Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah Irks Patients By Booking VIP Floor Of New York Hospital After Surgery

One day after he was revealed to have implored Washington to launch military strikes against iran, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah finds himself at the epicenter of a second media firestorm -- this time, for commandeering the entire wing of one of New York City's top hospitals to recover from back surgery.

According to the New York Post, the 86-year-old monarch irked fellow patients by block-booking the VIP floor of New York Presbyterian Hospital, which contains the facility's best treatment and recovery rooms, in an effort to maintain his privacy after undergoing surgery for a blood clot and slipped disc Nov. 24.

"Patients are grumbling that they have been moved out to other areas of the hospital, and that despite there being a number of unused VIP treatment rooms, they can't be moved into them because they are all reserved for the king of Saudi Arabia," a family member of one patient is quoted by the Post as saying.

Saudi Health Minister Abdullah al-Rabeeah would only confirm that King Abdullah -- who reportedly told U.S. officials to "cut the head off the snake" by launching military strikes in Iran, according to documents released by WikiLeaks yesterday -- was in "reassuring" health, but offered few further details. "He has begun a programme of physical therapy and rehabilitation as recommended by his doctors," he is quoted by the AFP as saying. There has been no indication how long the king will remain in the U.S.

Comments

[roninroshi]

09:55 PM on 12/08/2010

Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHF558u6Q_8&feature=related

[Proximaking]

04:29 PM on 12/03/2010

Whoever here said that he is the only friend of democracy in the middle east needs their head examining, since when did he allow Saudis the vote? What happened to the elections in Kuwait that president Bush assured us would be a direct outcome of the first gulf war? Kuwait is still a dictatorship exactly the same as Saudi. No, strangely if you are looking for a democratic force in the middle east you have to look to Hamas, remember the party a huge swathe of Palestinians voted for in elections that everyone but the USA said were perfectly free and fair but of course the people voted for the "wrong" party so the USA twisted everyone's arms to cut off funds for them. Now I wonder when the arm twisting that went on there will appear on Wikileaks or more likely its big brother successor? More importantly how many more leaks will it take before ordinary Americans realise their country has been kidnapped by the rich and powerful who take great umbrage at the people of the world sticking up for themselves. Not one stone of the temple will be left standing one upon another, the temple where they worship their golden calf who has all grown up and condemns the very streets with its presence, ........ capitalism. When will Americans see what they have become as God saw what they would become and tried to warn them all those years ago?

[Algo]

08:48 PM on 12/01/2010

Why are you leaking this news! This could jeopardize his health and we could lose a prime, pro-democracy advocate in the Middle East and ally of many US presidents.

[notillegal2]

03:41 PM on 12/01/2010

The money they get from the king will fund that floor for a long time against the back drop of the non payers who will invade the hospital.

[Paula Ann]

02:50 PM on 12/01/2010

they complaints need to be directed to the administration of the hospital....they allowed this.

[Paula Ann]

02:51 PM on 12/01/2010

**the complaints...

[karim banned]

09:37 AM on 12/01/2010

Only a few rich families who are either connected to royal family or to the Wahhabi clergies are benefiting from the wealth SA has. The rest of the people are suffering from poor health, lack of basic sanitary functions like garbage collection etc.

I was in Makkah a few weeks ago after a few hours of rain most of the streets were look like a ocean of floating garbage, because of lack of regular garbage collection and drainage facilities.

As you know Makkah is the holiest city in Muslim world and if Makkah looks like a garbage dump, you can guess how the rest of SA look like.

It is miracle that SA as country goes around, since there is no proper management for anything in SA.

It is common fashion for leaders all over the world to think "BIG", ignore their domestic problems and blame all their problems on foreign countries.

Iran has send around 300,000 pilgrimage to SA this year. Only the visa fees that SA has collected from Iranians are about 90 million dollars.

Iran has shown no hostility toward SA and still King Abddullah who is not capable of managing his own country, despite all the money pouring into SA from all over the Muslim world, wants US to attack another Muslim country on behalf of Zionists.

An act of aggression is forbidden against another Muslim country according to Quran and only defensive wars are allowed.

SA should explain its position regarding attacking a Muslim country.

[gingershot]

06:26 PM on 12/11/2010

Karim - I don't know if you are of Iranian descent but I basically agree with your questioning of the Saudi dictatorship. I do believe there is ample evidence US and Israel Lobby in the US is in a regional agreement with both the House of Saud and Israel. US maintains control in the Middle East for Israel by the use of Saudi Arabia, as well as Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, and several others

How will the Saudi autocracy be overthrown? - is bin Laden the only one who is actively pursuing an end to the House of Saud?

Is the US support for this dictatorship, in concert of it's support of Israel, just still so overwhelming that overthrow of this despot is out of the question?

I think these despots in the House of Saud need to be overthrown, and about the same time THAT happens there will be the traction necessary to overthrown the Apartheid Israeli regime

I dislike Abudullah as much as I dislike Netanyahu

[Systems Nominal]

12:09 AM on 12/01/2010

I assume that if that hospital had "VIP" rooms and is used to handling world dignitaries, most of the responsibility for any inconvenience lies with them. Furthermore, as a medical professional, I wonder where did the NYT got so much confidential information on the medical procedure underwent. Wikileaks?

[white mende man]

11:59 PM on 11/30/2010

money may not buy you love but it sure can buy you everything else

[aidendamien]

08:40 PM on 11/30/2010

Make him stay in Saudi Arabia for treatment. Seriously. How would you feel if you were the leader of your country and had to leave to get better treatment?

[white mende man]

12:02 AM on 12/01/2010

leaders and other people all over the world seek treatment elsewhere if the treatment is better elsewhere. why blame foreigners for being rich... they have a product to sell and we demand that product just as they use and demand our heavy equipment and military expertise which we are more than willing to sell to them.

[Dec2086Lover]

06:30 PM on 11/30/2010

Hopefully he dies soon along with Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak.

[Systems Nominal]

11:47 PM on 11/30/2010

Lovely .

[Paula Ann]

02:53 PM on 12/01/2010

what makes you think the brother that comes after him will be any better?

[channala]

07:13 PM on 12/01/2010

Agreed. In fact Abdullah has is by far much better than his predecessors in terms of his lifestyle and mentality.

[Abdulla AlNaemi]

05:02 PM on 11/30/2010

He didn't mean any harm by booking a whole floor its just the way he role!! He usually book a whole floor in hotels too! some times they book two or three floors!!

I love This guy :**

[Shomali]

03:29 PM on 11/30/2010

I wonder, with all the money they have in Saudi Arabia, they haven't built a single decent hospital where they can remove a blood clot and fix a slipped disc? These operations are done in every little hospital in the US, on a daily basis. These aren't experimental cancer treatment or brain surgery. Someone has to tell this dictator, take the $60 billion he wants to buy weapons from US and buy medical equipment (from the US) and build 60 modern hospitals and train doctors to staff them, so that next time someone in his corrupt royal family slips and falls they don't have to make a fool out of themselves and be a pain in the rear end for people who really need to use a hospital.

[Dec2086Lover]

06:31 PM on 11/30/2010

Great post! LOL!

[Callah]

07:50 PM on 11/30/2010

FnF you go....

[Yoda]

02:45 PM on 11/30/2010

Saudi's king and his entire so-called gov have been nothing more than a set of useful instrument to the West. Everyone with an IQ higher than the number of their fingers would know this. So why am I point this out. That's because a large number of American population has IQ lower than the number of their fingers.

[Dec2086Lover]

06:31 PM on 11/30/2010

LOVE YOUR COMMENT!

[Systems Nominal]

11:51 PM on 11/30/2010

That useful instrument has some useful weapons that we sold to them. And lots of money. We have trouble controlling Wikileaks.

[karim banned]

02:44 PM on 11/30/2010

This guy has big plans for the world, Like dominating the ME. I bet if ME is served to him on a silver platter he finds a way to mess things up.

SA is a land of incompetence and ignorance. These guys cannot even run affairs in their own harem, let alone their country, let alone ME.

The incompetence is exactly why SA needs west so much. SA is adopting western policies without questioning them. For SA west is god and you do not question god in that neighbourhood.

Now when west plans to attack Iran, SA is the first country to line up and help.

Since Iran is actually capable of managing the neighborhood and solve problems, with Iran both West and SA become redundant and lose their legitimacy in ME.

Never mind that the whole Iran war is planed in Tel Aviv. The irony is that SA see itself as the leader in Muslim world and at the same time help Zionists who kill Muslims on daily basis to achieve their goals.

He spends money to show off his wealth but a closer look at SA society reveals totally different story.

He ignores domestic issues like widespread poverty even in oil rich provinces of SA.

Basic things like proper sanitary services, water treatment, sewer system and garbage collection are neglected and mismanaged and money is spent on extravagance things to show off the wealth.

I never understand Wahhabis, who feel closer to Zionists than Shia Muslims brothers.

[Doctoress]

02:21 PM on 11/30/2010

The doctors at that hospital should just "cut the head of that snake, the Saudi king' while there is a chance to rid the world of these pests to humanity.

[Dec2086Lover]

06:33 PM on 11/30/2010

Friended and faved!