Publicly, U.S. government officials have said they’re making progress in their attempts to cut off international funding of terrorist organizations. Privately, they tell a much different story.

 

A classified communiqué from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last year makes clear that she and other senior State Department officials had grown frustrated with Middle Eastern allies who have not done more to disrupt the money pipeline from these countries to groups connected to al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Hamas and other terrorist groups.

 

Clinton’s cable from December 2009 says it has been “an ongoing challenge” to get leaders in Saudi Arabia to treat terrorist financing emanating from within their borders “as a strategic priority.” America’s top diplomat went on to write that “donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.”

 

Although the Saudi royal family has cracked down on al-Qaeda, by which it feels directly threatened, it has been more lax about the Taliban and Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistan-based group that has carried out numerous terrorist attacks. While the Taliban was in power in Afghanistan, from 1997 to 2001, the Saudi royal family was one of its major supporters.

 

Clinton also complained about the situation in the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar, which is described as “the worst region in the region” as a fundraising locale. (Qatar was recently awarded the World Cup of soccer for 2022.)

 

American officials have accused terrorist financiers of robbing banks, kidnapping people, trafficking illegal drugs and conducting fundraising during religious pilgrimages to Mecca to raise money for their activities.

-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky

 

Cash Flow to Terrorists Evades U.S. Efforts (by Eric Lichtblau and Eric Schmitt, New York Times)

Wikileaks: Saudis 'Chief Funders of Sunni Militants' (BBC News)

US Embassy Cables: Hillary Clinton Says Saudi Arabia 'a Critical Source of Terrorist Funding' (Guardian)