US President Donald Trump has been talking highly of the prospects of Saudi Arabia agreeing to normalize ties with Israel, but it is unlikely to happen when Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visits the White House next week.
The establishment of diplomatic relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia after decades of enmity could shake up the political and security landscape in the Middle East, potentially strengthening US influence in the region.
Trump last month said he hoped Saudi Arabia would “very soon” join other Muslim countries that signed the 2020 Abraham Accords normalizing ties with Israel.
Riyadh has signaled to Washington through diplomatic channels that its position has not changed: it would sign up only if there is agreement on a roadmap to Palestinian statehood, two Gulf sources said.
The intention is to avoid diplomatic missteps and ensure alignment of the Saudi and US positions before any public statements are made, they said. One said the aim was to avoid any confusion at or after the White House talks on Tuesday next week.
CREDIBLE PATHWAY
The crown prince “is not likely to entertain any possible formalizing of ties in the near future without at least a credible pathway to a Palestinian state,” said Jonathan Panikoff, former deputy US national intelligence officer on the Middle East.
Bin Salman is likely to try to use his influence with Trump to seek “more explicit and vocal buy-in for the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state,” said Panikoff, now an analyst for the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington.
Next week’s visit is bin Salman’s first to Washington since the 2018 killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a critic of bin Salman whose murder in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul caused global outrage. Bin Salman denied direct involvement.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Morocco have already normalized ties with Israel under the Abraham Accords, and Trump has said he expects an expansion of the accords soon.
“We have a lot of people joining now the Abraham Accords, and hopefully we’re going to get Saudi Arabia very soon,” he said on Wednesday last week, without offering a timeline.
In an interview on Oct. 17, Trump said: “I hope to see Saudi Arabia go in, and I hope to see others go in. I think when Saudi Arabia goes in, everybody goes in.”
The agreement signed by the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco sidestepped the issue of Palestinian statehood.
The two Gulf sources said Riyadh had signalled to Washington that any move to recognize Israel must be part of a new framework, not just an extension of any deal.
For Saudi Arabia — the birthplace of Islam and custodian of its two holiest sites, Mecca and Medina — recognizing Israel would be more than just a diplomatic milestone. It is a deeply sensitive national security issue tied to resolving one of the region’s oldest and most intractable conflicts.
Such a step would be hard to take when public Arab mistrust of Israel remains high over the scale of its military offensive during the war against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza, despite a fragile ceasefire in the conflict that followed the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs official Manal Radwan has called for a clear, time-bound Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the deployment of an international protection force and the empowerment and return of the Palestinian Authority to Gaza.
These steps are essential to the establishment of a Palestinian state, she said — the prerequisite for regional integration and the implementation of the two-state solution.
CONCESSIONS
With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu staunchly opposed to Palestinian statehood, Saudi Arabia sees no immediate prospect to satisfy Trump’s demand that it normalize ties with Israel, the sources told Reuters.
Progress on that front depends on concessions neither Washington nor Israel is prepared to make, Saudi officials say.
Saudi officials are intent on steering the Trump-bin Salman meeting towards defense cooperation and investment, wary that the politically charged issue of normalization of ties with Israel could overshadow the agenda.
The meeting is expected to seal a pivotal defense pact defining the scope of US military protection for the de facto ruler of the world’s top oil exporter, and to cement the US’ military footprint in the Gulf.
However, the prospective deal has been scaled back.
Two other Gulf sources and three Western diplomats said the defense deal falls short of the full, US Congress-ratified treaty Riyadh once sought in exchange for the long-promised normalization of ties with Israel.
The agreement, loosely modeled on an arrangement with Qatar that was established through an executive order in September, expands cooperation to include cutting-edge technology and defense.
Riyadh pushed for provisions to allow future US administrations to elevate the pact to a full treaty — a safeguard to ensure continuity for a non-binding pact, vulnerable to reversal by future presidents, according to the two Gulf sources.
“It’s not the treaty they want, they might not see it as perfect but it’s a stepping stone [to a full treaty],” said David Makovsky, a fellow at the Washington Institute, where he directs a project on Arab-Israeli relations.
The linkage between the defense pact, normalization with Israel and Palestinian statehood has produced a complex negotiating equation, pushing Riyadh and Washington to settle for a limited defense deal in the absence of progress on the other two tracks, the Gulf sources and Western diplomats said.
That compromise, they say, could eventually evolve into a full treaty if normalization advances.
DASHED HOPES
“The Saudi-American negotiations have undergone a fundamental shift in environment and context following the developments in Gaza since Oct. 7,” said Abdulaziz Sager, head of the Saudi-based Gulf Research Institute think tank.
The direct linkage between normalization of ties with Israel and Palestinian statehood remained, but Riyadh wanted Saudi national security requirements addressed separately, he said.
“The Saudi position is clear: Meeting the Kingdom’s national security demands will help shape its broader stance on regional issues, including the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict,” he added.
A NATO-style defense pact appears a distant prospect, given the shifting regional calculus and the political hurdles in Washington.
Iran, the main threat once driving Riyadh’s pursuit of binding US guarantees, has been strategically weakened over the past year by Israeli strikes on its nuclear and military infrastructure.
Tehran’s proxies — the Hezbollah movement in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and the Houthis in Yemen — have suffered heavy blows.
With pressure from Iran easing, the appetite for a treaty requiring two-thirds congressional approval has diminished, especially in the absence of normalization with Israel.
Such a pact would likely come with conditions, including curbs on Saudi Arabia’s expanding economic and technology ties with China, complicating Riyadh’s drive to balance strategic autonomy with US security guarantees, the two Gulf sources said.
The deal would expand joint military exercises, deepen cooperation between US and Saudi defense firms, and include safeguards to limit Riyadh’s military-industrial ties with China, the sources said.
It would also fast-track advanced US weapons sales to the kingdom, bypassing delays and political hurdles that have stalled previous deals.
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