Year of the Golden Ape

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In January two major assassinations took place in the Middle East. The new, thirty-year-old King of Saudi Arabia was murdered as he made love to one of his numerous wives, skewered through the back so savagely as he lay prone that the knife blade penetrated the body of the girl beneath him, piercing her heart. An alleged cousin promptly assumed nominal power and issued a statement that he would not rest until Arab troops patrolled the streets of Jerusalem. The statement reassured everyone east of Suez – it showed that the King's heart was in the right place, that he was bent on the extinction of the State of Israel.

But the significant figure in this drama was the man who planned it. Sheikh Gamal Tafak immediately took over the posts of Oil and Finance Minister from his predecessor, who with so many other moderates had fled the country for his life. Tafak, a brilliant fanatic, sincerely believed that to recover Palestine for the Arabs, the oil weapon which chance had placed in their hands must be wielded ruthlessly. It was from this moment that the power of the sheikhs was really exerted against the West.

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