To Anticipate Trump’s Middle East Policy, Focus On What The Saudis Want
The first days of Trump’s second administration have already proven that Trump will do whatever the Saudi’s want – we need to recognize what that means for Israel and the Jews
(First published on the Times of Israel)
One of the biggest mistakes people make when it comes to President Donald J. Trump is to declare him unpredictable. Trump certainly is mercurial, and definitely non-ideological, but for the most part he is predictable: Trump seeks out power and prestige as an individual, putting his own benefit over anyone or anything else, and is willing to sell out those closest to him to gain it. In other words, if you want to know where Trump is going, follow the money.
That is why it was entirely predictable that Trump’s first call to a foreign leader once returning to office was with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who friends and enemies refer to as MBS. And that is why, if we would like to ensure Israel’s wellbeing over the next four years of the Trump presidency, we need to focus on the Saudis.
The Saudis want, as the historian and Saudi expert Joshua Teitelbaum emphasizes, what Trump wants: power for themselves and their family. The hint is in the name: Saudi Arabia.
Prior to the Saudi dynasty’s conquest of Arabia in the early 1920s, the peninsula housing the Muslim Holy Cities was ruled by the Hashemite dynasty (who now rules Jordan). Since that coup, from the House of Saud’s perspective, the Kingdom and its riches are the private property of the family. Anything that could threaten the family and its hold on power is to be dealt with by any means necessary.
Protecting the family, the House knows, requires the family to forge strong alliances with powers committed to their existence. The family chose the United States over the Soviet Union because the Soviets supported the Arab revolutionary movements that threatened their control. Yet their trust in the US has waned. Under the Biden Administration, the Saudi family came to believe it needed to hedge its bets, leading it to build a stronger relationship with China. Now that Trump is back, we can expect business to return to normal as Trump’s America provides the Saudis with the resources they desire to secure their hold on power.
That is why the zealous fantasies of Israel’s messianic settler movement are going to be upset. Despite Trump’s picks of Marco Rubio for Secretary of State, and Mike Huckabee for Ambassador, the Saudi interest will always win out: Trump has a history of overruling and contradicting his employees, leading to the highest executive turnover rate for any recent administration. What can you expect from a person who got famous for saying the words, “You’re Fired”?
If we accept that Trump’s policy will be calibrated to secure Saudi survival, and if we want Israel to remain in his good graces – of critical importance given the dismal state of Israel’s State capacity given the past two years of crisis – that means we need to understand how Saudi priorities impact Israel and how we can work within their interest constraints.
Specifically, I believe this means thinking through the ramifications of Israeli policy on three main dimensions of Saudi interest: internal stability, regional stability, economic continuity.
It’s worth addressing the Israeli impact on each of these individually:
Internal stability. As a family, it has been widely and regularly reported that the Saudis couldn’t care less about the Palestinians. Yet the persistence of the Palestinian tension activates internal opposition to Saudi rule, which is why they want the conflict solved. This means one can expect the Zealot’s plans to settle Gaza and annex Judea and Samaria are dead on Trump’s arrival in the White House. The best they can hope for is a revival of Trump’s deal of the century – one deeply impacted by the Saudis and their agents, resulting in a road towards a Palestinian State.
Regional stability. It is true that the Saudis take their role as Guardians of the Holy Sites – and champions of Sunni Islam – seriously, putting them in tension with the Shiia Clerics of the Islamic Republic in Iran. But conflict between the two serves neither at the moment. Israel’s recent battlefield successes have at least momentarily ended the Shiia expansion, and the Saudis have no desire to pick a fight. Therefore it is hard to imagine the Saudi’s approving of a re-escalation of the conflict in the Gulf. Moreover, despite the Saudi’s continued animosity to the Hashemite family, it is hard to imagine they would bless the destabilization of Jordan that would occur if the ‘Jordan is Palestine’ vision pushed by many on the extreme right were carried out.
Economic continuity. Despite much of Trump’s cabinet’s refusal to believe, climate change is already a fact in the Middle East, and the Saudis know that in the foreseeable future their ability to profit off of the sale of the main driver of global heating will be curtailed. This is why the Saudis are investing heavily in what many have called ‘the new oil,’ Artificial Intelligence, and will desire Israeli technical brilliance more than ever. On the other hand, AI requires massive amounts of energy, motivating the Saudis to develop alternative energy infrastructure now if they want to smoothly transition over the course of the next two decades. This means more nuclear reactors in the Middle East whether Israel likes it or not.
A Saudi-envisioned, Trump determined Middle East can benefit Israel, so long as Israel’s leadership recognizes what it can and cannot achieve given the family’s constraints. Unless our policy makers truly believe in Divine Intervention – what unfortunately seems to be the case with certain figures who have yet to quit the coalition – it would be wise to filter our expectations of the day after the Gaza War through the lens of Saudi interests. And it would be prudent for those leaders who are working to replace the current government to develop their vision for Israel’s future taking the Saudi ascendancy into account.
IIRC, Saudi interests are in conflict with neo-Ottoman interests and could help curtail the ambitions of the HTS regime in Syria? The regional tensions definitely look different than that did a year ago.
Not saying I disagree, but how would you describe the nexus of Trump's interests and the Saudi interests? It's stated as a given, but I don't see the specific reason they are together. To say 'they want power and to protect their interests" is fine, but it's also broad.