As Netanyahu's Influence on Trump Wanes, the Saudis May Get Their F-35s Without Normalization With Israel - Middle East News
Israel's most worrying near-term scenario isn't just the prospect of Saudi Arabia getting U.S. F-35 fighter jets. It's the possibility that this will happen without a deal that includes Israeli-Saudi normalization and some kind of ambiguous Israeli recognition of the vision of a Palestinian state.
In the run-up to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's visit to Washington on Tuesday, there has been speculation about the F-35s being attached to the kind of comprehensive deal U.S. President Donald Trump is seeking. But the Republican administration's relationship with the Saudi royal house is so close that Trump may well give Riyadh this gift without demanding any immediate payment in Israeli coin.
Prior to Hamas' terror attack on October 7, 2023, Israel and Saudi Arabia were on the verge of normalizing ties, as part of the Biden administration's plan for a far-reaching agreement between Washington and Riyadh. What Prince Mohammed wanted from the Democratic administration was a defence pact with America that would resemble its commitment to NATO countries, advanced weaponry and assistance in building a civilian nuclear program.
At that time, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's help was needed in mobilizing Republican support in order to get such a deal through Congress. Israel was negotiating with the Americans, but all the parties thought there was a good chance for normalization.
Netanyahu was supposed to convene a decisive meeting on the issue on October 8, 2023. But the massacre in southern Israel resulted in an immediate freeze in the talks. Several senior Hamas officials later said that the organization's leaders in the Gaza Strip decided to launch the attack in part to thwart Saudi-Israeli normalization.
The Trump administration has been seeking a similar agreement, with minor changes, ever since the president was inaugurated in January. In Trump's view, this would be a glorious conclusion to the Abraham Accords, which he saw as the crowning achievement of his foreign policy in his first term.
But there are also weightier considerations in the background – expectations for giant deals in the fields of defence, intelligence and technology. These deals would benefit America, but would also apparently benefit certain funds and companies connected to the Trump family.
At the end of his first term, Trump intended to link the Abraham Accords to a deal to sell F-35s to the United Arab Emirates. Netanyahu twisted and turned but effectively gave his consent. But then Trump lost the 2020 election, other problems cropped up and the deal with the UAE wasn't approved.
Now, Trump apparently views F-35 sales as a key element of U.S. foreign policy. Saudi Arabia and Turkey are both on the list of potential customers. Such sales, of course, would contradict the policy of preserving Israel's qualitative military edge in the Middle East, which successive U.S. governments have upheld for more than five decades.
The F-35, as the last two years have underscored, is a strategically important weapon. Using it helped Israel establish its superiority on every possible front in the recent war, including Iran and Yemen, as well as Syria and Lebanon.
The problem is that Netanyahu's bargaining power with Trump has steeply declined. The president sent American planes to bomb the Iranian nuclear facility in Fordow and brought about the return from Gaza of all the living Israeli hostages and all but three of the dead. In exchange, he is demanding Netanyahu's obedience to his plans, and also to his whims.
Trump is the one who forced Netanyahu to end the war in Gaza last month, and before then, in June, to end the war with Iran. There isn't a lot Netanyahu can say to him, and certainly not publicly.
Meanwhile, the Saudis aren't enthusiastic about normalization with Israel, given what Israel did in Gaza and the fact that Saudi public opinion has been roused in favor of the Palestinians. And the crown prince may get what he wants without any progress toward normalization (or perhaps Trump is saving this for later, as a card that will help Netanyahu politically in advance of next year's election).
The direct continuation of this decline in Netanyahu's power can be seen in the resolution the Americans want the UN Security Council to approve on Monday. The resolution provides formal backing for Trump's plan for Gaza and also includes a line speaking in general terms about the creation of a credible pathway to a Palestinian state.
Netanyahu reiterated on Sunday that no such state will ever arise. But the fact that he prolonged the war for two years and refused to discuss any postwar arrangements will now secure the Palestinians a notable achievement in the international arena, even if it's so far a strictly symbolic one.
And as Yaniv Kubovich reported in Haaretz last week, the Pentagon is now dictating the Israel Defence Forces' moves in Gaza. There is almost no consultation between the sides on these moves; they are simply transmitted as American demands with which Israel is expected to comply.
Meanwhile, preparations for a multinational force in Gaza are moving forward fairly slowly. Foreign countries aren't exactly waiting in line to risk their soldiers' lives there.
The party that is currently benefiting from this slow progress is Hamas, which has begun rebuilding its military strength and is gradually resuming its civilian control over Gaza. There is a large and growing gap between the way the government describes the war's results and the accumulating signals from reality itself.