Trump says Saudi Arabia is 'disintegrating'

Saudi Arabia is “disintegrating”, US President Donald Trump said in an interview released on Friday, which is likely to offend the kingdom, as it suffers missile and drone strikes from Yemen’s Houthis. Trump passed judgment on Saudi Arabia, one of the US’s closest allies, in an interview with Stephen A Smith, boasting he could destroy Iran in three days by attacking civilian infrastructure but that Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have asked him not to because of their own weaknesses. “If I want to take them out, I hit their [energy] in one day. Their energy is gone. In one day, their bridges are gone, and in one day, their manufacturing capability is gone. It would only take me three days, one day each,” Trump said. "Saudi Arabia has asked me to please just let it be the way it is now for a while because they're disintegrating," Trump said. "Qatar, if you look at that, Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, all of them would much prefer the waiting period,” he added. This is not the first time Trump has appeared to enjoy bragging about the leverage he has over Gulf states and, particularly, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Saudi Arabia has relied on the US as its security guarantor since WWII. “He (MBS) didn’t think this was going to happen… he didn’t think he’d be kissing my ass… he thought it’d be just another American president that was a loser… but now he has to be nice to me,” Trump said in March, when the war on Iran was in full swing. Read more: Trump says Saudi Arabia is 'disintegrating' Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman during a meeting in Cairo, on 15 September 2026 (Egyptian presidency/AFP)