Countering Trump, Saudi Arabia reiterates it won’t form ties with Israel without Palestinian state

WASHINGTON — Saudi Arabia reiterates its stance against normalizing relations with Israel before a two-state solution has been reached, after US President Donald Trump said earlier that Riyadh has not made the establishment of a Palestinian state a condition for a peace deal with Israel.

A statement from Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry says that the kingdom’s stance in favor of a Palestinian state on the pre-1967 lines with East Jerusalem as its capital is “firm and unwavering.”

It notes that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman stated as much in a speech last September, when he said Riyadh would not establish ties with Israel without this main condition met.

The Saudi statement carefully doesn’t mention Trump by name, as Riyadh and other countries around the world try to avoid crossing the US president at the start of his second term.

However, Riyadh does stress that it had already conveyed its position against normalizing ties with Israel before a Palestinian state is established “to the previous US administration and the current administration.”

Non-Saudi officials and analysts alike, though, have long dismissed such statements from Riyadh, insisting that bin Salman is far more flexible on the issue in private and is only seeking the establishment of a “pathway” to Palestinian statehood before normalizing ties with Israel.

However, those same officials and analysts acknowledge that Riyadh has been seeking a much more irreversible pathway since the Gaza war, which has catapulted the Palestinian issue to the top of the international agenda.