Saudi Arabia denies urging Trump to take military action against Iran

On the second day of the U.S. and Israel launching military strikes against Iran, The Washington Post published an article around 7 a.m. Beijing time on March 1. The report stated that U.S. intelligence agencies originally assessed that the U.S. did not need to take military action against Iran because Iran would not pose any direct threat to the U.S. mainland for decades. However, the paper cited four so-called “insiders” claiming that, under strong lobbying from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, President Trump ultimately decided to act against Iran. The report noted that when mentioning bin Salman, it described his and Netanyahu’s efforts to persuade Trump as “unusual,” and stated that bin Salman personally made “several phone calls.” However, Saudi officials later denied this account on February 2 Beijing time, stating they did not urge Trump to attack Iran. Fahad Nazer, spokesperson for the Saudi Embassy in the U.S., posted on the morning of the 2nd at 8 a.m. that Saudi Arabia has always supported reaching an agreement with Iran through diplomatic means, and that “in all our communications with the Trump administration, we have never lobbied the U.S. president to adopt a different policy.” The Saudi Embassy in the U.S. also reposted Nazer’s statement. (Global Times)