National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi said on Monday that the road to normalizing ties with Saudi Arabia was "still long" while ministers ruled out concessions to Palestinians as part of any deal.
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US officials have sought for months to reach what would be a historic agreement that Netanyahu has said would be a huge step toward ending the Arab-Israeli conflict but that Riyadh has signaled would rest on Palestinian statehood.
US President Joe Biden in late July dispatched his national security adviser to Riyadh to discuss a possible deal, and on Friday said a rapprochement was "maybe underway."
Video: Gulf leaders arrive in Jeddah for C5 summit. Credit: Reuters
"I can identify with what the United States president said in an interview a few days ago, where he said that the road is still long but that he thinks there will be a possibility of progress," national security advisor Tzachi Hanegbi told the Israeli public broadcaster Kan, adding that Israel is not involved in the US-Saudi discussions.
"I can say that Israel will not give in to anything that will erode its security," he added. Asked whether this included Riyadh establishing a civilian nuclear program on its soil, he said that for that, Israel's consent was not needed.
"Dozens of countries operate projects with civilian nuclear cores, and with nuclear endeavors for energy, this is not something that endangers them nor their neighbors."
The idea of Israel and Saudi Arabia formally cementing ties has been under discussion since the Saudis gave their quiet assent to Gulf neighbors United Arab Emirates and Bahrain establishing ties with Israel in 2020.
"Israel is the closest it has ever been to a peace agreement with Saudi Arabia," Israel's Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said on the Channel 12 News Monday, adding that he expects a deal to be announced by next March before the November 2024 US elections.
But on Monday one minister in the government rejected any concessions toward the Palestinians as part of a pact. "We certainly won't agree to such a thing," National Missions Minister Orit Strock said. "We are done with withdrawals. We are done with freezing settlements in Judea and Samaria," Strock told Kan.
Though it was unclear whether Strock was speaking on behalf of her entire party, such a position would pose a political obstacle for Netanyahu, who has cast the normalization of ties with Saudi Arabia as a major foreign policy goal.
Her remarks were echoed by the head of another government member, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir who heads the far-Right Otzma Yehudit party. He told Army Radio that he has nothing against diplomatic deals with Arab countries.
"But if this deal includes concessions to the (Palestinian) Authority, handing over territory, arming the Authority or giving ... terrorists power then I surely object."
US-Israel ties have been strained in recent months by the government's expansion of Jewish settlements on land that the Palestinians seek for a state and by contentious judicial changes pursued by Netanyahu's nationalist-religious coalition.
Citing previous deals with Arab neighbors, foreign minister Cohen said the Israeli government's policies on the Palestinians were "not an obstacle to peace."
On Monday Israel Hayom reported that Israel would be willing to forgo any push to apply its sovereignty in Judea and Samaria for four years as a concession to help seal a normalization deal. Such a step was taken in 2020, when Israel agreed to halt the implementation of then-President Donald Trump's peace plan – which included a provision to extend Israeli sovereigntly to Jewish communities in Judea and Samria – in exchange for the signing of the Abraham Accords, a set of peace agreements with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan.
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