The Murder of Jamal Khashoggi

The Murder of Jamal Khashoggi

DW (2020)

Film Review

This documentary is based on the Turkish intelligence investigation into Khashoggi’s disappearance and apparent murder. It was subsequently authenticated by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Khashoggi*, a dissident journalist, left Saudi Arabia for the US (where he worked for the Washington Post) in September 2017 after running afoul of Saudi authorities for criticizing their human rights violations.

He disappeared on October 2, 2018 after entering the Saudi consulate in Ankara Turkey. He was collecting divorce papers needed to fulfill Turkish legal requirements prior to remarrying. Although his  fiancee Hatice Cengiz waited for him outside the consulate, but he never reappeared. Khashoggi and Cengiz, a Turkish divorcee** and PhD student, first met at an academic conference in May 2018.

On October 8, Turkish authorities began leaking intelligence to the international media that Khashoggi had been killed and dismembered during his visit to the Saudi consulate. This intelligence included surveillance footage on a 15-member Saudi security team. It shows the team arriving in Ankara on October 2, buying 20 large suitcases, visiting the consulate and leaving by plane ten hours later. It also shows two vehicles leaving the consulate a few hours after Khashoggi’s visit, traveling to the Consul’s residence and from there to a car wash. Most importantly it included a surveillance audiotape from the consulate consistent with Khashoggi being injected with a sedative, suffocated with a plastic bag and dismembered with a bone saw.

fter reviewing this evidence, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights concluded in June 2019 that Khashoggi was the victim of a deliberate premeditated extrajudicial assassination. He called for Saudi Arabia to extradite the 15-member security team to Turkey to be tried for Khashoggi’s murder.

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*Jamal Khashoggi was the nephew of the prominent arms Saudi arms dealer, Adnan Khashoggi, known for his role in the Iran–Contra scandal. Jamal was also the cousin of the late Dodi Fayed, the lover killed with Princess Diana in the August 1997 Paris car crash.  Jamal Khashoggi Saudi Arabia Journalist Connect Princess Diana Dodi Fayed

**Cengiz has one son by a prior marriage to Turkish movie star Deniz Oral (see Deniz Oral Biography) and Khashoggi three previous marriages and four children (see Hatice Cengiz Biography)

The Spy in Your Phone

The Spy in Your Phone

Al Jazeera (2021)

Film Review

This film concerns Al Jazeera reporter Tamer Almisshal, who learned in mid-2020 that advanced phone spyware was collecting all his passwords, texts, emails and social media posts. He sought help from Citizen’s Lab, an interdisciplinary laboratory at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. They discovered his phone had been hacked by Israeli-made Pegasus software. The latter is marketed by the Israeli company NSO Group to United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia to monitor dissident journalists and human rights activists.

Al Jazeera believes that Saudi Arabia used Pegasus to track the movements of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi (prior to murdering him in 2018). They believe UAE hacked Almisshal’s phone because of his investigation into the three-year embargo of Qatar by Saudi Arabia and UAE (which ended January 5 – see Arab States Agree to End Three Year Boycott of Qatar.

Citizens Lab ultimately discovered that 36 Al Jazeera journalists had phones infected by Pegasus software.

Citizen Lab first uncovered the existence of Pegasus spyware when it was used to target UAE dissident Ahmed Mansour in 2016. It’s also used to target journalists in African and Latin American countries. Unlike other spyware, Pegasus has “zero click” capability. This means it can download itself (by dialing a phone number) without the user answering, clicking on a link or downloading a file.

The film also reports on a UAE enterprise known as Dark Matter that uses Pegasus to spy on US journalists and activist. The company employs a number of former NSA and CIA officials in their surveillance activities. This, according to NSA whistleblower William Binnie, is illegal without clearance from the contracting agency that employed them.

People who believe their phone is being hacked can contact Citizens Lab at  https://citizenlab.ca/ for assistance.

 

 

Who Murdered Jamal Khashoggi: the Findings of Turkish Intelligence

Jamal Khashoggi: The Silencing of a Jounalist

Al Jazeera (2019)

Film Review

This documentary is a collation of Turkish intelligence findings in the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi at Istanbul’s Saudi Consulate in October 2018. The evidence consists mainly of an audio recording of the murder (presumably Turkish intelligence had the Saudi Consulate bugged), forensic analysis of the Consulate interior, CCTV footage and interviews with a cab driver and a builder who constructed a massive incinerator outside the Saudi Consul’s home in April 2018. The documentary also features an exclusive interview with Hatice Congiz, Khashoggi’s fiancee, who was waiting for him outside the Consulate.

Based on the audio recording, where Khashoggi is heard to say, “Don’t cover my mouth – I have asthma and I can’t breathe,” Turkish Intelligence concludes the Saudi hit team put a plastic bag over his head and choked him. He is heard to struggle for seven minutes before he succumbs.

It would take fifteen days and massive international pressure before Saudi intelligence allowed Turkish police inside the Consulate to conduct a forensic analysis. They discovered the walls had been recently repainted. After removing the new paint, they discovered traces of Khashoggi’s blood and fingerprints belonging to the hit team.

At present, Turkish intelligence believes his body was dismembered inside the Consulate and packed into suitcases. Within hours of the murder, there is CCTV footage of hit team members arriving at the Saudi Consul’s home with the suitcases.

The most gruesome evidence comes from a builder commissioned to build an enormous incinerator in the Saudi Consul’s back garden in April 2018. This coincides with the date Khashoggi began visiting Istanbul to court Hatice Congiz, leading eventually to their engagement.

Khashoggi was visiting the Saudi Consul to obtain copies of his divorce decree. Under Turkish law, all foreigners must provide proof they are single to marry Turkish nationals.