White House Fetes MBS, Designates Saudi Arabia 'Major Ally'
The Independent, among others, highlighted Cristiano Ronaldo's attendance at a Trump-hosted dinner for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, alongside tech titans like Elon Musk. While Barron Trump's Ronaldo fandom was a quoted highlight, the actual news was Trump's designation of Saudi Arabia as a 'major non-NATO ally.' This, mere months after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, a crime the CIA
concluded MBS ordered, and amidst Saudi Arabia's devastating war in Yemen. One might wonder if Ronaldo's presence was meant to distract from the inconvenient reality of aligning militarily with a regime accused of egregious human rights abuses, a regime Israel has increasingly warmed to as well. The media frames this as a celebrity sighting at a geopolitical pow-wow, not as a transparent
rebranding effort for a dictatorial regime that the US has armed to the teeth with billions in weaponry. How many dazzling photo-ops does it take to launder a nation's image or justify strategic alliances built on oil and regional power plays instead of shared democratic values? It appears a celebrity's endorsement is now more valuable than any inquiry into state-sponsored violence or journalistic
assassinations.