The United States has reached a historic agreement that will support Saudi Arabia’s ability to enrich uranium on its own soil without the stringent safeguards traditionally required under U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements. The deal was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. Under the terms of the agreement, Washington will seek to ensure the program remains focused on civilian purposes by retaining influence over key aspects of Riyadh’s nuclear infrastructure.
What makes the deal truly significant is Trump’s decision to decouple it from Saudi-Israeli normalization efforts. The Biden administration had tied any prospective nuclear agreement to Riyadh joining the Abraham Accords, before Oct. 7, 2023, derailed those efforts. Today, however, the regional security environment has fundamentally changed. The war between the United States and Iran has demonstrated that Gulf states are no longer bystanders but potential targets of Iranian retaliation. But this comes with added risk of regional escalation.
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Should Riyadh eventually pursue a military nuclear capability, for example, Israel’s strategic position in the region would be significantly weakened. As the Middle East’s only nuclear power, Israel enjoys a unique deterrent advantage, providing it with considerable leverage over regional adversaries. Preserving that advantage was one of the principal reasons previous U.S. administrations linked Saudi nuclear cooperation to normalization with Israel.
By greenlighting this agreement without such conditions, Washington risks two major consequences: weakening its leverage to expand the Abraham Accords and accelerating a regional nuclear arms race. The first risk is already becoming apparent. Syria offers a telling precedent.
Earlier this year, Trump abandoned the previous requirement that Damascus normalize relations with Israel in exchange for sanctions relief. Instead, the administration merely pledged to “monitor” Syria’s progress toward normalization, without establishing meaningful conditions or enforcement mechanisms. The Saudi deal reinforces the same message: countries seeking major concessions from Washington no longer need to recognize Israel. That weakens one of America’s most effective sources of leverage for reshaping the regional order.
The second risk is even more consequential. Allowing Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium on its own soil is likely to intensify nuclear competition across the Middle East. Iran would have an even stronger incentive to preserve — or eventually rebuild — its own nuclear capabilities if its principal regional rival were granted domestic enrichment. Turkey, long wary of strategic isolation and increasingly determined to assert itself as a regional power, would likely demand similar treatment. Egypt, despite its recent rapprochement with Turkey, would also face growing pressure to avoid falling behind its regional competitors. Once enrichment becomes acceptable for one major regional power, it will become increasingly difficult for Washington to deny it to others.
US AND SAUDI ARABIA SIGN ‘PEACEFUL’ MULTIDECADE NUCLEAR COOPERATION DEAL
The Abraham Accords were designed to foster a more integrated, prosperous, and stable Middle East by incentivizing diplomatic normalization and strategic cooperation.
This agreement risks moving the region in the opposite direction. By separating nuclear cooperation from normalization, Washington may gain a short-term diplomatic victory. But it risks doing so to the detriment of the Middle Eastern stability it has spent years trying to build.
