While Benjamin Netanyahu has not yet officially returned to the Israeli prime minister’s office, he’s already making waves with a not-so-thinly veiled critique of President Biden’s handling of the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia, during an interview with Al Arabiya, per Reuters:
“The traditional (U.S.) alliance with Saudi Arabia and other countries, has to be reaffirmed. There should not be periodic swings, or even wild swings in this relationship, because I think that the alliance…is the anchor of stability in our region,” Netanyahu told the Saudi-owned website.
“I’m to speak to President Biden about it,” Netanyahu said according to a published transcript of the interview.
Netanyahu also said that adding Saudi Arabia to the Abraham Accords could eventually be in the offing and that he would pursue that:
An accord with Saudi Arabia, birthplace of Islam, would be a “quantum leap for an overall peace between Israel and the Arab world” and ultimately facilitate Palestinian-Israeli peace, Netanyahu said.
Brokering a thaw in the relationship between the Biden administration and the Saudis will be no small task, as Biden’s trip to the country this year does not seem to have papered over the fallout resulting from the regime’s assassination of Jamal Khashoggi and Biden’s criticism of the murder.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s visit to Saudi Arabia this month showed that Riyadh is still hedging—and that Washington stands to lose out.