2026-07-23T13:29:19+00:00
US President Donald Trump said
on Thursday that the proposed US-Saudi civil nuclear agreement will move
forward only if Saudi Arabia joins the Abraham Accords*
Trump stated that the
arrangement with the US Department of Energy would be limited to civilian,
non-military nuclear activities and would not permit uranium enrichment,
noting, “The United States is not opposed to Civil (Non-Enriched) Nuclear
Facilities.”
Washington and Riyadh signed
two accords on Tuesday creating the legal framework for long-term civilian
nuclear cooperation. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Saudi Energy Minister
Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman signed a peaceful nuclear cooperation pact, known
as a “123 agreement,” alongside a bilateral safeguards agreement, according to
the US Department of Energy
The agreement drew alarm across Israeli
officials, with criticism directed at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over
his handling of the file
Avigdor Lieberman, a former Israeli defense
minister and foreign minister, said on Israel’s public broadcaster on Wednesday
that the agreement risked drawing the wider Middle East into an accelerating
nuclear arms race
Speaking to Israel’s army radio station, former
Prime Minister Ehud Barak characterized the agreement as a marker of “the loss
of trust between Netanyahu and Trump.”
Yair Lapid, leader of the Israeli opposition,
said on an Israeli podcast that preventing a Saudi nuclear program was
Netanyahu’s responsibility and that the outcome amounted to a failure on his
part. “His job is to prevent a Saudi nuclear program,” Lapid said
“Given Israel already has
nukes, it’s no surprise they don’t want any of their neighbors to have them too,” Trump posted
* Launched in 2020 during
Trump’s first administration, the Abraham Accords normalized relations between
Israel and several Arab states, including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain,
Morocco, and Sudan
Read more: Abraham Accords resurface: Trump is selling a new Middle East
