The New York Times said in a report on April 15 that Saudi Arabia has warned the U.S. Congress that it will sell off hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of American assets held by the kingdom if it passes a bill that would allow the Saudi government to be held responsible in American courts for any role in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

If Riyadh claims that 9/11 Commission found “no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded” hijackers there was no reasons to make such a threat.

In February, Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called “20th hijacker” who pleaded guilty to participating in an al Qaeda conspiracy in connection to the 9/11 attacks, alleged members of the Saudi royal family supported al Qaeda.

It is not a coincidence that 15 of 19 hijackers were Saudi nationals. There is absolutely something wrong with the kingdom either ideologically, religiously, politically, or culturally that raises such extremely dangerous personalities.

Riyadh is well aware that top officials in the U.S. know that Saudi Arabia was directly or indirectly involved in the September 11 attacks. Officials in Riyadh also know that it has been due to political and economic considerations that the Bush and Obama administrations have held the public in dark about the Saudi role about the tragedy.

Former Sen. Bob Graham, the co-chair of the 9/11 congressional inquiry, told CNN, “The Saudis have known what they did in 9/11, and they knew that we knew what they did, at least at the highest levels of the U.S. government.”

It is obvious to the world that the Saudi kingdom has been financing and fueling the ideology of extremism and terrorism for long years. Its recognition of the Taliban as Afghanistan's government in 1997 to its support for extremists in Iraq and Syria are examples of this.

It is not also a secret that last December German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel publicly accused Saudi Arabia of financing extremism in the West. “We have to make clear to the Saudis that the time of looking away is over,” Gabriel told Bild am Sonntag newspaper. He said, “Wahhabi mosques all over the world are financed by Saudi Arabia.”

Just by condemning terrorism and extremism does not whitewash the name of Saudi kingdom which has almost become synonymous with extremism and terrorism. The Saudi regime’s honeymoon with the West, which had been unfairly covering up its backing for extremism over these years, is also coming to an end.

The article is written by M.A. Saki