Never give the devil a ride

Thierry Meyssan at Voltaire Network is in his element talking about a Palace Coup in Riyadh. These are my favorite passages so far (I'm still reading):

... On 4 November at about 11 a.m. UTC, the Lebanese Prime Minister, speaking on the TV channel Al-Arabiya, live from the Hotel Ritz in Riyadh, and in the presence of the Saudi Crown Prince « MBS », announced his resignation. Reading carefully from the text which had been written for him, Saad Hariri suddenly forgot that he was President of a government which included ministers from Hezbollah. He expressed himself in these terms: 

[...] 

Saad Hariri added that he was afraid for his life. Shortly afterwards, Al-Arabiya explained that a few days earlier, Hariri had escaped an assassination attempt. However, first the Lebanese police, then Lebanese General Security, expressed their doubts by denying that they had any knowledge of such an attack. 

Al-Arabiya assured that Rafik Hariri, Saad’s father, had been assassinated in 2005 by Iran – despite the fact that the same channel had persisted for years in accusing the Lebanese and Syrian Presidents, Emile Lahoud and Bashar al-Assad, of having ordered the murder.

Once he had finished his speech, Saad Hariri telephoned the Lebanese President, Michel Aoun, to inform him officially of his resignation. The conversation was very brief, and he did not answer the question as to why he had resigned.

The Saudi Minister for Affairs of the Gulf, assured that, contrary to what one might think at first, Saudi Arabia had not imprisoned Saad Hariri, and that he could return to Lebanon whenever he liked. Since the rumours of his arrest persisted, the Prime Minister’s Twitter account shared a photo of him in a polo shirt with the Saudi ambassador for Lebanon.

Even before Saad Hariri had finished his speech, his rival, the ex-Central Director of the police (FSI) then Lebanese Minister for Justice, Achraf Rifi, headed to Beirut from his Italian exile. 

As it happens, since Mister Hariri is one of the most profoundly indebted people on the planet -- he owes a personal debt to the Saudi government of about four billion dollars – he is probably not in a position to take decisions which go against the interests of his creditor. ...

Mention of MbS always reminds me of the Bluegrass song, Never Give the Devil a Ride: He'll be in that driver's seat as soon as he's inside.

Have no idea why.

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