Saudi Arabia-Israel normalisation difficult but possible: Blinken

Establishing diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel is difficult but possible, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said, reasserting that Washington is pushing to normalise ties between the two countries.

Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City on Wednesday, the top United States diplomat said both Saudi Arabia and Israel are “interested” in the prospect of normalisation.Few Arabs states have recognised Israel – a key US ally in the region – since its establishment in 1948, but former US President Donald Trump’s administration helped secure agreements to forge formal relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco in 2020.Israeli leaders have said they are seeking to include Saudi Arabia in the normalisation deals.

For their part, Saudi officials have said Riyadh is sticking by the Arab Peace Initiative, which conditions normalisation with Israel on its withdrawal from Arab territories and the establishment of a Palestinian state, as well as finding a “fair solution” to the plight of Palestinian refugees.

As the Biden administration continued to encourage deeper ties between Israel and Arab states, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has raged on – with the right-wing Israeli government expanding illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank and intensifying violence against Palestinians.

US officials have voiced opposition to settlement-building while also stressing “ironclad” support for Israel. The US provides at least $3.4bn in aid to Israel annually.

On Wednesday, Blinken warned that unrest between Israelis and Palestinians makes it more difficult for Washington’s normalisation drive.

“We’ve told our friends and allies in Israel that if there’s a fire burning in their back yard, it’s going to be a lot tougher – if not impossible – to actually both deepen the existing agreements as well as to expand them to include potentially Saudi Arabia,” he said.

Blinken went on to suggest that settlement expansion is not in Israel’s interest.

“If Israel were to find itself – either by intent or by accident – responsible for the West Bank with three million Palestinians and 500,000-plus settlers, what is that going to mean in terms of the allocation of resources, including security resources, that Israel otherwise needs to be concerned about when it comes to Gaza, when it comes to Lebanon, when it comes to Iran?” Blinken asked.