to join the NATO-led operation.

But it was Syria that proved to be the most difficult test. As that country descended into civil war, the administration provided humanitarian aid to the growing flood of refugees, pushed for sanctions and sought to organize the political opposition. The United States lagged France, Britain and Persian Gulf states in recognizing that opposition as the legitimate representative of the Syria people, but by December, Mr. Obama had taken that step.

Still, rebel fighters were clamoring for weapons and training. The White House has been reluctant to arm them for fear that it would draw the United States into the conflict and raise the risk of the weapons falling into the wrong hands. Rebel extremists affiliated with Al Qaeda had faced no such constraints in securing weapons from their backers.

When Mr. Petraeus was the commander of forces in Iraq and then-Senator Clinton was serving on the Senate Armed Services Committee and preparing for her 2008 presidential bid, she had all but called him a liar for trumpeting the military gains of the troop increase ordered by President Bush. But serving together in the Obama administration, they were allies when it came to Syria, as well as on the debate over how many troops to send to Afghanistan at the beginning of the administration.

Mr. Petraeus had a background in training foreign forces from his years in Iraq, and his C.I.A. job put him in charge of covert operations. The Americans already had experience in providing nonlethal assistance to some of the rebels.

http://www.thenation.com/blog/172774/obama-opposed-syria-war-plan-clinton-petraeus-panetta-gen-dempsey Let’s give the White House and President Obama, personally, credit for blocking the hawks in his administration from going to war in Syria.

Last week, we learned that Hillary Clinton and David Petraeus, now thankfully pursuing other opportunities and spending more time with their families, had cooked up a plan to arm and train the ragtag Syrian rebels, thus getting the United States directly involved in that horrible civil war.

Now we learn that Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs—both of whom are about to join Clinton and Petraeus in the private sector—also backed the Clinton-Petraeus plan,

Who was against it? Obama.

Here’s how The New York Times reports the bombshell revelation, which emerged at a Senate Armed Service Committee hearing with Panetta and Dempsey, under questioning from the invariably pro-war John McCain:

Did the Pentagon, Mr. McCain continued, support the recommendation by Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Petraeus “that we provide weapons to the resistance in Syria? Did you support that?”

“We did,” Mr. Panetta said.

“You did support that,” Mr. McCain said.

“We did,” General Dempsey added.

Despite the formidable coalition of Panetta, Clinton, Petraeus, and Dempsey—and no doubt Susan Rice was in there punching, too—Obama nixed the idea.

http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Israel-Saudi-Arabia-admit-secret-diplomacy-for-first-time-405123

Israel and Saudi Arabia have held five secret meetings since the beginning of 2014 to discuss the common threat Iran posses to the region, it was revealed for the first time Thursday at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, according to Bloomberg.

Although the two are considered to be historic enemies, with Saudi Arabia refusing to recognize the Jewish State's right to exist, they never-the-less have engaged in a campaign of clandestine diplomacy in an effort to thwart the Islamic Republic's growing influence in the Middle East.

http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Israeli-Saudi-relations-best-kept-quiet-415758

Israel should keep its relations with Saudi Arabia as quiet as possible as it continues to explore other ways to improve relations, Prof. Joshua Teitelbaum, an expert on Saudi Arabia and the modern Middle East, told The Jerusalem Post.

“Beyond facing a similar threat from nuclear threshold Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia have been brought closer together by the Obama administration’s strategic decision to draw down its involvement in the Middle East by seeking a strategic balance between Sunnis and Shiites,” said Teitelbaum.

For the Obama administration, said Teitelbaum, who is an expert at Bar-Ilan University’s Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (BESA), there is little respect left for Saudi Arabia, which it sees as responsible, if indirectly, for 9/11 and Islamic State.

“While Iran might support the terrorist Hezbollah and Bashar Assad, Sunni extremists have profited from Saudi support.”

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/23/world/clinton-and-his-ties-to-the-influential-saudis.html

Clinton and His Ties to the Influential Saudis
By TIM WEINER
Published: August 23, 1993

The conventional wisdom in Washington in the election last year was that George Bush was the great friend of Saudi Arabia -- after all, he went to war to defend the kingdom.

It turns out that Bill Clinton was hardly unknown to the Saudis.

One of President Clinton's college classmates at Georgetown University was Prince Turki bin Feisal. Today Prince Turki is the head of the Saudi Arabian intelligence service. The two stay in touch, an Administration official said.

As Governor of Arkansas, Mr. Clinton worked hard to secure a multimillion-dollar Saudi donation to a Middle Eastern studies program at the University of Arkansas, said Bernard Madison, the dean of the university's Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences.

The discussions about the donation began in 1989. They involved Americans with ties to both the Saudis and Mr. Clinton; officials of Stephens Group Inc., the Arkansas business empire that has provided crucial financial assistance to Mr. Clinton; and David Edwards, an investment banker in Little Rock who has Saudi clients and is a friend of Mr. Clinton.

Mr. Clinton's efforts included a 1991 meeting with Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi Ambassador, the dean said.

According to Mr. Madison, the Saudis did not give their first donation to the university -- a $3.5 million gift -- until last summer.

Mr. Madison said: "The gulf war intervened. It was put on hold. They didn't have a lot of money."

One week after he was elected President, Mr. Clinton discussed the donation as part of a telephone conversation he had with Saudi Arabia's monarch, King Fahd, according to a spokesman for Mr. Clinton.

Another $20 million arrived in February, a few weeks after President Clinton's inauguration, Mr. Madison said.

"To boil it all down to the essence: The fundamentalist-Sunni royal family of the Sauds have bought the highest levels of the U.S. government in order to control U.S. foreign policies, especially the ongoing wars to take down the governments of Iraq, Libya, Syria, and ultimately (they hope) of Russia itself, which latter nation has allied itself instead with Shiia countries. The controlling entities behind American foreign policies since at least the late 1970s have been the Saud family and the Sauds’ subordinate Arabic aristocracies in Qatar (the al-Thanis), Kuwait (the al-Sabahs), Turkey (the Tuktik Erdoğans, a new royalty), and UAE (its six royal families: the main one, the al-Nahyans in Abu Dhabi; the other five: the al-Maktoums in Dubai, al-Qasimis in Sharjah, al-Nuaimis in Ajman, al-Mualla Ums in Quwain, and al-Sharqis in Fujairah). Other Saudi-dominated nations — though they’re not oil-rich (more like Turkey in this regard) — are Pakistan and Afghanistan."