The US Jewish News Syndicate launched a fierce attack on Qatar’s campaign to buy politicians within the United States, saying that such activities demonstrated that Washington should not consider Doha a friend or ally in any way.
One of the aspects of Qatar's desperate strategy to buy influence in the United States last May was to buy a large stake in the conservative media outlet, Newsmax, owned by Christopher Rudy, a close friend of Trump, and allocated more than 90 million Dollars for this purpose.
The report added that Qatar’s bid for Newsmax came as the outlet veered towards softer coverage of Qatar.
Last year, Newsmax headlines related to Doha included opinion pieces that attacked Qatar for its investments in terrorism and criticized U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson for his support of the Gulf nation. More recently, Newsmax has regularly published more sympathetic news and opinion coverage on Qatar.
In a separate event, the United States Mission to the United Nations decided to recognize a diplomatic immunity claim last month made by a Qatari agent who was a ringleader in the hacking of a prominent Republican donor and the leaking of his emails to the media.
The diplomatic immunity claim was a sham—the Qatari agent hadn’t worked as a diplomat since leaving his job at the United Nations a year before, and instead was employed by Qatar managing a criminal operation to destroy the reputations of prominent American critics of Qatar. Qatar and Morocco claimed that he enjoyed diplomatic immunity, not because he was a diplomat, but in order to shield him from a lawsuit brought by one of his victims.
“The most bizarre part of this story is why they went along with state’s effort to protect a Qatari agent credibly accused of crimes from being held accountable,” said the head of a pro-Israel Republican group, who requested anonymity in order to speak candidly. “What Qatar did to a prominent Republican donor and pro-Israel stalwart is a disgrace … by offering one of the perpetrators diplomatic immunity, the State Department is protecting Qatar from accountability.”