Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday held secret talks in Saudi Arabia with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, media said, in the first reported trip by an Israeli prime minister to the kingdom.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who was in Israel last week, was also at the reported talks, a diplomatic correspondent at Israeli public broadcaster Kan said yesterday.
The broadcaster cited unnamed Israeli officials as saying that Netanyahu and the head of the Mossad spy agency, Yossi Cohen, “flew yesterday to Saudi Arabia and met Pompeo and MBS in the city of Neom,” referring to the often-used initials of Prince Mohammad.
Photo: Reuters
The reported meeting comes weeks after Israel agreed historic US-brokered deals to normalize ties with two Saudi allies in the Gulf — the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain — pacts known as the Abraham Accords.
Multiple other Israeli media outlets reported on a Netanyahu trip to Saudi Arabia, including prominent diplomatic correspondent Barak Ravid of Walla News and Axios, who reported Netanyahu and Cohen flew on a plane belonging to Israeli businessman Udi Angel.
Ravid also cited flight tracker data that apparently showed Angel’s plane leaving Israel at 8pm on Sunday, heading to Neom on the Red Sea and returning to Israel five hours later.
Netanyahu’s office was not immediately available to comment on the reports.
The Saudi royal court and media ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the reported meeting between the three.
Pompeo had traveled to Neom on Sunday from the UAE as part of a Middle East tour.
The Abraham Accords were brokered by US President Donald Trump’s administration. US and Israeli officials have repeatedly indicated that more Arab states were set to forge ties with Israel. Sudan has agreed to do so in principle. In late August, Netanyahu said Israel was holding secret talks with multiple Arab countries.
Publicly, Saudi Arabia has said it would stick to the decades-old Arab League position of not having ties with Israel until the Jewish state’s conflict with the Palestinians is resolved.
Israeli experts have raised questions about the prospects of expanding the Abraham Accords under US president-elect Joe Biden’s administration, particularly with respect to Saudi Arabia.
Trump’s administration downplayed the role of human rights in international diplomacy, and in particular was cautious about criticizing Saudi Arabia’s rights record, notably over the murder by Saudi agents of prominent journalist and Saudi royal critic Jamal Khashoggi.
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