Opinion

SAUDI JOURNALIST’S KILLING WILL BE ‘DOWNFALL’ OF CROWN PRINCE MOHAMMAD BIN SALMAN, FORMER CIA DIRECTOR SAYS

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman will pay the consequences for the death of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who vanished after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, earlier this month, former CIA director John Brennan said Wednesday.

“I have great confidence in my former colleagues at the CIA and the rest of the intelligence community to uncover what actually happened here. And although Donald Trump and others in the administration may try to cover it up in some way, it’s really going to be up to the congressional intelligence committees to demand immediate briefings from CIA and others about what we know and what MBS’s role was in that,” Brennan told MSNBC Wednesday morning. “So I don’t think, in fact, that MBS is going to get out of this predicament. In many respects, I think the Saudi government has to decide between Mohammed bin Salman and the U.S.-Saudi relationship, and the U.S. Saudi relationship has been fundamental to the kingdom for the last 85 years since its founding…. I think this is basically the downfall of Mohammed bin Salman.”

Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote a regular column for The Washington Post and was a U.S. resident, vanished on October 6 after entering the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to obtain documents for his upcoming wedding.