RIYAD – In an apparent reference to Iran, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed binSalman says the regimes in Saudi Arabia and Israel have “a common enemy”and that they could immediately normalise their relations once thePalestine issue is resolved.
In an interview with the TIME magazine, the first in line to the Saudithrone spoke of the prospect of Riyadh-Tel Aviv relations, describing theregime’s conflict with the Palestinians as the only obstacle to thenormalisation of ties with Israel.
“We have a common enemy, and it seems that we have a lot of potential areasto have economic cooperation,” the crown prince said.
The remarks come days after bin Salman, in an interview with the Atlantic,attempted to put Israeli and Palestinian land claims on an equal footing ina dramatic shift in Riyadh’s long-held position on Palestine, sayingIsraelis, like Palestinians, have the “right” to have “their own homeland.”
That interview stirred so much controversy among the defenders of thePalestinian cause that apparently forced the prince’s father, Saudi KingSalman, to reaffirm support for the Palestinians and their “legitimaterights” to an independent state in a phone call with US President DonaldTrump.
Bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader, repeated the same stance in hisremarks to Time and said both Israelis and Palestinians “have the right tolive and coexist.”
Saudi Arabia has been the main sponsor of the Arab Peace Initiative, whichenvisions a so-called two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinianconflict. However, prior to bin Salman, no senior Saudi official hadpublicly accepted that Israel has a right to any land.
“We cannot have relations with Israel before solving the peace issue withthe Palestinians,” but “when it happens, of course next day we’ll have goodand normal relations with Israel and it will be in the best for everyone,”he stated.
Saudi Arabia does not officially recognise Israel and has no formal tieswith the regime. However, the two sides have been widely reported to havecooperated secretly for years.
The warming of Riyadh-Tel Aviv relations has gathered pace since June 2017,when bin Salman became the crown prince.
In recent months, the kingdom has been gradually softening its publicposture toward Israel in what analysts describe as an attempt by Riyadh toprepare public opinion at home and elsewhere for potential normal relationswith Israel.
Recent reports also suggest that Saudi Arabia has taken up an active rolein US attempts to scramble a “peace” deal between the Israelis andPalestinians to get rid of the decades-long conflict, which Riyadh views asa stumbling block to overt relations with Tel Aviv.
Last November, Lebanon’s al-Akhbar daily published a secret undated letterfrom Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir to bin Salman, in which heoutlined a roadmap for normalising ties with Israel with the ultimate goalof uniting against Iran, their common enemy.
Under that roadmap, Saudi Arabia and Israel would first try to resolve thePalestine issue, with Riyadh making huge pro-Israel concessions on theissues of Palestinian refugees and the occupied Jerusalem al-Quds, whichthe Palestinians want as the capital of their future state. Afterwards,they would pursue their “common goals” regarding Iran.
Last November, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas travelled toRiyadh for closed-door talks with bin Salman about Trump’s Middle Eastplans, which are yet to be unveiled.
The New York Times cited Palestinian, Arab and European officials as sayinga month later that bin Salman presented a plan “that would be more tiltedtoward the Israelis than any ever embraced by the American government, onethat presumably no Palestinian leader could ever accept.”
“The Palestinians would get a state of their own but only noncontiguousparts of the West Bank and only limited sovereignty over their ownterritory. The vast majority of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, whichmost of the world considers illegal, would remain. The Palestinians wouldnot be given East Jerusalem (al-Quds) as their capital and there would beno right of return for Palestinian refugees and their descendants,” thereport said.
Bin Salman’s latest interview comes towards the end of his three-week tourof the United States, where he met with leaders of a number of pro-Israelilobbying groups, including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee(AIPAC).
The Israeli military’s chief of staff, Gadi Eizenkot, recently said theregime was ready to share intelligence with Saudi Arabia on Iran.
Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz has indicated that Israel has hadsecret contacts with Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries over theirmutual concerns about Iran. – Agencies