In an interview with Al Arabiya, a Saudi daily, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Jewish state’s prime minister-designate, stated on Wednesday that a peace agreement between Saudi Arabia and Israel would result in a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Netanyahu suggested that rather than directly engaging with Palestinian leaders, whom he claimed were unwilling to recognize Israel, it would be more effective to extend the progress made in the 2020 Abraham Accords, a peace initiative between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain, to other Arab states.
Peace with Saudi Arabia will, in my opinion, accomplish two things: He stated, “It will change our region in ways that are unimaginable, and it will be a quantum leap for an overall peace between Israel and the Arab world.”
Additionally, I believe it will ultimately facilitate Palestinian-Israeli peace. That is what I think. I intend to investigate it.
Netanyahu pointed the fault at Palestinian pioneers for the inability to accomplish harmony.
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“The Palestinian leadership has refused to do what is finally happening in the rest of the Arab world, which is to recognise that the state of Israel is here to stay for the next century, which is the reason we have not had an Israeli-Palestinian peace.”
However, Benjamin Netanyahu stated that it was “up to the leadership of Saudi Arabia” to make peace with Riyadh.
The Arab Peace Initiative, a proposal to achieve Arab-Israeli peace if Israel agreed to end all occupation of Arab territories, was spearheaded by Saudi Arabia in 2002. Netanyahu avoided committing to the terms of the initiative when asked about it and if he would use it as a model.
He stated that it was “an indication of a desire to end the conflict in all its terms, but I think we need to have a fresh view 20 years later.”
Saudi Arabia has been a major supporter of the Palestinian cause and has stated on numerous occasions that it must see a Palestinian state before normalizing relations with Israel.
There have been indications of a thaw in relations over the past few years, despite the fact that Riyadh has not officially commented on the Abraham Accords.
Bandar bin Sultan, a prominent former Saudi Ambassador to the United States, stated the following in an interview with Al Arabiya in October 2020: The Palestinian cause is just, but the people who support it are failures. Additionally, the Israeli cause is unfair, but its supporters have achieved success.
