{"id":2277,"date":"2018-10-26T02:50:18","date_gmt":"2018-10-26T02:50:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/?p=2277"},"modified":"2018-10-26T02:50:18","modified_gmt":"2018-10-26T02:50:18","slug":"khashoggis-death-is-explained-by-the-saudis-in-five-acts-and-counting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/2018\/10\/26\/khashoggis-death-is-explained-by-the-saudis-in-five-acts-and-counting\/","title":{"rendered":"Khashoggi\u2019s Death Is Explained by the Saudis in Five Acts (and Counting)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"StoryBodyCompanionColumn css-p1yi70\">\n<div class=\"css-4w7y5l\">\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">He was somewhere on the streets of Istanbul, until he wasn\u2019t. He was dead in a fistfight, until he wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">From the moment the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi disappeared after walking into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul this month, Saudi officials have offered a dizzying variety of public accounts about his fate. Here\u2019s how the Saudi government has changed its story.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"link-421a56f5\" class=\"css-rcspn7 eqpy7av0\"><strong class=\"css-8qgvsz euv7paa0\">Oct. 3: Mr. Khashoggi left the consulate, and we have no idea where he is.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">That was the contention of the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, in an\u00a0<a class=\"css-1g7m0tk\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2018-10-05\/saudi-crown-prince-discusses-trump-aramco-arrests-transcript\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">interview with Bloomberg reporters<\/a>, the day after Mr. Khashoggi walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul for a marriage document and vanished.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">\u201cMy understanding is he entered and he got out after a few minutes or one hour,\u201d Prince Mohammed said, later adding, \u201cWe have nothing to hide.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-13jtjmc\"><\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"story-ad-1-wrapper\" class=\"ResponsiveAd-storyBodyAd--35v2w\">\n<div id=\"story-ad-1-slug\" class=\"ResponsiveAd-adSlug--3H3QM\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"StoryBodyCompanionColumn css-p1yi70\">\n<div class=\"css-4w7y5l\">\n<h2 id=\"link-8a4be32\" class=\"css-rcspn7 eqpy7av0\"><strong class=\"css-8qgvsz euv7paa0\">Oct. 15: The supposed hit squad was actually a group of tourists.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">After Turkish officials put out word through news media outlets that a 15-person team of Saudis had killed Mr. Khashoggi, a Saudi-owned satellite news channel offered up an innocent explanation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">They were only tourists, the news channel, Al Arabiya, said, and had been falsely accused of involvement in the dissident journalist\u2019s disappearance.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"link-dbae11\" class=\"css-rcspn7 eqpy7av0\"><strong class=\"css-8qgvsz euv7paa0\">Also on Oct. 15: \u2018Rogue killers\u2019 lashed out during an interrogation gone wrong.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">With international furor over Mr. Khashoggi\u2019s fate growing, the Saudis started to float the narrative that Mr. Khashoggi was in fact dead, as much of the world suspected, but\u00a0<a class=\"css-1g7m0tk\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/10\/15\/us\/politics\/trump-saudi-king-journalist-khashoggi.html?module=inline\">at the hands of \u201crogue killers.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">That account was initially backed up by President Trump, following a phone call with King Salman of Saudi Arabia: \u201cIt sounded to me like maybe these could have been rogue killers \u2014 who knows,\u201d the president said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"StoryBodyCompanionColumn css-p1yi70\">\n<div class=\"css-4w7y5l\">\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">A person familiar with the Saudi government\u2019s plans then said that a Saudi intelligence official who was a friend of the crown prince ordered the interrogation, and that Prince Mohammed had approved it, but that the intelligence official went too far.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"link-7c03239c\" class=\"css-rcspn7 eqpy7av0\"><strong class=\"css-8qgvsz euv7paa0\">Oct. 20: Mr. Khashoggi was strangled during a fistfight.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">Mr. Khashoggi got into a\u00a0<a class=\"css-1g7m0tk\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/10\/19\/world\/middleeast\/jamal-khashoggi-dead-saudi-arabia.html?module=inline\">tussle in the Saudi Consulate<\/a>\u00a0when he tried to escape from men trying to force him to return to his home country, Saudi officials said on Oct. 20.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">Saudi Arabia arrested the 15 men sent to confront Mr. Khashoggi, and dismissed a close aide to the crown prince and Maj. Gen. Ahmed al-Assiri, the deputy director of Saudi intelligence, who the government said organized the operation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">A Saudi official said the goal had been to return dissidents living abroad, but the order had been misinterpreted as it made its way down the chain of command. A confrontation erupted when Mr. Khashoggi saw his captors, the official said: The men stopped him from fleeing, punches were thrown, Mr. Khashoggi screamed and one of the men put him in a chokehold, strangling him to death.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"link-7e8b0238\" class=\"css-rcspn7 eqpy7av0\"><strong class=\"css-8qgvsz euv7paa0\">Oct. 25: The killing may have been \u2018premeditated.\u2019<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">Saudi Arabia\u2019s public prosecutor said on Thursday that\u00a0<a class=\"css-1g7m0tk\" title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/10\/25\/world\/middleeast\/saudi-arabia-jamal-khashoggi-turkey.html?module=inline\">Turkey had given Saudi officials new information in the course of a joint Saudi-Turkish investigation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">But the prosecutor said the investigation was continuing, making it unclear whether Saudi Arabia itself had concluded that the killing was premeditated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1xl4flh e2kc3sl0\">The new shift in the Saudi account coincided with a visit to Turkey by Gina Haspel, the director of the C.I.A., who was expected to gain access to an audio recording and other evidence that Turkey says proves Mr. Khashoggi was assassinated on orders from the upper levels of the Saudi royal family.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>He was somewhere on the streets of Istanbul, until he wasn\u2019t. He was dead in a fistfight, until he wasn\u2019t. From the moment the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi disappeared after walking into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul this month, Saudi officials have offered a dizzying variety of public accounts about his fate. Here\u2019s how the Saudi government has changed its&#8230; <a href=\"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/2018\/10\/26\/khashoggis-death-is-explained-by-the-saudis-in-five-acts-and-counting\/\">Read more &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[157],"class_list":["post-2277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-ny-times"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2277"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2278,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2277\/revisions\/2278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}