US, Saudi to Discuss Security Deal     05/20 06:05

   President Joe Biden's national security adviser met early Sunday with Saudi 
Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to discuss what the kingdom described 
as the "semi-final" version of a wide-ranging security agreement between the 
countries.

   DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- President Joe Biden's national security 
adviser met early Sunday with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman 
to discuss what the kingdom described as the "semi-final" version of a 
wide-ranging security agreement between the countries.

   The announcement by the state-run Saudi Press Agency comes as the strategic 
deal had been upended after Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 
people and saw 250 others taken hostage back to the Gaza Strip.

   In the time since, a punishing Israeli airstrike campaign and ground 
offensive there has killed over 35,000 Palestinians, endangering the security 
deal that had included Saudi Arabia diplomatically recognizing Israel for the 
first time since its founding in 1948.

   Saudi state media released no images of Jake Sullivan and Prince Mohammed 
meeting in Dhahran, a city in the kingdom's far east that's home to its 
state-run oil giant, the Saudi Arabian Oil Co. known as Saudi Aramco.

   "The semi-final version of the draft strategic agreements between the 
kingdom and the United States of America, which are almost being finalized -- 
and what is being worked on between the two sides in the Palestinian issue to 
find a credible path -- were discussed," the statement released after the talks 
said.

   That included "a two-state solution that meets the aspirations and 
legitimate rights of the Palestinian people" and "the situation in Gaza and the 
need to stop the war there and facilitate the entry of humanitarian aid," the 
statement added.

   Saudi Arabia has long called for an independent Palestinian state to be 
created along Israel's 1967 borders, with east Jerusalem as its capital. 
However, that likely may be untenable for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin 
Netanyahu, whose government hinges on support from hard-liners who oppose a 
two-state solution and support Israeli settlements on lands Palestinians want 
for that state.

   The White House issued a statement early Monday after Sullivan traveled to 
Israel and met with Netanyahu, saying the Saudi talks "focused on a 
comprehensive vision for an integrated Middle East region." The statement did 
not elaborate, other than to call the talks "constructive."

   Saudi Arabia has long relied -- like other Gulf Arab nations -- on the U.S. 
to be the security guarantor for the wider Middle East as tensions over Iran's 
nuclear program in recent years have spilled over into a series of attacks. The 
proposal now being discussed likely would deepen that, and also reportedly 
includes access to advanced weapons and possibly trade deals as well.

   Saudi Arabia has also pushed for nuclear cooperation in the deal that 
includes America allowing it to enrich uranium in the kingdom -- something that 
worries nonproliferation experts, as spinning centrifuges opens the door to a 
possible weapons program. Prince Mohammed has said the kingdom would pursue a 
nuclear weapon if Iran had one. Iran in recent weeks has increasingly 
threatened it could do so.

   Iran's mission to the United Nations in New York meanwhile confirmed that 
Tehran held indirect talks with U.S. officials in Oman last week. Iran's 
state-run IRNA news agency quoted the mission as describing the talks as "an 
ongoing process."

   "The negotiations have not been the first and will not be the last of their 
kind," the mission said, according to IRNA.

   Oman, a sultanate on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, has been the 
site of U.S.-Iran talks in the past, including under Biden despite the tensions 
between the two nations.