Saudi-Iran in new row over ‘Hitler’ remark
RIYADH, Nov 25 (AFP) - Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has denounced Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as the “new Hitler of the Middle East”, as tensions simmer between the regional rivals.
Saudi Arabia and Iran have engaged in a bitter war of words after a missile fired from Yemen was intercepted near Riyadh airport on November 4. The missile was claimed by Yemen's Tehran-backed Huthi rebels.
Iran's “supreme leader is the new Hitler of the Middle East”, Prince Mohammed told The New York Times in an interview published Thursday.
“We learned from Europe that appeasement doesn't work. We don't want the new Hitler in Iran to repeat what happened in Europe in the Middle East.” Tehran has strongly denied supplying any missiles to the rebels, and President Hassan Rouhani has warned Saudi Arabia of Iran's “might”. Iran's foreign ministry spokesman reacted scathingly to the interview, comparing Prince Mohammed to “a dictator” and urging him to “reflect on the fate” of some leaders in the Middle East in recent years.
“The immature, unpredictable and senseless behaviour and remarks by the Saudi crown prince result in no one in the world giving the slightest credit to comments of this kind,” spokesman Bahram Ghassemi said in a statement.
“Errors due to the adventurism of the Saudi crown prince -- the latest being the scandal of (Saudi) interference in