Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman claims that Riyadh fought to normalize relations with Israel only if there was a “clear path” to Palestinian statehood under Trump’s Abraham Accords.
Published On 18 Nov 2025
Mohammed bin Salman, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, is meeting with Donald Trump at the White House.
The crown prince’s first visit since 2018 highlights the close relationship between the Trump administration and Saudi Arabia.
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Up to 48 F-35 fighter jets are being planned for sale to Saudi Arabia, something the kingdom has been wanting for years, but previous US administrations have turned down, partially due to Israel’s opposition.
So why is Saudi Arabia so interested in purchasing the F-35? And why did the US change its mind about the sale? What information is necessary here.
A family of Lockheed Martin stealth strike fighters is named after the US aerospace company. The F35 Lightning II is referred to as “The Most Advanced Fighter Jet in the World” on its official website.
It is designed to defy radar and other technologies because it operates as a stealth fighter. If successful, it can use its strike capabilities to attack an enemy’s defenses and fighter jets before they launch, establishing air superiority in any given conflict.
Australia, Canada, Italy, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, and the United Kingdom are some of the nations that work with the US to produce F-35s. They either create the fighter jets from scratch or have facilities there to do so for their own governments.
The most prevalent variant is owned by the most countries, making up the majority. On a regular runway, it can take off and land. To maintain its stealth capabilities, the F-35A’s weapons and fuel are housed inside the jet’s body.
Israel owns the customised F-35A known as the F-35I “Adir.” It includes Israeli-developed decoy and jamming technologies to enhance its stealth capabilities. Additionally, it has been modified to fly longer missions without having to refill it with external fuel. Israel has obtained US approval to modify the jet’s main operating system to allow the installation of local Israeli weapons.
Italy, Japan, Singapore, the UK, and the US all use the F35-B. It has a very short lead-up and can land like a helicopter, making it a good choice for operations with very short runways. It weighs more and has fewer weapons and fuel than the F35-A, but it is still smaller.
The US Navy’s F35-C is a supersonic stealth fighter that operates long-range. It is specifically designed for aircraft carriers.
The F-35 fighter jet is referred to as the “most lethal, survivable, and connected fighter aircraft in the world,” according to Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer.
The combination of stealth, advanced sensors, and high-speed computing, which accounts for the plane’s reputation for air superiority, is at the heart of the aircraft’s success.
It uses a 360-degree camera suite and other sensors directly to provide the pilot with more information about its surroundings and reduces detection than earlier generations of fighter jets.
It makes a significant change in how air power is used for militaries by putting less emphasis on identifying threats first, disseminating that information across the force, and coordinating strikes with other assets.
Saudi Arabia has been a major buyer of US weapons for decades. However, it was unable to join the F-35 program.
That would enable Saudi Arabia to improve its air force and strengthen its position in the Middle East. Tehran and Riyadh have previously cut off ties and treated each other as threats, despite the fact that their current relations are positive right now.
Saudi Arabia has previously fought Yemen’s Houthi rebels. Although it is still in its early stages, the unresolved conflict could rekindle in the coming years.
Even if sales of weapons are authorized by the president, the US Congress has the option to refuse them.
Trump has sincere statements to the contrary, and he reiterated his desire to continue selling in his White House appearance on Tuesday.
He blasted Saudi Arabia and the crown prince, particularly in light of the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who had long been a major source of tension between the two nations, particularly under former US President Joe Biden’s administration.
He also notably demonstrated no disregard for Israel’s “qualitative military edge” US security policy, which stipulates that it should always have access to superior weapons over its neighbors in the Middle East.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is seated next to US President Donald Trump, claimed Osama bin Laden was responsible for the US-Saudi relations and that anyone who disagrees would advance that goal.
Published On 18 Nov 2025
Hamas and other Gaza-based groups said in a joint statement that the US-led effort will serve as a framework that “opens the door for field arrangements imposed on the Palestinian national will” and that other groups in Gaza also stated in a joint statement on Tuesday.
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The international military force to be stationed in Gaza “will turn into a type of imposed guardianship or administration,” according to them in its current proposed form, repressing a reality that restrains the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination and control their own affairs.
The factions claimed that the plan, which is led by US President Donald Trump and supported by a number of Arab states in the area, was a “form of deep international cooperation in the [Israeli] occupation’s] war against our people.”
Hamas and other organizations claim that the resolution does not pay any attention to root causes, such as ending Israeli occupation and apartheid, and ignores the daily attacks by Israeli soldiers and settlers across the occupied West Bank.
Some residents of Gaza were skeptical about the UN resolution despite the fact that Palestinians in Gaza had hoped the ceasefire would stop more frequent bombardments and hunger.
Residents of Gaza City Moamen Abdul-Malek told Al Jazeera, “I completely reject this decision.” Our people have the power to rule us. We don’t need foreign or Arab forces to rule us. We as a people of this nation will bear responsibility for it.
Mohammed Hamdan, a resident of Gaza’s largest urban center, was quoted as saying that he also believes the Trump plan is against Palestinians’ interests. It was badly damaged during Israel’s two-year conflict.
Despite the fact that resistance is a cherished right of the people under occupation, it would remove its weapons.
Palestinians, according to Sanaa Mahmoud Kaheel, rejected the decision, which would cause uncertainty in Gaza.
We were excited when they announced that the Palestinian Authority would take control of the Gaza Strip. However, the international forces’ interactions with them will remain ambiguous, and she said that she does not know what might occur with their presence in Gaza tomorrow or the following day.
According to Mohamad Elmasry, a professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, the UN Security Council resolution’s lack of guarantee for an independent Palestinian state raises a lot of questions.
No “meaningful path forward” has been established in the direction of Palestinian statehood, he claimed.
Israeli politicians criticized the resolution, even as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thanked Trump for his role in the so-called “board of peace” that is expected to rule Gaza in a statement.
Itamar Ben-Gvir, the head of the Israeli National Security Council, said that President Mahmoud Abbas must be imprisoned and senior Palestinian Authority officials must be assassinated if the resolution advances the possibility of a future sovereign Palestinian state.
The occupied West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, which controls some of the region, welcomed the resolution and indicated that it was ready to put it into practice.
Israeli airstrikes east of Khan Younis on Tuesday targeted areas east of the so-called yellow line, a line that defines Israeli military-held territory, while east of Gaza City carried out raids and demolition operations.
Despite growing threats from her counterpart, Donald Trump, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has once more rejected the possibility of American military action on her country’s soil.
Sheinbaum was asked about Trump’s statements from the morning of Tuesday, when he expressed his anger toward Mexico and pondered taking swift action.
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Sheinbaum responded in Spanish, “It won’t happen,” saying.
She then went on to say that she had spoken to Trump’s and Marco Rubio’s secretary of state “many times” about her position.
She explained that “He has suggested or said, “We offer you a United States military intervention in Mexico or whatever you need to combat criminal groups,” on several occasions.
She reiterated her position that no outside intervention would be permitted on Mexican soil, despite her assurance that she would cooperate with the US military and share intelligence with them.
Sheinbaum continued, “We do not consent to any foreign government intervention.” On the phone, I told him. I’ve said it before to Marco Rubio and the State Department.
Her remarks follow a Monday meeting between Trump and Gianni Infantino, the president of FIFA, in the Oval Office. The Republican president addressed the growing military campaign against drug cartels and criminal networks in Latin America using the occasion.
Trump responded in the affirmative when a reporter inquired about his potential “potentially launching strikes in Mexico.”
“To stop drugs,” That’s fine with me. Trump remarked, “We must do everything to stop drugs.” Over the weekend, I took a look at Mexico City. There are some significant issues there.”
The US bombing campaign that started on September 2 was then mentioned by him.
83 people have been killed in alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean as a result of at least 21 deadly missile strikes.
The military campaign has been criticized as an unlawful extrajudicial killing by UN officials and other legal experts.
Trump, however, suggested that Mexico’s campaign might eventually include strikes on land-based targets.
Would we proceed as we have done to the waterways if we had to? You’re aware that almost no drugs are entering our waterways anymore, Trump continued.
Would I use land corridors to do that? I’d say it without a doubt. Look at the destruction of families as we save 25, 000 American lives every time we knock out a boat.
There is no factual justification for Trump’s repeated use of that statistic, which is 25, 000.
Deaths from fatal drug overdoses have decreased in recent years, according to preliminary data from the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, with 73, 960 deaths reported during the 12-month period ending in April.
Additionally, the Trump administration has not established a link between the bombed vessels and the link between them and drug trafficking.
Although families in nations like Venezuela, Colombia, and Trinidad and Tobago have claimed that their loved ones vanished following the attacks, the identities of the victims are largely unknown. Some claim that their relatives were fishermen alone.
In October, two survivors were repatriated: one to Colombia and the other to Ecuador, where they both released the man without charging him with a crime.
Trump has long threatened to expand his bombing campaign to include targets from the land. However, he declined to specify whether, should he choose to strike Mexico, he would ask for permission.
He said to a reporter in the Oval Office on Monday, “I wouldn’t answer that question.” I’ve been in Mexico lately. They are aware of my position.
Let me just put it this way, he later said. With Mexico, I’m not happy.
Trump has proclaimed extraordinary powers since taking office for a second term to support his increasingly violent actions against drug cartels, even going so far as to say that the US is at war with traffickers.
In the US, only Congress can declare war. However, a rumored secret order allowing the military to combat the cartels was signed by Trump in August, which sparked new concerns in Mexico.
Sheinbaum stated to her constituents that there would be “no invasion” at the time.
Then, on October 2, Trump wrote to Congress in a memo outlining his administration’s legal justification for the ongoing attacks in the Caribbean and the Pacific, calling Latin American cartels “enemy combatants” in a “non-international armed conflict.”
Trump has referred to a number of drug cartels as “foreign terrorist organizations” throughout his second term, but international and domestic law does not support that claim.
Trump reiterated his assertion that the US is engaged in an armed conflict in his Oval Office remarks on Monday.
Every drug lord’s address is known to us. Their address is known to us. Their front door is known to us. We are completely knowledgeable about each and every one of them. Our country’s citizens are being killed. Trump remarked, “That’s like a war.”
There has been renewed interest in the US’s right to send armed forces into Mexico in recent years because of its long and contentious history of military intervention in Latin America.
For instance, former Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, a well-known Republican figure, announced that he would send US special forces to Mexico to combat drug-trafficking cartels in 2023.
DeSantis was joking about his presidential plans when he stated to Fox News that “I will do it on day one.”
Fears that Trump might spearhead such a movement date back to the first year of his presidency, from 2017 to 2021, when he first thought about using the term “foreign terrorist organization” designation.
Sheinbaum’s successor, former Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, had to avenge concerns that Trump would subsequently engage in international intervention.
Sheinbaum denied any US intervention on the table on Tuesday by echoing Lopez Obrador.