WASHINGTON (AP) — US President Donald Trump has not been subtle about how badly he wants to see Saudi Arabia and Israel normalize relations.

He has talked up his push to extend his first-term Abraham Accords — the project that formalized commercial and diplomatic ties between Israel and a trio of Arab nations — as key to his plan for bringing long-term stability to the Middle East as the fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza continues to hold.

The normalization push is expected to be high on the agenda when Trump hosts Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Tuesday for talks during a pomp-filled White House visit.

“I hope that Saudi Arabia will be going into the Abraham Accords very shortly,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday as he made his way to Florida for the weekend.

Yet Trump’s optimism that a US-brokered deal could come soon is tempered by more sober internal assessments. Saudi Arabia is unlikely to sign on to the accords anytime soon, but there is cautious optimism that an agreement can be sealed by the end of Trump’s second term, according to three administration officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The first Trump administration and its successor, the Biden administration, tried to persuade Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords. But those hopes were dashed first by opposition from the crown prince’s father, King Salman, during Trump’s first term and then by Prince Mohammed himself following the Hamas attacks on October 7, 2023, against Israel that sparked the two-year Gaza war.

Although the crown prince, widely referred to as MBS, has indicated he may be more flexible than his father on the matter, a guaranteed path to a Palestinian state remains a condition and something that the Israeli government vehemently opposes.

Trump could try to convince Prince Mohammed that the American leader’s 20-point Gaza peace plan represents such a path. That, however,

© The Times of Israel