Aides to the former Sunni Prime Minister of Lebanon Saad al-Hariri, who recently announced his resignation via a broadcast from Saudi Arabia, have reportedly denied claims disseminated by a pro-Shiite Hezbollah newspaper that the Sunni kingdom is holding the influential politician under house arrest.
TEHRAN – President Hassan Rouhani warned Saudi Arabia on Wednesday that it will achieve nothing by threatening the might of Iran, as a war of words between the regional heavyweights intensifies.
A number of the Saudi royals and top officials arrested for corruption over the weekend have reportedly been detained at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Riyadh, leading to an uncomfortable statement from the hotel’s owner and fueling outside interest in exactly what is going on in the kingdom.
President Trump tweeted enthusiastic support of Saudi Arabia’s king and crown prince on Tuesday morning, while most of the Washington foreign policy establishment was still mulling over its response to the dramatic events in Riyadh.
TEL AVIV – Saudi officials, including Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, have made comments over the last day accusing both Iran and Lebanon of “acts of war” on Riyadh.
CAIRO – Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ruled out a constitutional amendment to extend his term, saying an election would be held next year and he will not run again in 2022, in an interview with CNBC Monday.
Gulf Affairs Minister Thamer al-Sabhan of Saudi Arabia said in a television interview on Sunday that he has “confirmed information” of a plot to murder Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri, who resigned on Saturday.
The Trump administration should take the stirring reforms being implemented in Saudi Arabia by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) with a grain of salt because the effort could backfire and end up empowering Islamic hard-liners, warns the director of the threat information office at the Center for Security Policy (CSP).
Saudi Arabia on Monday declared that the missile fired from Yemen at Riyadh over the weekend was a “blatant act of military aggression” by Iran, acting through its Yemeni proxies, the Houthi insurgents. The Saudi-led military coalition that has been attempting to restore the internationally-recognized government of Yemen announced that it would temporarily close all land, air, and sea routes into Yemen to prevent further weapons smuggling.
Breitbart News Executive Chairman Steve Bannon analyzed the dramatic weekend events in Saudi Arabia on Monday’s edition of Breitbart News Daily on the SiriusXM Patriot Channel.
RIYADH (Reuters) – A campaign of mass arrests of Saudi Arabian royals, ministers and businessmen expanded on Monday after a top entrepreneur was reportedly detained in the biggest anti-corruption purge of the kingdom’s affluent elite in its modern history.
Saudi Arabia over the weekend saw the upheaval of leading government officials and business figures, as well as increased tension with the kingdom’s rival Iran.
Saudi Arabia and Iran traded fierce accusations over Yemen on Monday, with Riyadh saying a rebel missile attack “may amount to an act of war” and Tehran accusing its rival of war crimes.
TEL AVIV — Prominent social media users in the Gulf have been posting extensively regarding developments in the Saudi royal family after the arrest of dozens of officials in the country, including 11 princes from the royal family, as part of an ongoing fight against corruption.
Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton joined SiriusXM host Alex Marlow and special co-host Stephen K. Bannon on Monday’s Breitbart News Daily to look at this weekend’s momentous events in Saudi Arabia.
Contents: Hezbollah’s Nasrallah calls for calm in the streets of Lebanon; Yemen’s Houthi missile attack on Riyadh called a ‘dangerous escalation’; Saudi’s young Crown Prince Salman forces rapid change among multiple crises
The sweeping arrests of dozens of Saudi businessmen, officials, and even royalty on Saturday – culminating in the arrest of Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who is all three, and one of the richest men in the world – is one of the most dramatic events in the Kingdom’s modern history. It is a clear sign of power consolidating around Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, upon whom a great deal of President Donald Trump’s Middle East policy is based.
RIYADH – Saudi King Salman met on Monday with former Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri, less than 48 hours after he resigned as premier in a televised address from Riyadh.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said on Sunday the previous day’s resignation of the country’s premier Saad Hariri had been “imposed” by Saudi Arabia.
Middle Eastern news outlets are claiming an aircraft carrying Prince Mansour bin Muqrin, deputy governor of the Asir Province, and several other Saudi government officials crashed near the provincial capital of Ahba Sunday.
Contents: Saad Hariri shocks Lebanon by resigning as PM while in Saudi Arabia; Lebanon enters the Sunni/Shia front line between Iran and Saudi Arabia
In a phone conversation on Saturday, President Trump praised Saudi Arabia’s King Salman for his reform agenda to modernize the kingdom, which includes his recent crackdown on corruption. Mark Landler reports in the New York Times: President Trump has spoken
Saudi Arabia has arrested dozens of princes, senior military officers, businessmen and top officials, including a well-known royal billionaire with extensive holdings in Western companies, as part of a sweeping purported anti-corruption probe that further cements control in the hands of its young crown prince.
The arrest of Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal on corruption charges impacts the billionaire investor’s many business associates throughout the world.
TEL AVIV – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s resignation and his accompanying statement slamming Iran should be a “wake-up call” to the world to take action against the Islamic Republic.
TEL AVIV – The shocking resignation announcement of “fig-leaf” Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri has unmasked the country as an Iranian proxy state run by Hezbollah – the Middle East’s most powerful terror group, an Israeli analyst observed on Saturday.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has tightened his grip on power through the recent anti-corruption purge, report Stephen Kalin and Katie Paul in Reuters.
An assassination attempt on Lebanon’s prime minister Saad Hariri was reportedly thwarted just days before he announced his resignation during a trip to Saudi Arabia on Saturday, citing threats on his life.
BEIRUT — Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri resigned from his post Saturday during a trip to Saudi Arabia in a surprise move that plunged the country into uncertainty amid heightened regional tensions.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s King Salman on Saturday removed a prominent prince who headed the National Guard, replaced the economy minister and announced the creation of a new anti-corruption committee.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia says its forces have intercepted a missile fired toward one of its major international airports on the outskirts of the capital, Riyadh.
Contents: Israel and Hezbollah prepare for war with each other; Saudi Arabian minister calls for ‘toppling Hezbollah’
TEL AVIV – Saudi Arabia pushed the U.S. into pressuring Israel to delay the “Greater Jerusalem” bill that would see the connection of satellite settlements to the capital, the Hebrew news site Ynet reported Tuesday.
Saudi officials announced on Monday that they would seek to limit imports of uranium to generate nuclear energy by developing a domestic extraction program to foster “self-sufficiency in producing nuclear fuel.”
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s announcement that the Kingdom would return to a “moderate Islam that is open to all religions and to the world” did not go over well at the pro-Erdogan Turkish paper Yeni Safak, where columnist Ibrahim Karagul accused the Saudis of joining a U.S.-Israeli plot to water down Islam and divide the Muslim world.
White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner spent much of last week on an unannounced trip to Saudi Arabia — a sign that Kushner is still playing a key role in administration efforts to broker peace in the Middle East.
The Saudi Arabia government has decreed that women will finally be allowed into sports stadiums, as long as they are in a family unit led by a male relative.
TEL AVIV – Saudi officials have called for an international coalition to fight Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, saying it is the “Party of Satan” that is “worse than the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda put together.”
The man who may soon be king of Saudi Arabia is charting a new, more modern course for a country so conservative that for decades there were no concerts or film screenings and women who attempted to drive were arrested.
Ever since President Donald Trump appointed Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster as National Security Advisor, linking terrorism to radical Islam has been an issue. While McMaster quickly informed his staff the link was not to be made, Trump makes it.