Trump Sends Saudi Civil Nuclear Deal to Congress With Israel Condition

President Donald Trump has sent Congress a proposed civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia, but the deal depends on Riyadh normalizing relations with Israel.

The agreement, reached in July, would allow U.S. companies to export civilian nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia. A U.S. official said Trump's position remains that the deal will move forward only if Saudi Arabia joins the Abraham Accords, a series of U.S.-brokered agreements that established or normalized relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan.

Saudi Arabia has so far resisted recognizing Israel without a clear and irreversible path toward the creation of a Palestinian state.

Former President Joe Biden also sought to link a potential U.S.-Saudi nuclear agreement to normalization with Israel, and negotiations appeared to be making progress in 2023 before the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war significantly changed the regional situation.