BEIRUT (AP) — Two days after Jamal Khashoggi vanished into the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, The Washington Post published a column featuring his byline and the headline "A missing voice." The space below it was blank.

That influential voice on Saudi affairs has been silenced forever after three decades as a writer, editor, commentator and media adviser.

Eighteen days after Khashoggi disappeared, Saudi Arabia acknowledged early Saturday that the 59-year-old writer has died in what it said was a "fistfight" inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

The Saudi announcement shed little light on the m...