US President Donald Trump has intervened in the face off between influential Arab nations; the President said Tuesday his tour of the Middle East was already yielding fruitful results, with leaders now bold enough to accuse Qatar of sponsoring militant groups.
Anti Islamic comment
The anti-Islamic speech he delivered at a summit held in Riyadh in May was the inspiration for the decision by powerful Arab States to server relationship and transport networks with Qatar. This protest is due to what they believe is the oil rich nation’s support for terrorism.
To be frank, US officials were shocked by the decision of Saudi Arabia to cut diplomatic ties with Qatar in a well-coordinated manner with the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain, administration’s officials told reporters.
“So nice to see the visit to Saudi Arabia with the King and other 50 countries yielding positive result, they said they would be at the hemp of funding extremism, all fingers were pointing at Qatar. Maybe this will be the beginning to the end of sponsoring terrorism,” Trump tweeted.
Trump's intervention
President Trump’s initial reaction to the rift between Qatar and influential Arab states over its alleged funding of Iran and extremist Islamic groups came at a critical time in the dispute.
Kuwait's leader was billed to meet in Saudi Arabia to attempt to resolve the crisis.
Qatar has denied the allegation in totality, describing it as baseless. Residents of Qatar were seen crowding up in markets to stock up on goods against an escalation of the crisis.
A trip paying off
Trump said, in clear reference to major Gulf Arab leaders Saudi Arabia and the UAE, that he met leaders on his tour and they warned him Qatar was sponsoring “radical ideology” after he had demanded they take decisive step to stop funding militants.
It is not yet clear what Trump’s powerful response in the fracas would result. The situation is highly tense at the moment.
Administration officials said on Monday that the US would amicably find a way of calming the tides between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, insisting that the small Gulf nation was too strategic to US diplomatic and military interest to be sidelined.
Qatar has about 8,000 US troops on ground at al Udeid, which serves as the largest US air base in the Middle East and a base point for US led strikes on ISIS militant group that has claimed some territories in Syria and Iraq.
