Despite fundamentally disagreeing on a multitude of issues -- from human rights to intervention in Yemen and Syria -- the U.S. and Saudi Arabia have long been allies. It is strategic friendship -- Saudi Arabia is, after all, the world's largest oil exporter.
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But as President Obama touches down in the Middle East kingdom on April 20, 2016, a bill on the floor of the Senate is creating new tension between the two nations ...
U.S. officials and the families of numerous 9/11 victims are now calling for 28 top-secret pages of a congressional report on the attacks to be released. The pages contain details about a possible Saudi support network for the hijackers while they were in the U.S. What's more, the Senate is considering a bill, which would make it possible for Saudi interests to be held accountable in U.S. court for any role they may have played.
Public spaces in Saudi Arabia are so segregated by gender that, in February 2016, when a wall to separate men from women was temporarily taken down in the Riyadh Starbucks, women were banned entirely from entering the establishment. Instead, a sign informed them to send their drivers in to order beverages in their place.
For decades, Saudi women have been prohibited from driving cars, due to the kingdom's strict version of Sunni Islam. However, the ultra-conservative kingdom announced on September 26, 2017 that women in Saudi Arabia will be allowed to drive for the first time in the summer of 2018.
Here, Saudi women get into the back seat of a car in Riyadh on June 14, 2011, three days before a nationwide protest against a driving ban.When his father ascended to the Saudi throne in 2015, 30-year-old Prince Mohammed bin Salman stepped into a position of almost unrivaled power. He is now the youngest Defense Minister in the world, in addition to serving as the chief of the House of Saud royal court and the chairman of the Council for Economic and Development Affairs.
Second in line to the throne, many believe the young, outspoken prince is the one really calling the shots ... especially when it comes to oil.