MUST-READS

• Oil
  Saudi Aramco Chief Executive Warns on Oil Supply

  The chief executive officer of Saudi Aramco, the world's biggest oil producer, said Monday that worries such as rising oil-sector costs and global turmoil could lead to a lack of oil supplies down the line, if oil companies fail to make sufficient investments.

  • Arab News - Oil industry ‘needs timely investments’
  • The National - Saudi Aramco’s CEO trumpets investment plans for oil and gas amid falling prices
• ISLAMIC STATE
  Syria warns against U.S. strikes on Islamic State on its soil

  Syria warned the Obama administration on Monday not to extend its air war against the Islamic State group into Syria, as the militants celebrated another key victory over government forces in the north of the country.

  • The Atlantic: Opinion - The Problem With Bombing ISIS
  • Foreign Policy - The Islamic State's Homefield Advantage
  • Yahoo! - U.N. accuses Islamic State of mass killings
  • Bloomberg - U.S. Won’t Consult Syria on Militant Strikes: White House
• Syria
  Academics and Archaeologists Fight to Save Syria’s Artifacts

  Scholars can do little to stop the fighting and looting, but they have created blogs, websites, Facebook pages, and Twitter accounts to monitor the destruction and raise awareness about it. By sharing excavation records, scholars outside the Middle East have helped their counterparts in the Arab world to compile online lists of missing or stolen objects.

• Military
  In deaths of civilians in Gaza, U.S. weapons sales to Israel come under scrutiny

  What Israel used in that Aug. 3 strike, according to the United Nations, was a Hellfire missile — a U.S.-made weapon. The incident was one of many in the ongoing six-week-old war in the Gaza Strip in which weapons sold to Israel by the United States and some European nations have played a prominent role.

  • NYT - Op-Ed Contributor: Gaza, Victim of History
  • Washington Post - Israel and Hamas appear to have run out of ideas, but not bombs
  • Guardian - Israel destroys 2 Gaza high-rises in escalation
• Labor
  Contractors in Saudi Arabia welcome foreign firms, demand equal treatment

  Several Saudi contractors have said they are not against the Council of Ministers’ decision to allow foreign contractors to enter the Saudi market as long as they are given equal opportunities.   They said all local contractors are hoping for the same treatment foreign contractors will be given and that the Ministry of Labor should grant local contractors the necessary visas to allow them to recruit workers. 

• WATER
  Riyadh to get more water next year

  Riyadh currently gets 2.2 million cubic meters of water daily thanks to projects supported by Riyadh Gov. Prince Turki bin Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, the Saudi Press Agency reported Saturday. “Support has been given to the water and electricity sectors through the use of advanced technology and the adoption of international standards,” the prince said in a statement to the Saudi Press Agency.

• ISIL
  Assad Policies Aided Rise of Islamic State Militant Group

  Earlier in the three-year-old Syrian uprising, Mr. Assad decided to mostly avoid fighting the Islamic State to enable it to cannibalize the more secular rebel group supported by the West, the Free Syrian Army, said Izzat Shahbandar, an Assad ally and former Iraqi lawmaker who was Baghdad's liaison to Damascus. The goal, he said, was to force the world to choose between the regime and extremists.

  • New York Times - Response to Attack Reflects Iraq’s Sectarian Divide
  • BBC - Iraq forces defeat militant push to take oil refinery
  • Reuters - Turkey struggles as 'lone gatekeeper' against Islamic State recruitment
  • Al-Shorfa - ISIL's use of the Prophet's stamp an affront to Islam: Saudi clerics
  • Reuters - Britain close to identifying beheading suspect
• TASI
  Saudi Arabia Drafts Foreign Limits for $580 Billion Bourse – Bloomberg

  The QFIs’ holdings may not exceed 10 percent of the market value, including interests under swaps, they said. The Saudi bourse has a market capitalization of more than $580 billion. “For Saudi to begin like this is a positive start,” Ahmed Badr, Dubai-based head of MENA equities at Renaissance Capital Ltd., said by phone. “It’s a big enough slice of the pie.”

• Milk
  A Nice Tall Glass of Camel’s Milk

  Two years ago, a University of Southern California student named Walid Abdul-Wahab was visiting his native Saudi Arabia during the holy month of Ramadan when he noticed that everyone seemed to be drinking raw camel’s milk. The beverage is considered to be a favorite of the Prophet Muhammad's, according to Wahab, and during Ramadan, many Muslims try to walk in the Prophet’s footsteps. They might not have many other options: Because of refrigeration issues, the only cow’s milk he could find there was powdered.

• Counter-Terrorism
  Saudi counterterror donation sends ideological message

  "I think it's becoming clear that Saudi officials are frustrated with the lingering perception among some – especially in the West – that the Saudi government helped create ISIS and that it supports it financially," says Fahad Nazer, former analyst at the Saudi embassy in Washington. "I think the Saudis view themselves as being at the forefront of the global effort to combat terrorism. This donation and the center itself, which was proposed by [Saudi] King Abdullah in 2005, are indicative of  what appears to be a sincere commitment to fight Al Qaeda and its affiliates.

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