Foreign-policy expert: ‘Israel and Saudis have already normalized’

“Israel and Saudi have already normalized. When the formal agreement comes is anyone’s guess,” wrote Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

By JNS

Having watched Mohammed bin Salman’s recent interview when the Saudi Crown Prince told FOX News that peace with Israel is “getting closer every day,” coupled with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Friday-morning address to the U.N. General Assembly, Jonathan Schanzer decided to “go out on a limb.”

“Israel and Saudi have already normalized. When the formal agreement comes is anyone’s guess,” wrote Schanzer, senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“It will be a thrill to see. But that signing ceremony matters less when ties are already deep and maturing,” he wrote.

Netanyahu’s talk at the United Nations was reportedly carried live on Saudi television—the first time that has occurred with an address by an Israeli prime minister.

“I believe that we are at the cusp of an even more dramatic breakthrough: an historic peace with Saudi Arabia,” Netanyahu said at the United Nations.

Abraham AccordsBiden AdministrationIsrael-Saudi relationsIsraeli-Palestinian peace negotiationsnormalization of tiesUS Mideast policy