Trump to Saudi Arabia: You’ll join Abraham Accords in your own time

US President Donald Trump said Tuesday that it is his “dream” for Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords, before acknowledging that Riyadh will do so in its own time.

“It’s my fervent hope, wish and even my dream that Saudi Arabia… will soon be joining the Abraham Accords,” Trump said in a foreign policy speech at an investment summit in Riyadh on the first day of his Middle East visit.

“But you’ll do it in your own time,” Trump subsequently added, seeming to acknowledge that Riyadh is not currently prepared to normalize relations, given the ongoing war in Gaza and the current Israeli government’s refusal to establish a pathway to a future Palestinian state.

Successive American administrations have sought to broker such an agreement, framing it as the “crown jewel” of potential normalization deals, in light of Saudi Arabia’s overarching status in the Arab and Muslim worlds.

Former president Joe Biden’s administration sought to include a normalization accord in a “mega-deal” it worked to sign with Riyadh. It envisioned a series of bilateral agreements, including the first US defense treaty in decades that would have provided Saudi Arabia guarantees that Washington would come to its defense if the latter were attacked under certain circumstances.

Such a treaty would have required ratification from two-thirds of the Senate, and the Biden administration hoped that folding in an Israel-Saudi normalization deal would help gain support for the package from both sides of the aisle.

Riyadh has long made clear, however, that such an agreement would require a political horizon for the Palestinians — something that many progressive Democrats would also have demanded in exchange for their support of the “mega deal.”

The Biden administration had managed to make significant progress in the series of bilateral agreements with Saudi Arabia — and was slated to begin serious discussions with Riyadh regarding the exact terms of the Palestinian component of the package — when Hamas launched its October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, in which some 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage.

The onslaught and ensuing war derailed the normalization effort and Riyadh began to recognize that it would need more concrete steps toward the establishment of a Palestinian state, as solidarity with the Palestinians in Saudi Arabia and the region at large skyrocketed due to the devastating war in Gaza.

As the war continued through the end of Biden’s term, Saudi officials began speaking of trying to negotiate smaller bilateral deals with the US that wouldn’t require a normalization deal with Israel. Those weren’t finalized by the time Biden left office, but Trump’s administration has sought to move them forward, reportedly considering a deal that would allow for the establishment of a Saudi civilian nuclear program.

Trump has also pledged to broker an Israel-Saudi normalization deal, repeatedly asserting that additional countries would quickly join the Abraham Accords. But his remarks Tuesday indicated his recognition that Riyadh won’t be joining as quickly as he may have hoped.

Ending the Gaza war ASAP

At the same time, he touted his efforts to “get that [Gaza] war ended as quickly as possible,” in what would remove one of the two key obstacles to Riyadh joining the Abraham Accords.

Trump also highlighted Monday’s release of American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander, whom Hamas freed after 584 days in captivity in a gesture of goodwill to the US, in the hopes that Washington will, in turn, coax Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end the war in Gaza.

“We’ve been working tirelessly to bring back all hostages held by Hamas,” Trump said. Israel agreed to send a negotiating team to Doha on Tuesday at the US’s request, but Netanyahu has reiterated to coalition partners that he only intends to agree to a temporary ceasefire. Hamas has offered to release all remaining 58 hostages at once in exchange for a permanent ceasefire, but Netanyahu has rejected the trade, arguing that it would leave the terror group in power.

Trump also used his speech to stress that “all civilized people must condemn the October 7 atrocities against Israel.”

“The people of Gaza deserve a much better future, but that will or cannot occur as long as their leaders choose to kidnap, torture and target innocent men, women and children for political ends,” he said.

There were several other parts of the speech that indicated daylight between the US and Israel, including on Syria, Iran and broader foreign policy. Trump only mentioned Israel by name one time in the over 30-minute address that largely focused on the Middle East.

Lifting Syria sanctions at request of MBS and Erdogan

In what was arguably his biggest announcement in the address, Trump declared the lifting of all of Washington’s sanctions on Syria.

“I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness,” he said, adding that he had made the decision after being pressed by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Bin Salman rose to his feet in the front row to applaud the announcement and the rest of the crowd in the Riyadh auditorium followed.

“The sanctions were brutal and crippling and served a really important function at the time, but now it’s [the new Syrian government’s] time to shine,” Trump said. “So I say, ‘Good luck, Syria.’”

The new US policy would appear to put him at odds with Israel, which has urged a more cautious approach to the new Syrian government led by Ahmed al-Sharaa. Jerusalem has been quietly lobbying the administration and congressional lawmakers to buck the fledgling Islamist government of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa in favor of establishing a decentralized series of autonomous ethnic regions, with the southern one bordering Israel being demilitarized.

Threatening Iran with sanctions, but not a military strike

Turning to Iran, Trump reiterated his desire to strike a deal with the Islamic Republic through the ongoing nuclear talks. He still threatened to cripple Iran’s economy, but stopped short of raising a potential military strike, as he has done in the past.

“I want to make a deal with Iran… to make your region and the world a safer place,” Trump said. “But if Iran’s leadership rejects this olive branch and continues to attack their neighbors, then we will have no choice but to inflict massive maximum pressure [and] drive Iranian oil exports to zero like I did before.”

“Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. But with that said, Iran can have a much brighter future,” he added. “This is an offer that will not last forever. The time is right now for them to choose… Things are happening at a very fast pace.”

Shots at ‘neocons’ and ‘interventionalists’

Trump then took swings at “neocons” and “interventionists” who oppose his foreign policy.

“It’s crucial for the wider world to know this great transformation [in the Middle East] has not come from Western interventionists, or flying people in beautiful planes giving you lectures on how to live and how to govern your own affairs,” Trump said.

“In the end, the so-called nation builders wrecked far more nations than they built and the interventionists were intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves,” he continued.

“The gleaming marvels of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi were not created by the so-called ‘nation builders,’ neocons, or liberal non-profits.

“Instead, the birth of a modern Middle East has been brought by the people of the region themselves — the people that are right here, the people [who] have lived here all their lives, developing your own sovereign countries, pursuing your own unique visions and charting your own destinies in your own way.”

“You achieved a modern miracle the Arabian way,” Trump added.

The comments reflected the mounting battle between the more pro-Trump isolationist wing of the Republican Party and hawkish conservatives who are more fervent supporters of Israel, with the president making clear in his remarks that he sides with the former camp.

The latter group has been critical of US special envoy Steve Witkoff’s efforts to broker a nuclear deal with Iran and US special envoy Adam Boehler’s efforts to negotiate directly with Hamas earlier this year. Trump’s inner circle has ardently defended Witkoff, while Trump himself has kept Boehler on as hostage envoy, despite efforts by hawkish Republicans and senior Israeli officials to sideline him.