Saudi crown prince likens Iran’s leader to Hitler and warns against appeasement

SAUDI ARABIA’S crown prince has called Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei “the new Hitler of the Middle East” and warned that, as in European history, “appeasement doesn’t work”.

In his first comments since a widespread anti-corruption purge, Mohammed bin Salman made his strongest criticism yet of Saudi Arabia’s regional arch-rival.

“We don’t want the new Hitler in Iran to repeat what happened in Europe in the Middle East,” bin Salman, known by his initials MBS, told The New York Times in an interview. The 32-year-old prince has positioned himself at the forefront of an economic and social upheaval in Saudi Arabia.

But he has been criticised over the human costs of the intervention he has led in Yemen, seen as a proxy for the country’s conflict with Iran.

Oxfam claim that a further eight million people will be without running water due to fuel shortages arising from the Saudi-led blockade on the country’s northern ports. The coalition has given the UN permission to resume flights of aid workers to the Houthicontrolled capital from today, but not to dock ships loaded with wheat and medical supplies.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman reacted scathingly to the interview, comparing bin Salman to “a dictator” and urging him to “reflect on the fate” of some leaders in the Middle East.

“The immature, unpredictable and senseless behaviour and remarks ... result in no one in the world giving the slightest credit to comments of this kind,” said Bahram Ghassemi.

“Errors due to the adventurism of the Saudi crown prince... have been the cause of great problems for Saudi Arabia’s traditional allies.”