Last Friday afternoon I went to the Belgian restaurant Brasserie Beck, a few blocks down the street from The Post. It was the place I had my last lunch with my friend and Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. I couldn’t hold back the tears.

That evening, The Post reported that the CIA had concluded with “high confidence” that Jamal’s Oct. 2 murder by Saudi agents in the kingdom’s consulate in Turkey was ordered by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the 33-year-old de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia.

There has been mounting evidence of the crown prince’s culpability. U.S. intelligence officials have said MBS, as the crown prince is called, plotted to lure Khashoggi from his home in Virginia back to Saudi Arabia to detain him. Close advisers to the crown prince, including the notorious Saud al-Qahtani, have been directly implicated in the murder. Analysts and officials from around the world have said that such an extensive operation could not have happened without the crown prince’s knowledge.