Gulf News

Mohammad names ‘Triangle of Evil’

‘IRAN, THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOO­D AND TERRORISTS ARE A THREAT’

- BY HABIB TOUMI Bureau Chief

The Muslim Brotherhoo­d want to use the democratic system to rule countries and build shadow caliphates. Then they would transform into a real Muslim empire.”

Mohammad Bin Salman |

Saudi Crown Prince

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman has lashed out at the Triangle of Evil — the Iranian regime, the Muslim Brotherhoo­d and terrorists — in an interview with a US magazine.

“First in the triangle we have the Iranian regime that wants to spread their extremist Shiite ideology. They believe that if they spread it, the hidden Imam will come back again and he will rule the whole world from Iran and spread Islam even to America. They’ve said this every day since the Iranian revolution in 1979. It’s in their law and they’re proving it by their own actions,” Prince Mohammad told The Atlantic magazine in an interview published on Monday.

“The second part of the triangle is the Muslim Brotherhoo­d, which is another extremist organisati­on. They want to use the democratic system to rule countries and build shadow caliphates everywhere. Then they would transform into a real Muslim empire.”

Terrorists

The third part of the triangle is the terrorists from Al Qaida and Daesh who want to do everything using force, he said, stressing that their leaders “were all Muslim Brotherhoo­d first.”

“This triangle is promoting an idea that God and Islam are not asking us to promote. Their idea is totally against the principles of the United Nations, and the idea of different nations having laws that represent their needs.”

“Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait, UAE, Yemen — all of these countries are defending the idea that independen­t nations should focus on their own interests, in building good relations on the foundation of UN principles. The evil triangle doesn’t want to do that.”

The crown prince said that he challenged anyone to bring any evidence that the Saudi government financed terrorist groups.

“Yes, there are people from Saudi Arabia who financed terrorist groups. This is against Saudi law. We have a lot of people in jail now, not only for financing terrorist groups, but even for supporting them.”

“One of the reasons we have a problem with Qatar is that we are not allowing them to use the financial system between us to collect money from Saudis and give it to extremist organisati­ons.”

A peace agreement

On the issue of Palestine, Mohammad said: “I believe the Palestinia­ns and the Israelis have the right to have their own land. But we have to have a peace agreement to assure the stability for everyone and to have normal relations. We have religious concerns about the fate of the holy mosque in Jerusalem and about the rights of the Palestinia­n people.”

“Our country doesn’t have a problem with Jews. Our Prophet Mohammad married a Jewish woman. Not just a friend — he married her. Our prophet, his neighbours were Jewish. You will find a lot of Jews in Saudi Arabia coming from America, coming from Europe. There are no problems between Christians and Muslims and Jews.”

Should there be peace in the region, “there would be a lot of interest between Israel and the Gulf Cooperatio­n Council countries and countries like Egypt and Jordan,” he said since “there are a lot of interests we share with Israel.”

Yesterday, the Saudi Press Agency released this statement: “The kingdom stresses its steadfast position towards the Palestinia­n issue and the legitimate rights of the Palestinia­n people to an independen­t state with Jerusalem as its capital.”

King Salman also emphasised the need to advance the peace process in a phone call with US President Donald Trump on Monday night.

Women paid same as men

Prince Mohammad also said that he supported women, who represente­d half of the Saudi society. “In our religion there is no difference between men and women. There are duties to men and duties to women. There are different forms of equality. In the Saudi government women are paid exactly like men. We have regulation­s like this that are going into the private sector. We don’t want divided treatment for different people,” he said.

However, he cautioned against decisions that could divide society.

“There are a lot of conservati­ve families in Saudi Arabia. Some families like to have authority over their members, and some women don’t want the control of the men. There are families where this is okay. There are families that are open and giving women and daughters what they want.”

“Saudis don’t want to lose their identity but we want to be part of the global culture. We want to merge our culture with global identity.”

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