Since the blockade began, these countries have spent tens of millions of dollars and hired at least 20 American and British communications and lobbying firms to run public influence campaigns in the United States, according to documents filed under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
The campaigns themselves are nothing new. What is striking, however, is that they've moved past traditional Washington, D.C., lobbying, using American media to broadcast their narrative beyond the beltway. They've bought ads and promotions with Facebook, Twitter, and Google. They've created Snapchat filters and bought full-page ads in publications including the
New York Times, the
Wall Street Journal, the
Washington Post, and
Politico. Dozens of
pro- and
anti-blockade commercials were placed on networks including Fox, CNN, NBC, and MSNBC. The Qatari government even purchased a
billboard in Times Square.
Both Qatar and its Middle Eastern opponents, the Saudi-led blockade coalition, are fighting to control the narrative stateside. Both sides tout a similar message, highlighting the terrorist activities of its diplomatic opponent while boasting itself as America's partner for peace in the Middle East (Qatar and Saudi Arabia's governments have both been implicated in funding terrorism, and each denies it vehemently). But what is most alarming is that both the Saudi-led coalition and Qatar are using a tactic central to the Russian meddling: setting up websites and social media accounts that are designed to resemble grassroots American organizations.
The websites and social media accounts
Lift the Blockade,
Boycott Qatar, and
Qatar Insider are all funded by one of these Middle Eastern countries.
"It seems to me that they're saying, 'Well if Russia was so successful in using Twitter and Facebook to change public opinion, then maybe we can do the same thing,'" says
Richard Lau, a political science professor at Rutgers University who specializes in political persuasion and the effects of media on political campaigns.
One of the firms recruited by the Saudi-led coalition was the Podesta Group, which recently fell into turmoil after being named in the indictments of Paul Manafort and Richard Gates. According to the indictments, Manafort hired the Podesta Group to work on a U.S. communications campaign for a pro-Russia Ukrainian group. Tony Podesta stepped down as chief executive officer the day the indictments were announced, and the firm folded
soon after that.
Prior to the Podesta Group's downfall, the company was able to orchestrate a public-relations campaign for the Saudi-led coalition. It was hired last summer by the Saudi American Public Relation Affairs Committee, which is funded by the
Embassy of Bahrain as well as the Saudi millionaire Salman Al-Ansari, who is also SAPRAC's founder and president. SAPRAC receives no direct funding from the government of Saudi Arabia, but its relationship resembles that between AIPAC and the Israeli government: legally unassociated, but curiously in sync.