Saudi Arabia won’t recognize Israel without a path to a Palestinian state, top diplomat says

JERUSALEM (AP): Saudi Arabia’s top diplomat said the kingdom will not normalize relations with Israel or contribute to Gaza’s reconstruction without a credible path to a Palestinian state — a nonstarter for Israel’s government.

Prince Faisal bin Farhan’s remarks in an interview with CNN broadcast late Sunday were some of the most direct yet from Saudi officials.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — who faces mounting domestic pressure over the plight of Israeli hostages, including an angry protest inside a parliamentary committee meeting on Monday — has rejected Palestinian statehood and described plans for open-ended military control over Gaza.

The dispute over Gaza’s future — as the war rages with no end in sight — pits Israel against its top ally, the United States, as well as much of the international community, and poses a major obstacle to any plans for postwar governance or reconstruction of the impoverished coastal enclave that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians.

Before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel that triggered the war, the U.S. had been trying to broker a landmark agreement in which Saudi Arabia would normalize relations with Israel in exchange for U.S. security guarantees, aid in establishing a civilian nuclear program and progress toward resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In September, Netanyahu had said Israel was on “the cusp” of such a deal.

In the interview with “CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS,” the host asked: “Are you saying unequivocally that if there is not a credible and irreversible path to a Palestinian state, there will not be normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel?”

“That’s the only way we’re going to get a benefit,” Prince Faisal replied. “So, yes.”

Earlier in the interview, when asked if oil-rich Saudi Arabia would finance reconstruction in Gaza — where Israel’s offensive has caused unprecedented destruction — Prince Faisal gave a similar answer.

“As long as we’re able to find a pathway to a solution … then we can talk about anything,” he said. “But if we are just resetting to the status quo before Oct. 7, in a way that sets us up for another round of this, as we have seen in the past, we’re not interested in that conversation.”

The Palestinians seek a state that would include Gaza, the Israeli-occupied West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war.

Israel views all of Jerusalem as its capital and the West Bank as the historical and biblical heartland of the Jewish people. It has built scores of settlements across both territories that are home to hundreds of thousands of Jewish settlers. The last of several rounds of peace talks broke down nearly 15 years ago.

At a meeting about the war on Monday, European Union foreign ministers said the creation of a Palestinian state was the only way to achieve peace and expressed concern about Netanyahu’s rejection of the idea.