Happy National Day KSA and good luck for image building

On January 8, 1926, Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Saud was proclaimed king in the Grand Mosque in Makkah, where elders from Makkah,

On January 8, 1926, Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Saud was proclaimed king in the Grand Mosque in Makkah, where elders from Makkah, Medina, and Jeddah formally swore allegiance to him. A year later, he elevated Nejd to a kingdom as well, and ultimately unified both regions to establish the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on September 23, 1932, giving his family name to this new country.

The Kingdom calculates the official anniversary sequence using the lunar Hijri calendar, though the National Day itself remains to be on September 23. Hence, it is the 96th Saudi National Day and not the 94th.

In the century of the rule of the House of Saud over the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, six sons of King Abdulaziz also became kings. King Salman’s son, Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), became the crown prince in 2017, and exactly a century later in 2026, he is fundamentally carrying forward the dynasty of the House of Saud into its second century.

He will be the eighth king from the House of Saud and his success will be long-lasting as he breaks through obstacles like dangerous Gulf wars and intrigues.
MBS gave Saudi Arabia his Vision 2030, which ensures self-reliance and sustainability across fields. He prepared Saudi Arabia for the post-oil era, to remove the stigma of being a rentier state.

Due to his vision, Saudi unemployment fell to 7% in 2024 and female workforce participation surged past 36%, far exceeding the initial goals of Vicision 2030. The country has successfully started industrial production, and its first homegrown electric vehicle (EV) brand, Ceer, has just been launched.

The main task in the Ceer project was given to the same Chinese company that was known for manufacturing Apple iPhones. In the sectors of AI and EVs, China has taken over from traditional partners like the US and European states.

In his last visit to Riyadh, President Trump managed to get big contracts for AI and EVs from Saudi Arabia, but everyone knows that the US deals are an anachronism in this modern AI-driven world and are not going to sustain.
Saudi Arabia is no longer beholden to the US and its allies for its functioning, and Saudi industry has begun to rise with or without them. It is not totally dependent on China either, as other players like India and Japan are also competing for their share. This is the journey into Vision 2030.

But everybody is not happy with it. The war in the Gulf is an attempt to impede this journey. Main US media outlets like the Washington Post, New York Post, New York Times, CNN, and Fox News have continued churning out speculative stories upon speculative stories to discredit MBS and bring war to the Gulf region.

Different research studies published in the US and other countries have found that not only news stories but also editorials in leading US media outlets excessively used loaded terms in headlines and story construction to paint a negative picture of the crown prince.

The evidence suggests that major U.S. outlets have indeed produced coverage that Saudi Arabia considers negative, often relying on anonymous sources and framing that Saudi officials have publicly disputed. For example, in March 2026, the Washington Post published a report claiming that Saudi Crown Prince MBS and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu had repeatedly lobbied President Trump to launch military strikes on Iran, with MBS allegedly making “several phone calls” to pressure Trump.

Netanyahu made seven visits to Washington before Trump launched an attack on Iran but MBS did not such thing, which is beneath his protocol and position.
The Saudi response was swift and emphatic. Within 24 hours, the Saudi Embassy in Washington issued a denial via spokesperson Fahad Nazer, stating: “We have never lobbied the U.S. President to adopt a different policy,” and reaffirming Saudi support for diplomatic solutions with Iran.

The New York Times has faced sustained criticism for its consistently negative framing of Crown Prince MBS. Similarly, CNN published a report claiming Saudi Arabia had “for the first time” authorized its military to respond to Iranian attacks, citing Iranian missiles landing on Saudi territory. However, Middle Eastern media subsequently reported that while Saudi Arabia was displeased with Iranian missiles hitting its territory, it was actually calling on neighboring countries not to further provoke Iran directly contradicting CNN’s framing of Saudi belligerence.

The Saudi Research and Media Group (SRMG) is the body that is supposed to do image building for the crown prince and counter threats to Vision 2030. It has different media outlets successfully educating Saudi youth and winning their confidence in Saudi policies and Vision 2030.
Outside Saudi Arabia, London has historically operated as SRMG’s largest editorial base outside the Middle East. The UAE hosts extensive SRMG broadcasting, commercial, and advertising infrastructure.

And after that, SRMG operates four distinct localized platforms in Pakistan. But it is unfortunate that none of these four platforms has ever made any serious bid to be relevant for Saudi Vision 2030 in any way. A look at their content shows that on the global front, all these four localized media outlets of SRMG are an extension of Pakistani TV channels, which have lost credibility even among the Pakistani audience, and on the local front they are even worse and fail to compete with the YouTubers every second Pakistani has turned into.

At this crucial moment, when the upcoming Saudi Ambassador, Dr. Rajeh bin Tami Al-Baqami, is about to assume his office in Islamabad, an overhaul of these four localized SRMG media outlets in Pakistan is imperative. On this Saudi National Day, there were clear signs of improvement and discipline in Islamabad. Earlier, notorious journalists known for lack of credibility used to crowd such celebrations, and an army of self-serving politicians would create a mess in the name of security and protocol for them. This did not happen on September 23 at Serena Hotel in Islamabad, where the ceremony was observed.

The slogan for this year’s National Day celebrations was “Our Pride Is in Our Nature.” This is not the right translation. The slogan in Arabic gives a message that Saudi people are proud of being Saudis.

This is a clear message to both friends and foes of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, telling them that neither friends nor foes can define, alter, or influence the Saudi way of life. If Saudi Arabia has to fight a fight, it is the fight for its Vision 2030, and it knows that proud Saudis will fight this fight. Saudi Arabia has not initiated any war over the past century of the rule of the House of Saud, and it has given a message of peace and prosperity. Wars and war-mongering serve the purpose of dictators who know nothing but war and war-mongering. They do not serve the purpose of a forward-looking country like the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Happy National Day, Saudi Arabia.