Two crown princes, MBZ and his junior partner MBS, have long wielded great power and unfathomable amounts of money to forge their states as new powers in the Middle East. But to execute on their ambitions, they needed partners—which they found in the wildly ambitious son-in-law of President Donald J. Trump, Jared Kushner; notorious former Blackwater CEO Erik Prince, who was gathering mercenary armies for rent; and a former CIA assassin, among other allies.

At the heart of this shocking story is a tenuous relationship with Israel to confront Iran and marginalize Palestine, and secrets the conspirators want to remain hidden, including bank accounts for Kushner’s use to advance his own agenda in the Middle East. The actions of MBZ and MBS have already resulted in a trail of disparate wreckage, both domestically and globally, encompassing interference in US presidential elections, Israel’s war of annihilation in Gaza, and the Israeli-US war with Iran. These consequences beg the question: Did the president himself know what was happening in his own White House?

Impeccably reported in his signature “searing and unvarnished” (Jeremy Scahill, New York Times bestselling author) voice, Matthew Cole reveals these secret and dangerous relationships and the damage they have wrought to our democracy, providing an urgent and startling understanding of our recent history and foreign policy.