New Saudi Ambassador Close to King

Adel al-Jubeir is actually a family relation and is mentored by Abdul Mohsen Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Tuwaijri, who is King Abdullah's trusted alter ego. Adel is the most talented member of, in the words of a senior Saudi official in a private communication:

"the clan who are running the show since Abdullah became king. I am referring to "The Al-Majamaah Clan" or "The Tuwaijri Clan." Adel's family on both his mother and father's side are from this little town, Al-Majmaah in The Sudair Region which a mere 100 miles north west of Riyadh in the way to Qasim."

Adel's father was the local "Shaykh" or mayor and it is notable that the Sudair is where Hassa bint Sudairy, the mother of Crown Prince Abdullah [and former King Fahd] and five other brothers called "The Sudairi Seven" have family connections. And in Saudi Arabia, family and family connections are the single most important vector in power relationships.

Bandar bin Sultan's grandmother, obviously, would have been the macro-mom Hassa bint Sudairy.

I have actually driven from Riyadh through al-Majamaah on the road to and from al-Qassim where I went to a thousand-person family reunion in Rass, in the company of the French Charges' lovely daughter, a medical doctor at King Faisal Hospital in Riyadh [too much info!] I believe it is on the southeast edge of the Nafud desert, a beautiful red-sand beauty of gorgeous mountainous russet dunes extending a hundred miles until al-Qassim and Buraida and Unaiza on the other side Parenthetically, Unaiza could be the eponymous origin of the Unaiza Tribal Confederation and its Mesalikh clan that rules the Peninsula [KSA, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, and Bahrain] and the Syrian Desert, as I noted in previous posts.

Sheikh Tuwaijri ran and perhaps still runs the Saudi Arabian National Guard on a day-to-day basis and could sign official document on behalf of Crown Prince Abdullah when Abdullah was the Guard's Commander. The Saudi National Guard is a sort of Carabinieri parallel which protects the Royal Family and is comprised of tribal elements. The Saudi National Guard protected the American Embassy in Jidda, for instance, rather than Saudi Armed Forces personnel.

Tuwaijri was and perhaps still is so important that one day on a first-class trans-Atlantic flight, he found himself suddenly having the person next to him move to another seat and the new occupant was none other than Henry Kissinger, then running Kissinger Associates, who rode the trans-Atlantic flight with the influential advisor and engaged him in avid conversation. The Embassy checked later with the airline and US intelligence and found that Kissinger did that often with VVIPs.

It is the Tuwaijri connection that gives Adel the complete trust of the King, and parenthetically Prince Bandar's very close relationship with Adel.

Adel also studied in Germany and speaks fluent German. His brother Na'il aced Stanford Business School in record time and had a high-entry job at Morgan Stanley until he was summoned by his older brother to work at the Saudi Embassy in DC.

Cross-posted at Redstate