Washington: Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon revealed that the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt were planning to invade and occupy Qatar.
Bannon’s comments which only surfaced this weekend was made 10 months ago, during a meeting at Hudson Institute. Bannon had said US President Donald Trump’s summit with Arab leaders in Riyadh held in May discussed a plan to occupy Qatar.
Middle East Monitor has quoted Bannon as saying, “We went into the summit with UAE, Saudi Arabia and others; the number one thing was that we must take care of this financing of radical Islam, and there can be no more – as President Trump said – no more games.”
He recalled that two weeks after that summit, there was blockade by the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, Egypt and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on Qatar. He maintained that it was not a coincidence.
Bannon claimed that at the time of the summit he had information that Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt were ready to step in and carry out the plan.