For months, Israel and Saudi Arabia have been quietly negotiating a deal that would normalize relations between the two nations. But they aren’t the only parties involved. Israel and Saudi Arabia both want formal security agreements with the United States as part of any agreement. In other words, if either of those two nations get attacked, the U.S. military would be required to intervene.
The Saudis also want to develop a nuclear power program, and they want U.S. assistance with that. But the biggest barrier to a deal was always going to be the Palestinians. The Saudis are insisting that any agreement must include major concessions from both the U.S. and the Israelis. And the Palestinians are publicly making it known that they will not accept any outcome that does not involve formal U.S. recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations. At one time, such a demand would have killed negotiations, but apparently the Biden administration is very open to making such a move.
In fact, on Friday National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told the press that “a basic framework” for an agreement has been “hammered out”…
“All sides have hammered out, I think, a basic framework for what, you know, what we might be able to drive at,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters.
“But, as in any complex arrangement, as this will inevitably be, everybody is going to have to do something. And everybody is going to have to compromise on some things,” Kirby said.
After all these years, the sort of Middle East peace agreement that we have been anticipating could actually come to fruition.
But the Palestinians must be willing to accept the deal, and right now they are playing hardball. It is being reported that the Palestinians are demanding the transfer of territory in the West Bank from Israel and “recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations” from the United States…
Will Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu be willing to give up the territory that the Palestinians are asking for? And will the Biden administration shock the world by formally recognizing a Palestinian state at the United Nations?
If those two things actually happen, it will have enormous implications for all of us.
A year ago, it seemed impossible that such a comprehensive agreement could happen before the next presidential election in the United States. But now leaders on all sides seem optimistic. For example, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman recently told Fox News that an agreement is getting “closer” with each passing day…
He said that his country was moving “closer” each day toward reaching a normalization deal with Israel, the first time he has publicly acknowledged the process.
“Every day we get closer” to reaching an agreement, the 38-year-old heir to the Saudi throne told Fox News in an interview that aired Wednesday. “It seems it’s for the first time a real one, serious. We’re gonna see how it goes.”
And during a speech to the UN General Assembly on September 22nd, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu definitely sounded like a man that is ready to make a deal…
In an address to the United Nations General Assembly on September 22, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was “at the cusp” of a transformative peace agreement with Saudi Arabia. “Such a peace will go a long way to ending the Arab-Israeli conflict,” said Netanyahu. “It will encourage other Arab states to normalize their relations with Israel. It will enhance the prospects of peace with the Palestinians. It will encourage a broader reconciliation between Judaism and Islam, between Jerusalem and Mecca, between the descendants of Isaac and the descendants of Ishmael.”
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