Ahead of US President Joe Biden's visit to Israel on Wednesday, former prime minister and Opposition Leader Benjamin Netanyahu pledged on Monday to establish "full peace agreements" with Saudi Arabia should he be elected prime minister again.
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"If I am once again elected by you to lead the State of Israel, I intend to sign a comprehensive peace treaty with Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations," he said, adding that doing so "will bring us closer to the end of the Arab-Israeli conflict."
Netanyahu said the Abraham Accords, signed during his term, "truly brought about a new Middle East."
He also thanked Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman "for his contribution to the four peace agreements we had forged."
According to foreign reports, Netanyahu and bin Salman have met on several occasions, at least one of them on Saudi soil. In November 2020, the two leaders met in the Saudi city of Neom on the Red Sea coast, together with then-US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-Mossad chief Yossi Cohen. The small Israeli delegation spent nearly four hours in Saudi Arabia and returned directly to Israel following the meeting.
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are very closely tied and generally, the UAE doesn't pursue significant diplomatic initiatives on the international stage without prior coordination with Saudi Arabia. Hence, even prior to Netanyahu's remarks Monday, the working assumption was that the Abraham Accords were only finalized after Riyadh had already given the "green light."
With that, Saudi Arabia itself still isn't ready for a full peace agreement with Israel, in large part due to opposition from King Salman, the father of the crown prince. The belief is that as long as King Salman is alive, his son, who supports normalization with Israel, will struggle to implement a peace accord. Therefore, at this juncture, the Saudis are expected to proceed with measured steps only, with the next step likely being opening their air space to Israeli airlines.
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