 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. Today I have Prabir who is an editor with NewsClick with me. We are going to talk about the issue in Saudi Arabia where many Prince and Ministers have been arrested by the Saudi Government in case of corruption. Prabir, what do you think about the present, what the New York Times calls as political earthquake and in relation with the political power consolidation by the Crown Prince? Where are the things heading to? Well it is very clear that this is a major consolidation of power by the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman who is really, who as you know the son of the current monarch. Now there has been of course questions like how shall we say active is the current monarch, he seems to have handed over all the power to bin Salman, his son. If you look at Saudi Arabian way the government runs, it is essentially a kind of a boardroom of all the princes, there are 4000 of them, large number. But the bulk of the power is handled by the ones who are the sons of the kings, who have been the past kings or the current king. It is also peculiar that in Saudi Arabia it does not go by the first born, it in fact has happened that Al Saud's sons, one after the other, have serially inherited the Crown. So it goes from brother to brother as well. That also puts many more claimants to the throne in place. This time what has happened is that the bin Salman's becoming the Crown Prince number two initially, then Crown Prince number one meant that he removed all his competition as it were, who could have been the successor to King Salman. So that was what he was doing right in the beginning that first I think Bukkeen was the Crown Prince number one, then bin Naif became the Crown Prince number one, both of them have been removed in the past and now bin Salman is the Crown Prince. In this crackdown, it seems that all those who wield power as a part of the governing body of the Saudi Arabian state, who own a lot of other wealth, in fact Talal, who is the one who has been put in, now has been arrested for corruption. He is supposed to be one of the wealthiest men in the world. He is among the 50 billionaires that the world has at the moment. He has investment in city group, he has investments in various other things. So this is a huge issue. By the way bin Laden, again a very powerful figure in Saudi Arabia because he owns the construction companies and if you remember this is the same family from which Osama bin Laden came. He has also been arrested. There is also the son of the earlier Crown Prince, Mookin's son, who has died in a helicopter crash coincidentally at the same time. So all of this seems to indicate a huge upheaval going around in Saudi Arabia and it seems that bin Salman has consolidated his power enormously. All potential claimers to the throne, all other power centers have seemed to have been systematically dismantled and they have been either charged with corruption or been removed from the powers that they wielded. This is the first time Abdullah's all his children are now completely out of power. So this is quite a major reshuffle if you will of the Saudi Arabian power centers and definitely undisputed power center now is being bin Salman. It's also important to note that bin Salman's war in Yemen is going nowhere. Saudi Arabia seems to be deeply in a morass over there and just a few days back the Houthis have even fired another missile at the Saudi Arabian airport. So we do see that by no means are the Houthis down and out. Yemen war continues. Al Qaeda has made gains over there. So if extremism was a challenge, they certainly have gained ground in Yemen as a consequence of Saudi Arabia's focus being on the Houthis. So all of this seems to indicate on one hand that the Saudi balance of power may have shifted to bin Salman but at the same time it's an unstable base because Saudi Arabia faces currency crunch, a huge bleeding because of the war in Yemen, a loss of credibility because they're getting nowhere in that war. Syria, the misadventure has failed clearly. So all of this means that because there is more instability in Saudi Arabia, therefore also the reshuffle of this kind which is essentially a palace queue and throwing all other claimants to power out of the power centers they occupy. So I think it's a major internal, shall we say, change in Saudi Arabia from a more collegiate meaning, collegial in the sense of princes, not all 4,000 of them, but definitely 100, 200 of them wielding subsidiary power as it were, to a situation where you have an undisputed soul power center which is the current crown prince. So I think this is a very significant change but to me it's also the recognition that this unstable equilibrium within which these changes have taken place. I think it also indicates long term instability for the Saudi Arabian monarchy. Prabir, the whole process of power consolidation by Bin Salman, how do you think that this will affect the global and the regional political dynamics? Well, the other part of this equation is the external equation Saudi Arabia has been building and far more openly than erstwhile. So the alliance with Israel seems to be relatively now in the open. Senior Saudi princes have visited incognito Israel, though the Saudi Arabians have not talking about it. Israel has been crowing over this that we have a complete realignment with Saudi Arabia. This is the new axis Israel, Saudi Arabia versus Iran. So that is one part of it. This seems to be a kind of open alliance with Israel and the United States. To counter what they call Iran. Now, as you know Iran was not a major player till they started all their attempts to do regime changes. So it was US regime change in Iraq first, attempted regime change in Syria. That seems to have strengthened those forces who have now aligned with Iran. So on one hand you have this strengthening of shall we say an Iran, Assad, Syrian government and Lebanon, Hezbollah alliance taking shape, Russia being an intervener in Syria to help the Assad government. So strengthening of this side on the other hand Saudi Arabia weakened because it's coming out openly in alliance with Israel, which on the ground in the Arab world is not going to be acceptable. So this is where Saudi Arabia has actually weakened considerably. Now the target also seems to be Lebanon and Hezbollah. Now this is much more of an Israeli target than a Saudi Arabian one. Saudi Arabia has always been influential in Lebanese politics by supporting the Sunni groups as it were. It's a confessional state. So the Sunnis hold the prime ministership, the Christians hold the presidency and the speaker of the parliament is a Shia. So this is the confessional state that exists in Lebanon and Saudi Arabian influence has always been on the side of first Rafiq Hariri and now on Saad Hariri. Saad Hariri who has just resigned. It's interesting that he's resigned from his prime ministership as you know. Saad Hariri is a Saudi Arabian citizen as well. He has dual citizenship. He did not resign in Lebanon. He resigned in Saudi Arabia. So the argument is why would a Lebanese prime minister resign in Saudi Arabia? Was it done under coercion? Did the Saudi Arabians press him to resign? Is he also part of being arrested like the Saudi princes? So there are conflicting reports though he has tweeted that he's not been arrested. That he's also part of the corruption and he's also under investigation by the crown prince. So this is a part of the mix. We'll have to see how it plays out. But very clearly for Israel, Lebanon and Hezbollah are the most important pieces of the puzzle. And the fact that Saad Hariri has resigned clearly at the instance of Saudi Arabia also means that this could be a part of a bigger game plan in action which might lead to either further instabilities in Lebanon. Saad Hariri has to be replaced by somebody else or it could mean renewed hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah. With Israel trying to military again, trying to attack Hezbollah. This is the possibility that exists in Lebanon. It's also interesting what the president of Lebanon Ahun has said. He has said he does not recognize a resignation by a prime minister in Saudi Arabia. He should come to Lebanon in order for his resignation to be accepted. So we'll have to see how that plays out. But clearly Saudi Arabians have weakened in West Asia and Iran, Hezbollah and Syria. The Syrian government of Assad has gained ground and so has Russia. So it does seem to indicate weakening of the Israeli, Saudi Arabia and the United States axis in which Saudi Arabia is always not such a public figure as it is now. Thank you Prabir for talking to NewsClick. Thank you for watching NewsClicks. Please log into our website www.newsclick.net.