HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES VOTES TO DENY AID TO SAUDIS: Not that the Saudis need the money:

The US House of Representatives has voted to deny all aid to Saudi Arabia, despite repeated assurances by the Bush administration that the desert kingdom is cooperating in its "war on terror."

The ban is contained in a little-publicised amendment quietly slipped by a bipartisan group of lawmakers into a 34.2-billion-dollar bill that finances US foreign operations in the 2008 fiscal year. The massive bill, featuring a wide range of humanitarian programs, was approved by lawmakers in the middle of the night on Friday.

This is actually not the first time that the House has passed such a measure--but this time the bill goes further: it closes a loophole that used to allow the Bush administration to bypass the ban by invoking the requirements of the war on terror.

US administration officials have not commented publicly, and of course Saudi Arabia is not going to suffer economically just because of a few million American dollars being withheld, the sponsors are angry about Saudi support for Hamas, which has received more than half of its financing from Saudi Arabia. In May, the Saudis were planning on sending $300 million.

Saudi Arabia is also accused of undermining US troops in Iraq by making no move to stop the approximately 3,000 Saudis allegedly fighting there with the insurgents.

Technorati Tag: US and Saudi Arabia.