Quotes About Abdul Aziz

Abdul Aziz did not have a funeral. Foreign dignitaries, prominent tribesmen, wealthy oil executives, and jealous Arab strongmen did not come to pay their respects. Funeral prayers were recited in Taif and then Abdul Aziz was buried without fanfare in an essentially unmarked grave in Riyadh.

Roosevelt's agents on the Arabian peninsula, some of them oil prospectors, had begun to glimpse the vast wealth sloshing beneath the sands. They had urged their president to embrace the Saudi royals before the British wheedled in, and Roosevelt did, flattering Abdul Aziz as best he could and winning limited pledges of military and economic cooperation.