Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman said Wednesday that the Palestinian issue is "very important" in US-brokered talks of normalising ties with Israel.
"We need to solve that part," he stressed in an exclusive interview with Fox News.
The Crown Prince denied that the talks had been suspended. "Every day we get closer," he said in his first interview with a major American news network since 2019.
"If we have a breakthrough of reaching a deal that give the Palestinians their needs and make the region calm, we're going to work with whoever is there," he said, reiterating that he could not go into greater detail but that he wanted to see "a good life for the Palestinians."
He called the potential deal "the biggest historical deal since the end of the Cold War," which he stated would rest upon agreements related to the treatment of the Palestinians.
But he said the kingdom was seeking more progress on ensuring the rights of the Palestinians, adding that there had been "good negotiations" so far.
"We got to see where we go," he said. "We hope that will reach a place, that it will ease the life of the Palestinians, get Israel as a player in the Middle East."
On the current US-Saudi relations, Prince Mohammed Bin Salman said the kingdom has "great work" with US President Joe Biden at different aspects, describing him as "focused and well-prepared."
"We are working with President Biden on the big network between India, Saudi Arabia and Europe, we are working on peace arrangement between Israel and Palestine, we have the longest ceasefire in Yemen and there's a lot of good progress to creat a political solution, we have a lot of work on security and stability, and we are working on Ukraine, we have amazing work on techonology and 6G investment. So the agenda between Saudi Arabia and the US is very interesting today."
'World can't see another Hiroshima'
Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman said any country using a nuclear weapon means that it's launching a war against the rest of the world.
"The world can’t see another Hiroshima," he said. "If the world sees 100,000 people dead that mean you are in a war with the rest of the world."
"We are concerned about any country that gets nuclear weapons, that’s a bad move. It’s a useless effort to get a nuclear weapon because you can’t use it, if you use it, you are going to have a big fight with the rest of the world."
Asked what Saudi Arabia would do if Iran got nuclear weapons, the Crown Prince said: “If they get one, we have to get one. For security reason and for balancing power in Middle East. But we don’t want to see that.”
Supply and Demand
On the energy markets and the latest Saudi decision to cut oil production , Prince Mohammed Bin Salman defended the decision, saying the policy was purely guided by supply and demand.
He rejected that the move was taken to help Russia wage its war in Ukraine.
"In Saudi Arabia, we are just watching supply and demand. If there's a shortage of supply, our role in OPEC+ is to fill that shortage. If there is oversupply our role of OPEC+ is to measure that for the stability of the market," he said.
On Saudi Arabia's ties with Russia and Ukraine in an increasingly multipolar world, the Crown Prince said the kingodm strikes the right balance between both countries.
"We have good relations with Russia and also good relations with Ukraine. We have amazing trade between both countries. We are trying our best to resolve their problem," he said, noting that Saudi Arabia was among the countries that voted against the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
'Greatest success story'
Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman said the kingdom had witnessed terrorist attacks carried out by Al Qaeda of Osama bin Laden in 1990s.
"After that, killing Saudis and foreign people at that time in Saudi Arabia, he's our enemy and he's the American enemy," he stressed.
The Crown Prince was also asked about the recent splurge on sport and particularly football in the kingdom and the 'sports washing' description in western press reports.
"If sports washing increases my GDP by one per cent, then I will continue doing sportswashing. I don't care with the term. Call it whatever you want," he said with a smile.
"If you want to diversify an economy, you have to work on all sectors: mining, infrastructure, tourism, transportation. If you want to have tourism, you have to develop your culture, entertainment and sport sectors. Tourism used to contribute 3% to our GDP. Today, it's 7%. Sport used to contribute 0.4%, today it's 1.5%. And in tourism, we are aiming at getting 100 million visits by 2030. Last year, we reached around 40 million visits."
Prince Mohammed Bin Salman described Saudi Arabia as the "greatest success story" in the 21st century.
"Saudi Arabia is so big, so I'm quite sure most any person on the world, directly or indirectly, you have something to do with Saudi Arabia," he said.
"We have the most ambitious projects in all sectors on the planet. This's the story of this century. You want to miss it or not, your call," he said.
