Reporter’s fate derails U.S. plans for Iran
White House officials are worried that the apparent killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and Saudi Arabia’s changing account of his fate, could derail a major showdown with Iran and jeopardize plans to enlist Saudi help to avoid disrupting the oil market.
Officials said the dilemma comes at a fraught moment for the Trump administration, which is expected to reimpose harsh sanctions against Iran on Nov. 5, with the intent of cutting off all Iranian oil exports.
But to make the strategy work, the administration is counting on its relationship with the Saudis to keep oil flowing without spiking prices, and to work together on a new policy to contain Iran in the Persian Gulf.
If that carefully coordinated plan moves forward, the Saudis would probably see a significant increase in oil revenue at exactly the moment Congress is talking about penalizing the kingdom over the Khashoggi case. It is one reason that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was sent to see King Salman of Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Tuesday.
Part of the problem is optics, officials said: The Saudis look like a brutal ally, just as President Donald Trump and Pompeo have been casting Iran as the region’s bully.
After a phone call with Prince Mohammed on Tuesday, Trump said the kingdom’s rulers had again “totally denied any knowledge” of Khashoggi’s fate. He said the crown prince, who was with Pompeo during the call, would expand an investigation into Khashoggi’s disappearance and suspected killing two weeks ago.
Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post, has not been seen since he entered the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2. Turkish officials have asserted that Khashoggi was murdered and his body dismembered; Saudi officials denied any wrongdoing.
While Khashoggi’s disappearance has heightened tensions between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United States, the White House has been measuring the damage to its Iran strategy.
On Nov. 5, the administration is expected to announce that any company that does business with Iran — buying oil, financing projects or investing — will be prohibited from doing business in the United States, including clearing transactions in dollars. It would present a common front with the Saudis, and cast Iran as the source of almost all instability in the Middle East. That argument, officials have acknowledged, is in jeopardy.
Pompeo’s message was that an investigation of what happened had to be conducted rapidly, before it imperiled the rest of the agenda that Trump have devised with the kingdom.