The U.S. just resumed sales of bombs and missiles to the Gulf state, which still owes $15 million for jet fuel from its war on Yemen.

A Pentagon report obtained exclusively by The Intercept finds that Saudi Arabia has repeatedly stiffed the United States on its outstanding fuel bill. After the kingdom and the United Arab Emirates paid off a large portion of the debt in 2021 and 2022, Saudi Arabia has paid just over $950,000 on a years-old balance that, as of late last year, totaled $15.1 million. Despite the unpaid debt, the Biden administration announced last Friday that it is lifting a ban on selling offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia, authorizing an initial shipment of air-to-ground munitions to the Gulf kingdom. The ban had been in place for the past three years as a response to the heavy civilian casualties of the country’s campaign in Yemen but did not apply to sales of so-called defensive arms and military services. Those sales have amounted to almost $10 billion over the past four years.

The Intercept report

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