Fourth Saudi Prince detained by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

At least four Saudi princes have been trapped in a wave of detentions ordered by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a person close to the royal family said on Saturday.

Prince Nayef bin Ahmed, who held senior military posts, was arrested on Friday along with at least three other senior officials from the royal family. The full extent of the roundup remains unclear.

Analysts following the royal family said on Saturday that the latest wave of arrests has raised questions about whether Crown Prince Mohammed will soon seek formal takeover from his aging father, 84-year-old King Salman.

Others have suggested that the crown prince, who established himself as the de facto ruler of the kingdom on behalf of his father, was worried about discontent within the royal family as the fall of the Oil prices weighed on the country's budget and economy. They say he may have ordered the roundup in part because he feared a contestation of his power.

Prince Nayef has held posts in the Interior Ministry and in the military and once led the military’s intelligence services, according to a Saudi military site. However, he did not appear to hold office in government at the time of his detention.

He was detained with his father, Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz, who is the king's last full brother.

Crown Prince Mohammed, 34, has taken stock of daring and ruthless movements with few precedents in the modern history of the kingdom. He led a five-year military intervention in Yemen that created one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the world without any sign of victory.

He also suppressed the privilege and influence of his own sprawling royal family in order to tighten his own grip on the kingdom, notably by detaining hundreds of wealthy princes and businessmen in a Ritz-Carlton hotel. He has turned into a prison. He demanded that they hand over large sums of their wealth as part of what he described as a crackdown on corruption.

Outside of Saudi Arabia, the prince is best known for his association with the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, dissident and press columnist, by Saudi agents at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.

But even for Prince Mohammed, the detention of his uncle, Prince Ahmed, surprised many analysts.

It is surprising that he takes action on Prince Ahmed while the authority of the kings is still there, said Kristin Smith Diwan, a scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.

The recent spate of arrests has sparked fear in the family and raised questions about the king's status, three people close to the family said on Saturday.

The king has been pictured in recent days during a meeting with the visiting British foreign minister. A doctor linked to the Saudi hospital who treats many members of the royal family said that the hospital had not been informed that the king was sick.

Prince Ahmed had appeared for a short time in the fall of 2018 as a potential rival to the crown prince. But Prince Ahmed quickly disavowed such ideas and his status as a full-fledged brother to the king has so far appeared to grant him some immunity from the wrath of his nephew, Crown Prince Mohammed.

He was nonetheless arrested on Friday, a few days after returning from a hawk hunting trip abroad. His son Prince Nayef bin Ahmed was with him at the time, a family member said on Saturday.

Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, former crown prince and former interior minister who had close ties to American intelligence agencies, was also arrested. He has actually been under house arrest since his expulsion from his previous posts by the current Crown Prince in 2017.

His younger brother, Prince Nawaf bin Nayef, was also taken away by security agents. Prince Ahmed, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef and Prince Nawaf were all arrested on Friday, according to three people familiar with the matter.

It looks like MBS is eliminating all of its rivals, said Michael Stephens, an academic at the Royal United Services Institute, using the initials of the crown prince.

This is either the case that the king is on his deathbed, or MBS simply thinks it is the right time to bury the bad news, he added. But the problem is that after Khashoggi's murder, confidence in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is very weak and no one will believe the official account.