Since 2017, when Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salaman (MBS) was driven to madness, arresting any critical voice, Saad Al-Jabri, the former head of the Saudi Intelligence Service, has left the country after coming to terms with MBS’s betrayal. MBS later decided to impose a travel ban on his children and family members. However, his retaliatory measures did not end here.
According to a report in The Athletic, al-Jabri filed a lawsuit before a Canadian court, saying that a team known as the “Tiger Squad” was sent by MBS to kill him in Canada.
The paper said that Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the chairman of Newcastle United and LIV Golf, was added to the lawsuit for “having carried out the instructions” of MBS, with “the malicious intent” of “harming, silencing and ultimately destroying” the family of the country’s former intelligence chief Al-Jabri.
The documents sent to Al-Rumayyan this month ask the Canadian court for permission for Al-Rumayyan and others to not only be added to an existing court case, but for a new claim to be brought against them as well. The PIF and board member Mohammed Al Al-Sheik have also been listed as intended co-defendants in the legal papers. The Al-Jabri family is seeking $74 million in damages.
The case revolves around their involvement in a three-and-a-half-year campaign targeting the family of Al-Jbri, which reportedly included “wrongful kidnapping and detention” and embezzlement charges.
Omar and Sarah, two of Al-Jabri’s children, were detained by Saudi authorities in March 2020 from their Riyadh residences after being barred from leaving the country to finish their education in Boston, Massachusetts.
On November 4, 2020, a Saudi court found Omar Saad Al-Jabri guilty of financial crimes and plotting to leave the country illegally. He was sentenced to nine years in prison, and his sister to six and a half years. The court did not allow them to defend themselves.
According to family members who spoke to human rights organisations at the time, Omar and Sarah Al-Jabri were called to the office of a high-ranking official in the Presidency of State Security in March 2020, where they were under pressure to convince their family to return to Saudi Arabia.
Less than a week later, his children were taken into custody by Saudi security forces under the command of the same official in their Riyadh home, and they were held there for about ten months. The family Al-Jabri was unaware of their children’s whereabouts or incarceration during that time.
Notably, Al-Jabri maintains close ties with Western intelligence, particularly American intelligence. Tensions with MBS started in August 2019, when Al-Jabri filed a lawsuit claiming to have sent an “assassination squad” to kill the latter in Canada.
He stated in a TV interview: “A six-person Saudi team landed at Ottawa Airport.” He said they were carrying dubious DNA analysis equipment and had lied to customs about knowing each other, raising suspicions that they intended to get rid of him inside Canada after their attempts to entice him to “Saudi Arabia” failed. The six men were later deported.
Al-Jabri also revealed MBS’s attempts to seduce him over the past few years. The latter had threatened him in a letter, saying: “We will certainly reach you,” after failing in his repeated attempts to bring him back to “Saudi Arabia.”
Notably, MBS’s attempt to exact revenge on the Al-Jabri family has its roots in Al-Jabri’s long tenure as the former Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef’s assistant.
Al-Jabri also has strong ties with US, British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand intelligence services.
