“Yes, he does. He’s a fighter. By the way, he’s fighting us. Saudi Arabia has been excellent. And the United Arab Emirates has been excellent. And I’ll tell you, Qatar is incredible,” Trump said Tuesday when asked by reporters whether bin Salman was encouraging the US to continue striking Iran.
Predominantly Sunni Saudi Arabia is a long-term regional rival of Shiite Iran, and in retaliation for US-Israeli strikes, Tehran also attacked targets in this kingdom. But there is no indication that Riyadh would be involved in military actions against Iran. According to a Bloomberg report on Tuesday, he would only consider it if Tehran attacked its power plants or water sources. According to previous reports, bin Salman strongly encourages the US to attack Iran.
“Prince Muhammad, according to people familiar with the discussions, has spoken of Iran as a long-term threat to the Persian Gulf that can only be eliminated by removing the government,” the NYT wrote, adding that the prince had called Trump several times about it last week and that the Saudi stance toward Tehran is now apparently tougher than Israel’s.
According to the newspaper’s sources, the Saudi prince spoke with Trump about the ongoing strikes on Iran as a “historic chance” to reshape the Middle East region.
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also considers Iran a long-term threat, but analysts say that Israeli officials would probably consider a collapsed Iranian state too busy with internal unrest to threaten Israel as a victory. While Saudi Arabia considers a collapsed Iranian state a serious and deadly security threat,” the letter adds.
