Humanitarian Crisis in Pakistan: Will the Saudis Step Up?

According to Rachel Ehrenfeld, the answer to that question is a resounding "no." In an important piece for Forbes.com, Ehrenfeld looks at how the Saudis spend their vast oil wealth only on selected causes: with the Palestinians at the top of the list:

Conspicuously, neither Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz nor the rulers of any Arab or Muslim state are holding special national telethons to help raise funds for some 400,000 new Pakistani refugees. Many fled their homes after the Taliban took over the Swat valley, and others were forced to leave amid the fierce fighting between the Taliban and the Pakistani military. The Saudis say they are friends of the West and of all Muslim nations, but their real alliance is with Iran, Hamas and the Taliban--as you can tell just by following the money.

Indeed, to get hundreds of millions, and even billions, of dollars in emergency funds from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the Gulf States, the Pakistani refugees should have declared themselves Palestinian.

Since January 2009, or in just over four months, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States have given between $1.646 billion and $1.950 billion to the Palestinians, according to figures published on the Web site of Saudi Arabia's embassy in the U.S.

Most of the money, as well as medical aid, food and building materials, went to Hamas-controlled Gaza. These donations were in addition to $1 billion donated on Jan. 19 by King Abdullah "to help rebuild the Gaza Strip."

On May 6, a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates sought Saudi help to fight off the Taliban in Pakistan, the Saudis announced a $25 million donation, not to Pakistan, but to rebuild the Palestinian Nahr Al-Bared refugee camp in Lebanon.

Meanwhile on May 7, at the Arab League's meeting of foreign ministers in Cairo, Egypt, aid to Pakistan was not on the agenda. Instead, as reported by the Saudi Gazette, the League issued a warning about the imminent danger posed to Jerusalem by the Jews.

On May 10, while a new influx of 100,000 Pakistanis escaped the fighting between the military and the Taliban, Saudi Interior Minister Prince Naif, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal, chairman of the Kingdom Holding Company Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Secretary-General Abdul Rahman Al-Attiyah all found the time to meet with Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama. They promised to send a high-level delegation "to consider the volume of assistance that could be rendered to rehabilitate the [internal] refugees" in war-torn Sri Lanka.

So what about Saudi aid to the suffering Pakistanis? On April 23, the Saudi King gave Pakistan 150 tons of dates, as "humanitarian aid."

Is this an appropriate response from the "custodian" of the two holiest mosques, the second-largest Muslim country in the world and one that is 70% Sunni?

The Saudis are pouring money into Gaza, where Iranian-supported, sharia-enforcing Hamas caused death and destruction. At the same time, they are avoiding supporting Pakistan against the Iranian-supported, sharia-enforcing, murderous Taliban.

It seems that the Saudis care more about enforcement of the most radical form of sharia as imposed by Hamas and the Taliban, than they do about helping hundreds of thousands of suffering Muslim brothers in Pakistan.

And don't forget the untold millions the Saudis (here is but one recent example) have spent spreading their brand of radical Wahhabi Islam right here in the United States.