Israel has much to gain from an agreement with Saudi Arabia - opinion

The recent remarks by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) in a Fox News interview that “every day we are getting closer” to an agreement with Israel, which he called “the biggest historical deal since the end of the Cold War,” seem to reinforce the assessment that an agreement is no longer a question of if – but when. However, quite a few potholes remain to be filled first.

Saudi Arabia has traditionally implemented its foreign policy in measured steps. Looking back, one can identify six stages in the Kingdom’s relations with Israel. The first stage, at least since the 1990s, saw ties built clandestinely through the Mossad and the Saudi ambassador to Washington, Bandar bin Sultan, with Jewish leaders. 

The second phase consisted of indirect public diplomacy, as exemplified by the 2002 Saudi Peace Initiative (adopted by the Arab League and known since as the Arab Peace Initiative). It offered Arab recognition of Israel in exchange for the establishment of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, with east Jerusalem as its capital. Regrettably, Israel rejected the offer. 

The third phase began after the 2006 Second Lebanon War, with both sides identifying Iran and Hezbollah as common enemies and undertaking direct secret meetings to shore up their defenses against them. That same year, then-prime minister Ehud Olmert, accompanied by Mossad chief Meir Dagan, met in Jordan with Prince Bandar bin Sultan Al Saud (at that time head of the Saudi National Security Council). Dagan reportedly visited Saudi Arabia in 2010 – and all his successors appear to have done so, as well.

The fourth stage consisted of public diplomacy, including meetings between former military and intelligence officials from both sides who are known to represent incumbent officeholders, as well as positive mentions of Israel in the print and electronic media. 

Creeping public normalization measures ushered in the fifth stage. These included allowing Air India planes to fly over Saudi territory on their way to Israel and subsequently allowing Israeli passenger aircraft to overfly Saudi airspace – and Israeli athletes to compete in Saudi-hosted international tournaments, and more.

In the current sixth stage, Saudi Arabia has switched to overt official diplomacy, though not directly with Israel but through the United States. This stage is characterized by an unprecedented diplomatic offensive. In the Palestinian arena, for example, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and other senior officials have visited Riyadh in recent months to present their position on a possible agreement with Israel, and a non-resident Saudi ambassador was appointed to the PA and visited Ramallah.

In the global arena, Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farrakhan, together with the foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan, led an extraordinary meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly with the participation of no less than 50 foreign ministers, including from countries that do not recognize Israel such as Algeria, Kuwait, and Qatar. 

The event was aimed at promoting the two-state solution based on the Arab Peace Initiative and building a “peace package” that will be offered to Israel and the Palestinians. The diplomatic campaign also included MBS’s rare interview with an American network (Fox) and the participation of senior Israeli officials, including a government minister, in Saudi-hosted international conferences.

The Saudis link normalization to three issues. The first is an alliance with the US to ensure American protection against a possible Iranian attack. Israel should have no problem accepting such a demand, which would also strengthen Israeli-Saudi security ties. However, Israel has an interest in ensuring that the supply of advanced American weapons to Saudi Arabia does not erode its qualitative military edge in the region.

The second issue concerns the acquisition of nuclear capability for civilian purposes. Israel could accept this demand if Saudi Arabia complies with the terms of a nuclear agreement in force with the UAE, which precludes uranium enrichment capability. However, the Saudi insistence on permission to enrich uranium on its soil, where the mineral is found in relatively large quantities, could accelerate a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, which Israel should oppose.

The third issue concerns the Palestinian problem. MBS told Fox, “For us, the Palestinian issue is very important. We have to solve it,” adding that “we hope we can get to a point where Palestinian lives will be easier.” 

These and other statements appear deliberately vague in order not to antagonize Israel’s right-wing government. Yet, the Palestinians are said to be demanding the reopening of the American consulate in east Jerusalem and the PLO office in Washington, raising the level of Palestinian UN representation from observer to member, freezing the construction of new Israeli settlements, transferring territories from Area C (under total Israeli control) to Area B (under Palestinian civilian control), and more – demands which the current Israeli government would likely oppose.

Saudis are committed to solving the Palestinian problem

Despite the lack of clarity, Saudi Arabia has publicly committed to solving the Palestinian problem, as expressed by the Saudi Foreign Minister and the newly named ambassador to Palestine, who declared this week that his country is “working to establish a Palestinian state with east Jerusalem as its capital.” The Kingdom is thus seeking to present itself not only as the guardian of Islam’s holiest sites (in Mecca and Medina) but also as the guardian of the Palestinian cause. This public commitment may constrain negotiations with Israel.

Israel has much to gain from an agreement with the Saudis. First, an agreement with the Arab world’s most important state, which also plays a central role in the Islamic world, could serve as an impetus for other Arab and Muslim countries to follow its lead. Second, Israel could benefit from Saudi oil and in return provide Riyadh with advanced military and civilian technology. Israel might also reap a bonanza from the planned India-Middle East-Europe economic corridor through a rail network via Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Israel. The Saudi-Israel peace deal, as the Crown Prince himself admitted in his Fox Interview, will “position Israel as a player in the Middle East.”

However, the Saudi demands of the United States and Israel pose serious challenges for both the Biden Administration and the Israeli government. Many congressional Democrats oppose the Saudi demand for nuclear energy development and would reject any agreement that does not include significant concessions to the Palestinians. 

In Israel, defense experts strongly oppose handing the Saudis nuclear enrichment capacity, whereas hardline coalition members oppose any concessions to the Palestinians. 

Netanyahu could conceivably dismantle the governing coalition and establish one with members of the Knesset opposition more inclined toward a Saudi deal. Such a move, however, does not seem to be in the cards, given the stability of the current coalition and Netanyahu’s likely reluctance to share the glory of such a historic peace with his political rivals, namely Benny Gantz and/or Yair Lapid.

In articulating the benefits in store for Israel, Netanyahu attempts to downplay the importance of the Palestinian issue, telling the UN that the Palestinians must not be given “veto power over the peace processes with the Arab countries.” Thus, he ignores the dangers inherent in granting only symbolic concessions to the Palestinians while continuing Israel’s “creeping annexation” of the West Bank rather than moving toward a two-state solution. Prospects of any future solution to this festering problem are grim unless the Israeli-Saudi normalization is used to advance it. Failing to do so would allow the political right to celebrate the “peace for peace” formula expounded by the late prime minister Yitzhak Shamir, but in the long run, will prove to be a Pyrrhic victory.

The outcome of the American-mediated Israeli-Saudi saga is hard to predict. 

“We are on the cusp of a breakthrough – a historic agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia,” Netanyahu declared at the UN. For once, this is neither a Netanyahu spin nor fiction, but successful completion of this process requires political daring and wisdom, which are unfortunately rare commodities in Israeli politics.

The writer is a Mitvim Institute board member and teaches in the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is author of a book in Hebrew, From Mistress to Known Partner: Israel’s Secret Relations with States and Minorities in the Middle East, 1948-2020.