LONDON — No one has skewered the Saudi royal family as gleefully as Ghanem al-Masarir.

In hundreds of videos posted to YouTube — which have now been viewed more than 300 million times — Mr. al-Masarir sits at a desk, usually at his home in North London, offers a jovial greeting in Arabic, then launches into a series of embarrassing Saudi-related stories. The tone is sharply satirical, the delivery a bit hammy.

One of his favorite targets is Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi crown prince, whom he long ago tagged with a nickname, now widely used by detractors, that translates to “the bear that has gone astray.” As mild as this may sound to Western ears, calling someone a bear in the Middle East is tantamount to calling him fat and ugly, and “astray” in this context means immoral, corrupt, essentially a gangster.

[Related: Three senior members of the Saudi royal family are arrested.]

“There are academics in prison in Saudi Arabia for criticizing policy, and they haven’t even mentioned leaders by name,” said Madawi al-Rasheed, a visiting professor at the London School of Economics. “So imagine what they think of Ghanem.”

By now, it seems pretty clear.



In October 2018, Mr. al-Masarir says, the British police visited his home to deliver an official warning about a threat to his life. They left him with a “panic button” system, attached through his phone line, that summons the authorities when activated, but they offered no specifics about the source of the threat.