Saudi Arabia’s fragile support to Palestine

Saudi Arabia’s traditional pro-Palestinian positions are unlikely to be compromised even if some gestures are made to the Israelis and to the Trump administration.
Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal Bin Farhan (C) attends an emergency meeting at the Arab League headquarters in the Egyptian capital Cairo, on November 25, 2019, to discuss the US decision to no longer consider Israeli settlements in Palestinian Territories illegal. - US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on October 18 that after legal consultations, that Washington had concluded the establishment of settlements was "not, per se, inconsistent with international law". (Photo by Khaled DESOUKI / AFP) (Photo by
Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan (C) attends an emergency meeting at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo to discuss the US decision to no longer consider Israeli settlements in Palestinian Territories illegal, Egypt, Nov. 25, 2019. - KHALED DESOUKI/AFP via Getty Images
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Daoud Kuttab
@daoudkuttab

Five months separated the move of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in December 2017 and the convening of the Arab summit in the Saudi city of Dhahran in April 2018. The special relationship between US President Donald Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner on the one hand, and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on the other were well known.

It was expected that the Saudi monarch who was hosting the summit would at best avoid the topic of the embassy move rather than support or oppose it. But instead, King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud surprised Arab attendees and suggested changing the name of the summit from the Dhahran summit to the Jerusalem summit.

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