Prince Bandar Bin Sultan was not shocked by his sacking, Saudi’s King Abdullah has been angry with Prince Bandar who implicated the Kingdom in several conflicts which in turn angered the US and embarrassed Saudi Arabia in front of the White House earlier in the year, Saudi sources have said.
The news site Asrararabiya quoted sources as saying that Prince Bandar had failed to deal with several regional issues, in particular the financial and military support he had provided to armed forces in Syria who, it transpired, were affiliated to Al-Qaeda.
“Bandar channelled generous funds to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant dubbed as Daash and AnNusra Front which seized large areas in Syria but failed to topple the regime of Bashar Al-Assad,” the sources said. Price Bandar’s complete failure on the Syrian front has strengthened Al-Qaeda and did not topple Al-Assad’s regime.
Prince Bandar has also failed to convince the US to launch a military strike against the Syrian regime last year, at a time when he convinced the King that he could influence Washington and put pressure on the White House and Congress and convince them to attack Al-Assad’s government. But, at the last minute, the US cancelled its planned strike under an agreement with the Russians, the regime’s main ally, ignoring Prince Bandar’s objection.
Prince Bandar’s list of failures spreads to other regional issue. Not only did the Prince fail on the Syria front, he also failed to curb the Iranian regional influence and to create frictions between Sunni and Shia Muslims that could hinder the Iranians’ ambitions.
More importantly, Prince Bandar supported the military coup in Egypt, a move that has been widely opposed in the Kingdom prompting at least two princes to openly announce their opposition to it. King Abdullah is said to have been angered with the financial costs the Kingdom had to endure to support the military coup in Egypt which is said to have topped what Saudi Arabia spends on its largest cities. Prince Bandar has been widely criticised in Saudi Arabia for financing the coup in Egypt while thousands of Saudis suffer from poverty.
According to a Saudi source, Prince Bandar held secret reconciliation agreements with the Houthis in Yemen channelling generous funds to them in order not to attack the Kingdom after the Saudi forces failed to repel their attacks and incursions in the south.
Prince Bandar has also failed to reinstall Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to power, a key ally of Saudi Arabia.