Saudi authorities have permitted the use of lethal force to clear land for a futuristic desert city being built by dozens of Western companies, an ex-intelligence officer has told the BBC.
He said the April 2020 order stated the Huwaitat was made up of "many rebels" and "whoever continues to resist [eviction] should be killed, so it licensed the use of lethal force against whoever stayed in their home".
— BBC
The village of al-Khuraybah, home to members of the displaced Huwaitat tribe, was the target of Saudi security forces during the deadly raid that left one member dead. The report states, however, “The BBC was not able to independently verify Col. Alenezi's comments about lethal force.” The Line, which has now shrunk to 2.4 kilometers (about 1.5 miles), is expected to house its first 300,000 residents by the end of the decade.
Three other members of the tribe are still facing pending executions over their resistance, according to the UN. The state executed more than 170 people last year despite leader Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud's promises to enact more liberal reforms.
7 Comments
Shame on all involved, especially those who claim to profess enlightened values like Thom Mayne and Peter Cook. On brand for the more cynical ones like Nouvel, Fuksas, and Van Berkel.
Don't forget Oyler Wu and Tom Wiscombe...
IT'S unreal to see projects like this or like Dubai, all that money could have been used to host the palestinians so they can live in peace, but they'd rather feed the war machine
'host the palestinians'?
No one is shocked.
Again, I wish architecture journalists (Archinect, looking at you!) would participate in calling a spade a spade from day one. Contextualize. Do something more than copy paste the press release.
somewhat agree with comment above.
a big project happening somewhere is news, but without contextualization journalism is dead.
when journalism is dead mere reporting becomes a mouthpiece for feeding publicity of whatever ideology in charge. in Neom's case a mass scale white-washing project is undertaken. and yes even if architecture was good (which wasn't) that's not an excuse to nullify the context within which why we build what we build and how (including dispossession) we build it.
sounds too facile of a conclusion to draw, but atrocity of what's being built in architectural terms is in fact more often than not a manifestation of the context within which it arises.
Meanwhile (cough) has been doing this to Palestinians for 75 years now...
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