The disappearance in Saudi hands of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist and columnist for the Washington Post, has sparked outrage in the United States. But the U.S. should have made clear long before this that Riyadh’s position as a U.S. ally was not a free pass to abuse human rights and international norms.

Instead, Western countries seemed to have pegged the hopes of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman being the reformer that he made himself out to be, and without too much attention to what was actually happening on the ground.