Everything, Everywhere, All at Once: Saudi Arabia Moves Fast to Get a Makeover
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Everything, Everywhere, All at Once: Saudi Arabia Moves Fast to Get a Makeover
SAUDI ARABIA
The Nujuma Ritz-Carlton Reserve on the Red Sea recently opened in Saudi Arabia, the hotel chain’s first luxury resort in the Gulf kingdom. Like dozens of resorts making their debut in the deserts and coasts of the country, it offers guests “quiet luxury” and hopes to attract the world’s jet set.
What these luxurious retreats also offer the country and its de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also known as MBS, is a chance to diversify its oil-dependent economy and transform the country socially and culturally via a program known as Vision 2030.
The tourism initiatives that are part of this plan are in a class of their own, wrote Wallpaper:
“A number of so-called giga-projects have revealed vast landscapes rarely seen, uncovered ancient archaeological sites, and created buzzing destinations filled with some of the world’s most impressive hotels,” the design magazine gushed. “From Red Sea Global’s project to transform 28,000 square kilometers along the west coast of the country into a Maldives-like destination, to the $62.2 billion development program at historic Diriyah, it’s impossible not to get carried away by the inspiring energy pervading Saudi Arabia.”
But Saudi Vision 2030 goes far beyond luxury retreats.
It aims to transform Saudi Arabia, the steward of Islam’s holiest cities, Mecca and Medina, into a major economic hub in the Middle East and change its traditional, ultra-conservative image to one more moderate and forward-looking. And it wants to position the country as a major world player, analysts say.
Part of that is transforming its image abroad. Just eight years ago, tourism visas were impossible to obtain, investors were pulling out and political capitals were carefully avoiding the country because of the crown prince’s crackdown on the royal family, clerics, and critics and the 2018 killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in Turkey by Saudi security operatives.
These days, Saudi Arabia has managed to move past that pariah status, observers say.
For example, over the past few years, the country won the bids to host the 2029 Asian Winter Games, the 2030 World Expo, and the 2034 FIFA World Cup. These offer MBS a chance to show the world the new Saudi Arabia, where sports, art, culture, entertainment, and tourism are on offer on a grand scale. That’s quite a change from just a decade ago, when the country still banned movie theaters and concerts, and sporting events were rare.
“Vision 2030 is the horizon that is meant to not only restructure Saudi Arabia but re-imagine the Saudi state,” Aziz Alghashian of Lancaster University in the United Kingdom told Newsweek. “In addition, sports in general are a universal language and Saudi Arabia wants to be a universal hub. So, investing in sports, hosting sporting events, and importing famous athletes enables Saudi (Arabia) to be on the global map – crucial to the objectives of 2030.”
Still, it’s in politics where its moves have been most far-reaching, observers say. “Saudi Arabia is in the middle of a diplomatic blitz,” noted World Politics Review.
“From hosting talks between Washington and Kyiv over the war in Ukraine to positioning the kingdom as central to the ‘day after’ plans for post-war Gaza and offering to help deconflict tensions between the US and Iran, Riyadh appears to be everywhere,” it wrote. ”This ‘peace push’ is tethered to the political agenda of MBS – namely, his effort to rehabilitate his own image while positioning the kingdom at the forefront of Middle East geopolitics and casting Saudi Arabia as a constructive player on the international stage.”
This month, along with Qatar, Saudi Arabia said it would pay off Syria’s $15 million debt to the World Bank. It’s also holding out a carrot badly wanted by the US and Israel: Saudi diplomatic recognition of Israel. The price is Palestinian statehood. As a result, MBS has made Saudi Arabia central to the post-war equation, analysts said, and therefore the future of the Middle East.
That’s an about-face for a country that prior to 2020 broke off diplomatic relations with Iran, isolated Qatar, and fought a war with Yemen. Two years ago, however, Saudi Arabia reestablished diplomatic relations with Iran. It withdrew from the Yemen conflict. And unlike its Gulf neighbor, the United Arab Emirates, now it is mostly staying out of foreign wars. Instead, the policy is “zero problems with neighbors.”
Meanwhile, the country remains close to the US – and President Donald Trump is expected to visit in mid-May and offer the country an arms package worth more than $100 billion, Reuters reported. The Saudis are simultaneously creating close ties with the Global South and with China and Russia to extend the country’s diplomatic clout.
MBS wants to expand his own power domestically and internationally, analysts say. To do that, he needs stability at home and in the region to build the projects that are part of Vision 2030, as instability spooks foreign investors.
Still, some say MBS has overreached. Oil prices are not high enough for the country to pay for his mega projects outright, resulting in delays that underscore the financial strain they are imposing on the kingdom.
For example, Neom, the futuristic, ecologically minded megacity that is the flagship project for Vision 2030, is coming with a price tag of $500 billion. Initially slated to be completed by 2030, it’s now projected to take at least 50 years to finish.
“If anyone is thinking Neom in its grand size is going to be built and operated and making money in five years, that’s foolish,” said Saudi Finance Minister Mohammed Al-Jaadan. “We are not foolish.”
Plans for this city have been scaled down, too: It was initially planned to hold 1.5 million residents. Now it’s expected to serve 300,000. And The Line – once planned as a 105-mile stretch of renewable-energy-powered skyscrapers – was scaled back to 1.5 miles by 2030.
In January, Saudi Arabia issued its largest-ever bond sale of $12 billion, essentially borrowing to support the mega projects even as the country is forecast to have a $26.8 billion deficit for 2025 and an economic growth rate of just 0.8 percent.
“Neom was like an imaginary city when it was announced,” Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, a fellow at Rice University, told Business Insider. “Now, they’re finding it much more difficult to turn that imaginary vision into some sort of reality on the ground.”
THE WORLD, BRIEFLY
Israel Strikes Syria Following Sectarian Conflicts
SYRIA
Israel launched a series of airstrikes on Syria over the weekend in what it called a “clear message” against threats to Syria’s Druze minority following skirmishes between Druze factions and pro-government forces that raised fears of renewed sectarian violence, France 24 reported.
The strikes – which targeted military installations and were described by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as the most extensive this year – hit at least 20 locations across the country.
Syria’s official news agency SANA said four people were injured in the west-central city of Hama and the port city of Latakia, and two civilians were killed elsewhere.
Israeli military officials confirmed that warplanes had struck near the interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s palace in the capital, Damascus.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a joint statement that Israel “will not allow forces to be sent south of Damascus or any threat to the Druze community.”
Army officials later announced that Israeli forces in southern Syria were “prepared to prevent the entry of hostile forces into Druze villages.”
The Syrian presidency condemned the Israeli strikes as a “dangerous escalation against state institutions,” while United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres criticized them as violations of Syria’s sovereignty.
The responses of other countries were mixed: Qatar and Saudi Arabia condemned Israel’s “aggression,” while Germany warned that “Syria must not become the venue for regional tensions.”
The weekend strikes followed deadly clashes between the Druze and Syrian government forces in the southern Sweida province and the suburbs of Damascus last week. The violence began after an audio recording circulated on social media of a man insulting Islam’s Prophet Mohammad, the Associated Press wrote.
The voice was alleged to belong to Druze cleric Marwan Kiwan, but he issued a statement that he was not responsible.
More than 100 people were killed in the fighting.
In Damascus and other affected regions, Syrian authorities accused “outlaw groups” of fomenting violence and sectarian hatred. However, the Observatory and residents countered that government-allied forces attacked the Damascus suburbs and clashed with Druze gunmen.
On Friday, Druze factions reaffirmed their loyalty to Damascus and agreed to surrender their heavy weapons as part of a de-escalation deal with the government.
Some members of the Druze community would prefer that kind of internal resolution to Israel’s intervention, according to Al Jazeera. They claimed that “the Israeli prime minister is using this to put pressure on Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and attack targets in Syria.”
The Israeli military continues to occupy parts of Syria, including the Golan Heights, and has been launching attacks on various military sites across the country since the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and its allies toppled former President Bashar Assad in late 2024.
Prime Minister Albanese Wins Second Term in Australian Landslide
AUSTRALIA
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese secured a historic second term following a landslide election victory over the weekend, defying predictions of an “incumbency curse” in a race dominated by cost-of-living concerns and voters rejecting divisive campaign tactics, the BBC reported.
Though official results are expected later this week, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation projected that Albanese’s Labor Party will win around 86 seats, compared with about 40 for the opposition Liberal-National Coalition.
That will make Albanese the first Australian leader in more than 20 years to win re-election and signal a possible end to the country’s cycle of political instability, which has resulted in six different prime ministers in the past 18 years.
It’s also a stinging defeat for the Liberal Party and its leader, Peter Dutton, who lost his own seat of 24 years.
Albanese framed the result as a win for “fairness, aspiration, and opportunity.”
Dutton’s campaign struggled to connect with voters. Despite efforts to distance himself from hardline politics, the opposition leader’s positions on immigration, public services, and national identity prompted former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to describe his strategy as “very Trumpian,” as US tariffs and insults upset Australians.
With a commanding mandate, the ruling Labor party may pursue bolder reforms, CNN wrote.
The prime minister has pledged to improve healthcare, tackle housing affordability, and accelerate climate initiatives. He also pledged renewed efforts toward reconciliation with Indigenous Australians following the failed Voice referendum in 2023.
Australia’s election mirrored Canada’s recent Liberal victory, where fears of US President Donald Trump’s policies similarly helped left-leaning parties retain power. In contrast, the right-wing populist Reform party made major gains in local elections in the United Kingdom last week, the Washington Post added.
The gains came at the expense of both the governing Labour Party and opposition Conservatives, prompting political analysts to suggest that voters are dissatisfied with both major parties and Reform now has “the momentum of a winning party.”
Germany Declares Far-Right AfD “Extremist”
GERMANY
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency formally designated the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party an extremist group over the weekend, deepening the political isolation of the country’s largest opposition party and triggering swift condemnation from senior US officials and right-wing allies, NPR reported.
On Friday, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV) – Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution – released a 1,000-page report following a three-year investigation into the AfD.
The agency concluded that the AfD is a “proven right-wing extremist organization,” saying the party violated key constitutional principles, aimed to undermine democracy, and wanted to exclude certain groups from society.
Observers noted that the designation was not “a huge surprise” given that many of the party’s state-level branches have already been classified as extremist, but it is nevertheless a first for the national organization.
The AfD won 20.8 percent of the vote and 152 seats in February’s federal election, coming in second behind the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Christian Social Union (CSU). However, it remains politically isolated because mainstream parties have refused its offers to work in any coalition.
Analysts noted that the new designation will reinforce efforts to bar the AfD from key parliamentary roles.
AfD co-leader Alice Weidel accused German authorities of seeking to suppress dissent, and the move provoked sharp criticism from American right-wing figures. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio criticized the decision as “tyranny in disguise,” NBC News noted.
Germany’s Foreign Ministry pushed back, saying that “right-wing extremism needs to be stopped” to protect Germany’s Constitution and the rule of law and that the decision followed “a thorough and independent investigation.”
DISCOVERIES
Unicorn, Found
In the deep, dark waters of the Southern Ocean, marine biologists recently discovered the oceanic equivalent of a “unicorn” – capturing video footage of a colossal squid, Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni, that has evaded scientists for over a century.
“For 100 years, we have mainly encountered them as prey remains in whale and seabird stomachs and as predators of harvested toothfish,” said Kat Bolstad, a cephalopod researcher who helped identify the animal, in a statement.
Marine researchers captured the remarkable footage in March during a 35-day expedition to the remote South Sandwich Islands, part of the Ocean Census project aboard the research vessel “Falkor (too).”
Using a remotely operated vehicle dubbed “SuBastian,” pilots spotted the squid hovering at nearly 2,000 feet below the surface and filmed it for three minutes.
The team confirmed the species as a colossal squid after identifying the distinctive hooks on its arms – a feature absent in other members of the glass squid family, which are known for their transparent bodies.
Though colossal squids can reach lengths of 33 feet and weigh over 1,100 pounds, this one was a juvenile measuring roughly one foot in length.
“It was a teenager,” joked Michelle Taylor, chief scientist of the expedition, in an interview with BBC Science Focus. “Who would have thought that the first sighting of the colossal squid would have been such a modest size?”
Taylor and her team said the sighting and the resulting footage mark not only significant milestones for deep-sea exploration, but also a step forward in understanding one of the ocean’s most enigmatic giants.
The discovery also highlights the power of modern deep-sea research and underscores the need to protect these fragile, largely unexplored ecosystems.
“This is the final frontier,” Taylor told BBC Science Focus. “I find it baffling why people try to get to other planets when we’ve barely scratched the surface of this one.”