This agreement was supposed to reshape the Middle East.
Israel would normalize relations with Saudi Arabia, paving the way for ties with the broader Islamic world. In return, Saudi Arabia will receive a U.S. security package that includes F-35 stealth fighter jets. The F-35 stealth fighter is a fifth-generation aircraft that strengthens Riyadh’s relationship with the United States as it opens a new chapter with Israel.
But at least based on President Trump’s public comments so far, only half of this package deal is likely to materialize. On Monday, President Donald Trump announced in the Oval Office that Saudi Arabia would acquire the fighter jets it has long coveted.
President Trump called Saudi Arabia a “great ally” and said, “That’s what we will do. We will sell the F-35.” There was no mention of Israel in the statement.
The deal is likely to shift the balance of power in the region and strengthen Saudi Arabia as a Middle Eastern power and the first Arab nation to receive state-of-the-art American fighter jets. The sales still require U.S. government review and Congressional oversight, but the Trump administration could try to push them through the next three years, potentially shifting the military balance vis-à-vis Riyadh, especially over Israeli opposition.
Multiple Saudi sources told CNN that Riyadh was able to separate the two issues: The Trump administration has said the F-35 remains an important foreign policy objective, but the F-35 sale did not require normalization with Israel. President Trump cabled the sale of the jets, but gave no specifics, including what guarantees, if any, he gave Israel.
Before the Gaza war, the Biden administration believed it was close to finalizing a normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia. But the war derailed the deal, along with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s repeated rejection of Palestinian statehood. His far-right coalition partners prevented him from recognizing the possibility of Palestinian sovereignty in any form, even within Israeli security limits in the distant future.
Mr. Trump did not try to force solutions to stalled issues, but rather made progress where he could. Saudi Arabia was prepared to buy American weapons, and President Trump was prepared to sell them even without normalization.
“President Trump has made it clear that he is trying to separate the two,” said Nawaf Obeid, a senior fellow in the Department of War Studies at King’s College. “We were not going to waste our time blocking all these arms and goods sales just for Prime Minister Netanyahu.”
Riyadh has long been the largest purchaser of U.S. weapons, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Obeid said the sale of the F-35 was ultimately inevitable and a natural defense move. Mr. Trump has dramatically accelerated that process.
Saudi Arabia has not ruled out normalization in the future, but it is unlikely to result in F-35 sales. And that will never happen now.
“(Israel) needs a new government and an irreversible path to a Palestinian state,” Obeid told CNN.
An Israeli security official said Riyadh’s acquisition of fifth-generation fighter jets was of “very concern” to the military. “For many years, our implicit role has been to ensure that no country in the Middle East has the same aircraft or the same capabilities as (Israel),” the official told CNN about the F-35. “The seriousness is not an exaggeration. It’s not good for (Israel).”
In the final months of the first Trump administration, the United States agreed to sell F-35s to the United Arab Emirates, which would have made Saudi Arabia’s small neighbor the first Arab nation to own the fifth-generation fighter jet. In return, the UAE became the first Arab state in 26 years to normalize relations with Israel, which had agreed to a sale, giving President Trump a major foreign policy victory.
However, the deal ultimately fell apart during the Biden administration over concerns about growing military cooperation between the UAE and China. The United States was not willing to risk allowing the technology behind its most advanced fighter jets to fall into the hands of the Chinese government, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was not willing to accept what one Emirati official described as American “sovereign operational restrictions” on the jet’s use.
Daniel Shapiro, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel who participated in negotiations with the UAE, said similar concerns apply to Riyadh.
“It remains unclear whether Saudi Arabia will make a similar commitment to limit military cooperation with China, which in my judgment is necessary for the F-35 program to be fully consistent with U.S. security interests,” Shapiro told CNN.
Cinzia Bianco, a Gulf researcher at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said the UAE would be “quite disappointed” in Saudi Arabia’s F-35 deal, but could try to “use the momentum” to ask President Trump to reconsider the terms the Biden administration set on its own deal.
The United States is also required by law to maintain Israel’s qualitative military advantage (QME) over other countries in the region and to determine whether the sale of advanced military equipment would undermine that advantage. Shapiro warned that President Trump’s rush to complete large multibillion-dollar arms sales to foreign partners could complicate the vetting process, particularly for Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
“He has more affinity for the Gulf states than any president we’ve ever had, and perhaps even more affinity than he has for Israel,” Shapiro said.
Former Israeli military chief Gadi Eisenkot criticized the deal and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has repeatedly boasted about his relationship with President Trump, as incapable of blocking it.
“Prime Minister Netanyahu has lost the ability to protect Israel’s interests,” said Eisenkot, who was an opposition lawmaker until he resigned earlier this year.
But Mark Cancian, a security and defense expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Trump does not see the sale as a major foreign policy move.
“Trump has always viewed arms sales as primarily a jobs and manufacturing issue, not a foreign policy issue,” Cancian told CNN. As such, he is more open to arms sales than his predecessors. Still, Cancian said it would be “surprising” that Trump would proceed with the sale without involving Israel “given the diminishing qualitative advantage Israel has over its neighbors.”
The United States will continue to have influence over Saudi weapons, as the system requires significant support from American contractors to operate. While this may satisfy most of America’s concerns about the use of advanced systems, including the F-35, it will not be enough for Israel, which has long been America’s closest ally in the Middle East, Cancian said.
