This Week In Arabia!

Amid international uproar over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, some members of Saudi Arabia’s ruling family are agitating to prevent Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman from becoming king, three sources close to the royal court said.
Dozens of princes and cousins from powerful branches of the Al Saud family want to see a change in the line of succession but would not act while King Salman – the crown prince’s 82-year-old father – is still alive, the sources said. They recognize that the king is unlikely to turn against his favorite son, known in the West as MbS.

The Saudi sources said U.S. officials had cooled on MbS not only because of his suspected role in the murder of Khashoggi. They are also rankled because the crown prince recently urged the Saudi defense ministry to explore alternative weapons supplies from Russia, the sources said.

In a letter dated May 15, seen by Reuters, the crown prince requested that the defense ministry “focus on purchasing weapon systems and equipment in the most pressing fields” and get training on them, including the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system.

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo personally delivered a roadmap to Saudi King Salman to help his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, insulate himself from the investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The Trump administration official hand-delivered the plan last month in Riyadh, exactly two weeks after Khashoggi’s brutal murder Oct. 2 inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, reported Middle East Eye.
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A senior Saudi source told the website the plan includes an option to blame the Washington Post columnist’s killing on an innocent member of the ruling al-Saud family to shield the crown prince and others at the top

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