US President Joe Biden boards Air Force One before departing from King Abdulaziz International Airport in the Saudi city of Jeddah on July 16, 2022, at the end of his first tour in the Middle East as president. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN / AFP) (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)
BEIRUT — Despite reports swirling in the media that the White House is in discussions with Saudi Arabia about normalizing relations with Israel, both Washington and Riyadh have been careful to slow-roll the idea that any agreement is imminent.
To be sure, such a normalization would drastically alter the geopolitical dynamics of the region on a historic scale. But several experts and analysts expressed varying degrees of skepticism about what could come of negotiations — if anything — considering the obstacles still in the path to an agreement.
Among the challenges: the need to uphold Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge, the issue of Palestine and Saudi relations with Iran. Perhaps above all else, the biggest factor, some experts said, may be the Kingdom’s understanding that it holds the cards and can try to bleed the Biden administration, desperate for a big foreign policy win ahead of the presidential elections, for major American concessions.
Not much is yet known about the progress of negotiations and framework of prospective KSA-Israel normalization agreement, and this week White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the administration doesn’t “expect any imminent announcement… on the broader question of normalization.”
“There are a lot of elements to this,” he told reporters Tuesday. “We need to work through all of them, and we will do that… in as effective and systematic a way as we can. And… as and when we have more to report to you, we will report it.”
Before that, White House spokesperson John Kirby offered more caution.
“The reporting has left some people with the impression that the discussions are farther along and closer to some sense of certainty than they actually are,” Kirby said on Aug. 9, while assuring that there is “no agreed-to set of negotiations, there’s no agreed-to framework to codify normalization or any other security considerations.”
“I think it’s important to acknowledge that there doesn’t appear to be much ‘on the way’ other than an agreement to pursue an agreement,” Jonathan Lord, director of the Middle East security program at the Center for a New American Security, told Breaking Defense. “It’s been reported that to move forward, Riyadh is seeking security guarantees from Washington, along with the ability to purchase advanced weapons systems and to receive them in a timely fashion, and finally, a civilian nuclear energy program. This is a tall order, but may not be insurmountable if the administration can engage Congress proactively.”
CEO and founder of Gulf State Analytics, Giorgio Cafiero, was more skeptical.
“I don’t believe that under current circumstances Saudi Arabia would normalize with Israel. The nature of Israel’s government greatly contributes to my doubt. Riyadh is clear that Israel making concessions to the Palestinians would be necessary for the Kingdom to join the normalization camp, and the current Israeli government would not make such concessions,” Cafiero said, referencing the right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
David Des Roches, associate professor at the Near East South Asia Center for Security Studies, was also pessimistic, but suggested there may be a way to work towards a smaller agreement.
“I think the reports of Saudi interest should be taken as a maximalist opening gambit in what is likely to be a long series of negotiations, which will only begin in earnest once both President [Joe] Biden and King Salman [bin Abdulaziz Al Saud] have left the political scene,” Des Roches told Breaking Defense. “There is a lack of trust on both sides in this debate, and the type of concessions which the Kingdom will ask for are probably beyond the ability of the Biden administration to deliver.”
The Biden administration could seek some interim, smaller-scale deal through executive action, he said, before the US election in order to present a foreign policy win. But to get to that, the US would likely have to “overpay” in order to score a limited deal which can be portrayed as opening the door to normalization.
Israel’s Military Edge, Palestinian Problems And Iran
A key technical issue experts raised is Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge, a legally-required standard by the US Congress to ensure Israel is always ahead of the Gulf nations in terms of military technology. Given the Saudis are expected to ask for high-end weapons from the US, the QME could emerge as a practical problem for any deal.
“Any agreement with Saudi Arabia will need to be balanced against considerations of Israel’s qualitative military edge which would determine the type of defense deals that might be included in any such package,” said Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, a fellow for the Middle East at Rice University’s Baker Institute.
Kristian Alexander, a senior fellow and head of the Strategic Studies department at the TRENDS research and advisory think tank in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), said that the Saudis will likely seek access to advanced defense technologies, such as the F-35.
RELATED: What F-35 sales to the UAE mean
Lord also said to expect Saudi to seek THAAD or further Patriot procurements.
“It’s possible they have specific systems in mind, but their purpose is likely broader than that. The Saudis already fly F-15s, and continued maintenance and logistics support for those aircraft — provided through US foreign military sales — has been a divisive issue in Congress. FMS cases like that are critical to keeping the Saudi air force flying. Ostensibly, the Saudis shouldn’t face political obstacles in purchasing systems like THAAD or Patriot, since it’s the policy of both the Biden administration and the Congressional foreign affairs committees to green-light the sale of systems to the Saudis that are defensive in nature,” Lord said.
Whether Washington can, or wants to, balance Saudi Arabia’s thirst for high-tech weaponry with the mandated military advantage afforded to Israel remains to be seen.
“The track record here is not promising,” Des Roches said. “The Saudis have been assured of US support and preferential access to US weapons in the past, and have been disappointed. In both the Trump and Obama administration, the Saudis received assurances that their requests for weapons would be ‘fast tracked’ through the bureaucracy, only to find that the fast track is still too slow for them.”
And even if the US agrees to sell Saudi the weapons it wants, there are outstanding factors that mean the Saudis may not get them at the desired speed, said Lord.
“On the issue of security assistance, specifically, if Washington consents to selling Saudi Arabia the platforms it seeks, can the US defense industrial base deliver and deliver in a timely fashion? That’s a problem much broader than US-Saudi relations; it potentially implicates the DIB [defense industrial base], because already, it can’t seem to meet US and partner and ally demand for critical defense systems,” he said.
The experts were split on a wild card situation in which, after normalization, Saudi Arabia would buy high-tech arms directly from Israel. Breaking Defense has previously reported on apparent Saudi interest in Israeli systems.
Elsewhere, Des Roches noted that in addition to unilateral actions taken by the US, the Saudis will probably also insist on Israel making significant concessions on its governance of the Palestinians, most likely to include destruction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
“I can’t imagine Israel’s fractured coalition government having the ability or the interest to make these sort of concessions on a scale that would interest the Saudis. While the Kingdom is not a democracy, it is responsive to public opinion and would be unlikely to normalize relations with Israel while leaving the status of the Palestinians up to Netanyahu,” he said.
Meanwhile, another Middle Eastern rapprochement could complicate things further: the one between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
RELATED: ‘Devil in the details’: How the Saudi-Iran detente will (or won’t) affect defense in the region
Lord highlighted that Riyadh will do what it can to reduce tensions with Tehran, as it did when it announced the trilateral agreement with Beijing in March, but at the same time, will work quietly and diligently to build up the military capability to neutralize the military threat that Iran holds over its head.
“That will mean working with the US, possibly Israel, and certainly others too. Riyadh will work its relationship with Iran in parallel with its relationship with the US and Israel. From the Saudi perspective, those efforts are complementary for Saudi security and not at all in contradiction to each other,” Lord said.
But that will mean the Kingdom will be walking a diplomatic tightrope, according to Ulrichsen.
“The restoration of diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran is about the Saudi leadership’s desire to de-risk the regional landscape, and the Saudis are unlikely to take any step vis-à-vis normalization with Israel unless they feel assured it would not create instability that they really wish to avoid given the focus on domestic economic growth with Vision 2030 and the giga-projects,” Ulrichsen said.
Saudi Arabia’s ‘Uniquely Strong Position’
Even if the above-noted obstacles could be overcome, they’d likely present themselves alongside a not-so-subtle list of “requests” from Saudi Arabia beyond military tech, with the Kingdom emboldened by how the Biden administration likely sees the historic value of a deal facilitated on its watch, especially compared to the Trump-era Abraham Accords.
“The Abraham Accords are a big development on their own, but the progress made to date in normalization with Israel would be dwarfed by a Saudi recognition of Israel. Saudi Arabia understands that it is in a uniquely strong position as the only Arab state to not have experienced colonialism as well as the ruler of two of the holiest places in Islam,” Des Roches said.
He said that the United States would view a Saudi recognition of Israel as a “tipping point,” and expected that once the Kingdom recognized Israel, other Arab states who chose to not recognize Israel would be seen in the West as outliers and laggards on the wrong side of history.
Added Ulrichsen, “Normalization with Israel would be a game-changer for the entire region, not only the Gulf, if it happens.”
Hence, the Saudis are reportedly looking for major concessions. The biggest one, off the bat, may be a dealbreaker in and of itself: a security guarantee that the US would respond to defense Saudi against any attack.
“It is hard to see how any administration will make such an agreement,” Des Roches said of the Saudi interest in such guarantees, which was reported by The Wall Street Journal in March. “The Saudis are not stupid: they know that this sort of commitment can only be binding on the US through a treaty, but it is unlikely that the Biden administration will even submit such a treaty for ratification.”
Another potential issue, also reported by the Journal: the Saudis want help with a nuclear program, one described as civil but of which the nuclear community is concerned could lead to the Saudis developing a full-fledged nuclear weapons program, especially in light of the work the Saudis have reportedly done with ballistic missiles.
On Tuesday Sullivan declined to get into a discussion about Saudi Arabia’s interest in a civilian nuclear program, instead opting to “leave that where it belongs, which is in those diplomatic channels.”
Whatever the future holds, Cafiero said Saudi Arabia has many cards to play.
“Riyadh is trying to see how much the US would do for the Kingdom to entice Saudi Arabia into the Abraham Accords,” he said. “As I see it, the Saudi leadership is running circles around Biden.”
The Biden administration would surely disagree, and if the Saudis do actually normalize relations with Israel, it’ll be up to future historians to say who really came out on top.
“We also have an interest in a constructive, effective relationship and partnership with both Israel and Saudi Arabia — we, the United States, do — as we work on a range of mutual interests,” Sullivan said. “And so, you know, we see this both through the prism of our relationship with each country, their relationship with each other, and the relationship of a peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia to the larger cause of regional stability.
“And so, from our perspective, it is worthy to pursue this objective.”
