Will a U.S. Nuclear Deal Push Saudi Arabia to Recognize Israel?

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Luke Vargas (0:17)

President Trump sends a landmark nuclear accord with Saudi Arabia to Congress. Plus, Darlene Graham wins a tight runoff in South Carolina, and it's the Super Bowl for AI investors as the world's most valuable company prepares to report earnings.

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Luke Vargas (0:48)

It's Wednesday, August 26th. I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM Edition of What's News. The top headlines and business stories moving your world today.

We are exclusively reporting that President Trump has sent his nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia to the US. Congress. Lawmakers there are expected to spend months debating the deal, which attempts to promote the US nuclear industry without sparking wider nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. Rawan Maayeh is a senior analyst for the Middle East and North Africa at Oxford Analytica. Rawan, I should say that journal reporters in DC say it's going to be hard for lawmakers to block this deal regardless of any misgivings they may have about it, since that would require a joint resolution and a two-thirds vote to override a potential Trump veto. However, I still think there's some value in looking at the open questions around this deal or at least two of them. The first being, is Saudi Arabia going to normalize relations with Israel? This is a condition that President Trump announced actually last month after the deal had been negotiated and signed. What are we hearing from the Saudis on that?

Rawan Maayeh (1:56)

I think first it's quite important to say that there was quite a bit of domestic US opposition to the deal once it was announced. And so once Trump came out with that condition, it felt more as if it was a knee-jerk reaction wanting to temper down that opposition. So that begs the question as to how far would the administration be willing to apply that condition? How stringently is it going to apply it? We've seen the administration try to, in a way, sell the deal by playing up the benefits to US companies, to US jobs. So that, for me, brings out the question of whether that condition will in fact be applied quite stringently or not. But we have to also bear in mind that Trump was not the first person to come up with this condition. So this idea of having a whole grand bargain between Saudi Arabia and the US, it goes back to the Biden administration at the time. They were discussing this idea of having a nuclear civil program, enhanced security guarantees from the US, access to US technology, and Saudi Arabia in return would move towards normalization with Israel. But even then, it would also be contingent on Israel moving down, taking steps towards an irreversible path to a Palestinian state.

Obviously, since then, the circumstances in the region have changed fundamentally. The Gaza war has suspended progress on normalization talks. Israeli actions in the region, be it in Lebanon or Syria, the attack on Doha in particular in September last year. Saudi Arabia since then has really recalibrated, or it thinks differently about security in the region, where the sources of threats and risks are.

With Israel sitting alongside potentially Iran as to where those threats lie. Since then, Saudi Arabia has really adopted a very different approach in how it seeks to uphold its security. We've seen it really broaden its regional partnerships, deepen its defense agreements with different partners. The recently declared Mecca agreement with Turkey and Pakistan, these are two states whose relationship with Israel are not necessarily good either.

Luke Vargas (3:46)

So, it wouldn't necessarily be pushed into making a deal here out of necessity?

Rawan Maayeh (3:50)

No, not necessarily at all. This is a country that has diverse and deep defense and security partnerships across the region. And so, Israel is not the only state that is sort of available for that sort of relationship. It's not going to go down the UAE path in terms of doubling down on ties with Israel.

Luke Vargas (4:05)

Rawan, let's switch to looking at another thing lawmakers will likely be considering, which is whether or not the Saudis receiving nuclear fuel making technology is then in turn going to encourage other countries in the region to want to go nuclear. Have we seen any evidence of that?