White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan met with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the kingdom's eastern city of Dhahran to discuss bilateral relations and the Gaza war.
During Sunday’s sit-down, the two discussed "the semi-final version of the draft strategic agreements" between Riyadh and Washington, "the work on which is close to being completed," Saudi state media reported.
The US National Security Adviser and the Saudi Crown Prince also focused on "the situation in Gaza and the necessity of stopping the war there, and facilitating the entry of humanitarian aid."
The talks come as US President Joe Biden is reportedly pushing for a "broad" deal between Riyadh and Washington that would see Israel recognize a Palestinian state in exchange for Saudi recognition of the Jewish state.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly rejected calls for the creation of a Palestinian state, claiming it would become a "terror haven". US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, for his part, has previously stressed that normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia is possible but not a certainty.
As for the US-Saudi deal, it would include cooperation on a civilian nuclear program, the sale of advanced American-made weapons to Riyadh, and possibly a trade agreement.
Sullivan told the Financial Times earlier this month that normalization between Riyadh and Tel Aviv is "the path that we [the US] believe could produce a more secure Israel and a more peaceful region.
"The integrated vision is a bilateral understanding between the US and Saudi Arabia combined with normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia, combined with meaningful steps on behalf of the Palestinian people. All of that has to come together...you can’t disentangle one piece from the others," he pointed out.
According to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, Washington is "very close to reaching an agreement on the bilateral pieces of the package between the United States and Saudi Arabia. However, Riyadh has made it clear that it will not sign off on the deal unless there is calm in Gaza and a path to an independent Palestinian state, Miller added.
Bloomberg News earlier reported that the US and Saudi Arabia are "nearing a historic pact" to offer the kingdom "security guarantees and a possible path to diplomatic relations with Israel if its government ends the Gaza war." According to Bloomberg, the pact, if signed, would "potentially reshape the Middle East."
In January, media reported that Saudi Arabia had resumed negotiations with the US on a defense deal after a three-month hiatus due to the escalation in the Middle East following the Palestinian militant group Hamas' sudden attack on Israel on Oct. 7. The attack prompted the Jewish state to launch a ground military operation in the Gaza Strip, which is currently being devastated by Israeli airstrikes that have already killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, according to Hamas health officials.
In early August 2023, Washington and Riyadh agreed on the broad contours of a potential deal to normalize relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. In September of that year, however, the media quoted a source in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office as saying that Riyadh had informed Washington of the termination of negotiations on a Saudi-Israeli normalization deal.
In 2020, the United States initiated a process to normalize relations between Israel and the Arab world. As a result of these efforts, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain signed a series of documents known as the Abraham Accords in September 2020, joined by Morocco in December 2020.