Bernie may be a left-wing troglodyte with a brain stuck in the 1960’s, but occasionally he gets well ahead of the curve. Medicare-for-all is an obvious example, but so is the American-backed Saudi war in Yemen, which Sanders opposed before it was cool. He deserves credit for that.
But Bernie goes too far when he puts the Saudis in the axis of authoritarians, and makes his opposition to their regime personal. Yes, I have a huge issue with giving a blank check to Saudi adventurism. No, I don’t see any big moral difference between the Saudi and Iranian regimes; that was true even before the Khashoggi murder. But Saudi Arabia is obviously a major player in both the Middle East and world oil markets, and its interests cannot be ignored. In addition, even though they are being imposed in an authoritarian way, the MBS reforms are popular at home and should be welcome here.
The bottom line is that the Middle East is a messy and complex place, lacking clearly defined saints and villains. In one way or another, we have to do business with all of them. Not writing blank checks for one side or the other is not the same as singling them out as an enemy.