James Hewitt Shares Views on Prince William and Prince Harry’s Rift

Princess Diana would have been “concerned” about the rift between her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, according to her former love interest.

James Hewitt, who had an affair with Diana during her marriage to the future King Charles, appeared on Good Morning Britain on Feb. 25, where he was asked about the ongoing tension between the Prince of Wales, 42, and the Duke of Sussex, 40.

Host Richard Madeley said, “Any mother would be grief-stricken over the separation we’ve seen between Harry and Wills. Do you think she would have been able to make a rapprochement possible?”

Hewitt responded, “I think any mother would be worried and concerned about such a rift, as you put it. And she’d do her best to try and get them together.”

Hewitt, a British Army officer who met Diana at a party and offered to give her horseback riding lessons, joined the morning show to discuss his work with Operation Safedrop delivering humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

The schism between Prince William and Prince Harry reportedly began in 2016 when William expressed concerns about how quickly Harry’s relationship with Meghan Markle was moving. The conflict became public in 2020 when Prince Harry and Meghan announced their decision to step back from their royal roles, relocating to her home state of California later that year.

In the years since, the brothers have reunited only a handful of times, last presenting a united front with their wives when they met mourners outside Windsor Castle after Queen Elizabeth’s death in September 2022. They were recently together at a memorial service for their uncle Lord Robert Fellowes in August, but they reportedly avoided one another.

Sources exclusively told PEOPLE in 2024 that Prince Harry’s calls and letters to his father, King Charles, go unanswered, and his attempts to connect with Prince William are also ignored. The rift between the brothers is “very bad,” said a royal insider, but it’s not “irreparable.”

Prince Harry previously spoke about how his mother would feel about the tension with his brother, saying in 2023 that Diana would be “sad.”

“I think she would be looking at it long term to know that there are certain things we need to go through to be able to heal the relationship,” the Duke of Sussex continued.

Jason Knauf, a former royal aide to both brothers, recently gave an interview with 60 Minutes Australia where he discussed the ongoing royal family feud.

“It’s very difficult to have this stuff play out in the public eye, but [William]’s chosen to keep his thoughts on it private, and I think all of us who know him really have to respect that we should do the same,” Knauf said. “But I will say, of course, it’s been hard and sad, especially for all of us who know both of them.”

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Of Harry and Meghan, Knauf said, “I worked really closely with the two of them, and we had lots of great times.”