The assassination of the martyr Soleimani and the following US contact with the Saudis drew attention again to a report published by the New York Times in November 2018, which mentioned names of people who also had relations with the UAE who had held meetings with bin Salman.

The New York Times consulted at that time in the United States with (George Nader), advisor to the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and the Lebanese-American businessman, and (Joel Zamel), a Zionist who has close ties to the intelligence and security apparatus of the Zionist entity.

The newspaper said that the consultations and talks took place a year before the assassination of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate building in Istanbul, Turkey (October 2018), when Muhammad bin Salman was the crown prince and defense minister in Saudi Arabia.

The New York Times quoted sources as saying that senior Saudi intelligence officials and a number of people close to bin Salman had sought help from security companies to discuss the possibility of using them to assassinate their enemies in Iran.

According to these sources, the small circle around bin Salman, discussed the plan to assassinate its enemies, including the martyr Soleimani. In this regard, they ordered intelligence operations and military activities to consolidate the foundations of bin Salman's rule