Patriot who left kingdom over objections to limits put on dissent
Journalist Jamal Khashoggi always insisted he was not a Saudi dissident but a patriot, and that his self-imposed exile was a source of sorrow.
But Khashoggi’s love of Saudi was not enough to keep him from a terrible death inside the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul, where he had gone to obtain documents for his coming marriage.
Saudi Arabia confirmed his death yesterday, 18 days after he vanished.
Khashoggi was once close to the kingdom’s ruling family, at times acting as an unofficial spokesman for Riyadh. Between 2003 and 2007 he served as media adviser to Prince Turki Al Faisal, former head of the Saudi intelligence service and, at the time, ambassador to London. It was these connections and his writing that made his name.
Khashoggi began his career as a foreign correspondent covering anti-Soviet mujahideen in Afghanistan and the rise of Al Qaeda in Yemen and Sudan in the 1980s and 1990s.
In 1988 he wrote one of the first profiles of rising radical militant Osama bin Laden, a man with whom he travelled in Afghanistan and met several times for his stories.
Khashoggi wrote for the English-language Saudi Gazette and its Arabic sister newspaper Okaz, as well as the London Arabic dailies Al Sharq Al Awsat and Al Hayat.
Born in Madinah to a wellknown family of Turkish origin, he dedicated his youth to studying Islam and quickly became a member of the kingdom’s intellectual circles.
But the links to Islamist hardliners he cultivated for his stories would get him into trouble. Khashoggi spoke openly about being barred from writing his columns and appearing on television.
“I would know when he was in trouble because he wouldn’t answer his phone,” Deb Amos, a journalist at NPR covering Saudi Arabia and the region, told The National.
“The storm would pass and he would answer again.”
While some questioned his liberal leanings and accused him of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, those who knew Khashoggi say he was committed to dialogue, arguing the Arab world should engage with political Islam instead of shying away from regional and domestic issues.
Even at his most critical, he did not call for an end to the Saudi monarchy or the leadership of the country. His criticism was largely levelled at the policy and practice of the government.
“Politically he agreed with the new Saudi reforms but objected to the limits to dissent,” said Amos, his friend of 20 years.
Ms Amos described Khashoggi as fearless and restless, with a “laser-like analysis of Saudi Arabia in a country that has no tradition of an open free media – he did it because he loved his country”.
Khashoggi held several top posts in Arab media outlets. In 2003 he became editor-in-chief of Al Watan in the
kingdom before leaving after two months. He led the paper for a second time in 2007 and his tenure lasted until 2010.
In 2015 Saudi businessman Prince Alwaleed bin Talal appointed him to run Al Arab television station in Bahrain to broadcast no-holds-barred coverage of the Middle East. The channel was shut down within hours of launching.
In 2017 he moved to the US and began writing for The
Washington Post. His move coincided with the rise to power of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Randa Slim of the Middle East Institute says Khashoggi’s writing was always his priority.
“As he once put it in a conversation with friends about happiness, he was the most happy after submitting an article,” Ms Slim said.
She said Khashoggi left Saudi Arabia because he was censored, not because he felt there was a threat to his life. It is still unclear how Khashoggi came to die inside the consulate.
Riyadh says discussions with Khashoggi “did not go as planned”, leading to a brawl in which the writer died. Many have already voiced scepticism about this version of events.
“This appears to have been a deliberate, planned act followed by a cover-up,” US Senator Lindsey Graham tweeted yesterday.
Congress has already started a process for the US Treasury Department to consider human rights sanctions against Saudi Arabia and some politicians have vowed to block further arms sales to Riyadh, a move President Donald Trump will probably oppose.
“It offers no consolation to have Saudi officials confirm what the whole world already knows – Jamal Khashoggi was murdered inside the Saudi consulate,” said Joel Simon, executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Khashoggi is survived by his fiancee Hatice Cengiz, and his two sons and two daughters from his previous marriage. Ms Cengiz has described him as a martyr.