Joe Biden, Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss Saudi Arabia ties, Iran

The first face-to-face meeting between American President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu since Netanyahu assumed office in December will take place on Wednesday. Iran and a potential normalisation of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia are expected to be on the agenda.

Because of Netanyahu’s right-wing government’s reform of the judiciary, which limits judges’ influence, and Israel’s continued settlement building in the occupied West Bank, Biden had postponed sending Netanyahu an invitation.

The two leaders ultimately decided to schedule their discussions on the fringes of the U.N. General Assembly in New York rather than at the White House, which was Netanyahu’s preferred location.

U.S. officials anticipate that measures to stop Iran’s nuclear programme and the judiciary reform will come up in their discussions as well as the possibility of what would be a major development – a normalization of Israel-Saudi relations.

Given his extensive experience working with American presidents, Netanyahu had anticipated an earlier trip to the United States, but Biden had refused. In the early months of the Biden White House in 2021, Netanyahu did not receive a meeting, and he was later removed from office. Last December, he took back the throne.

Instead, to commemorate Israel’s 75th anniversary of founding, Biden welcomed Israeli President Isaac Herzog, a mostly ceremonial position, to the White House in July.

The US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia have been in talks about a possible agreement in which the US and Riyadh would agree to a defence treaty while normalising diplomatic relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

In a post on social media platform X, David Makovsky, a seasoned Middle East observer at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, remarked that the meeting “will occur 265 days after Netanyahu took office, the longest such gap since 1964.”

“The Saudi deal’s enormous potential has left Biden & Netanyahu little choice but to meet despite differences,” he said.

The Biden administration believes that if it can overcome significant challenges, the United States may benefit greatly from such a mega-deal.

“Many of the elements of a pathway to normalization are now on the table. We don’t have a framework, we don’t have the terms ready to be signed. There is still work to do,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan had told the media on September 7.

An eventual meeting between Biden and Netanyahu at the White House has not been disregarded by American authorities.

(With agency inputs)