Trump senior aide Kushner to visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar

White House senior adviser
Jared Kushner and his team are headed to Saudi Arabia and Qatar
this week for talks in a region simmering with tension after the
killing of an Iranian nuclear scientist.

A senior administration official said on Sunday that Kushner
is to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the Saudi
city of Neom, and the emir of Qatar in that country in the
coming days. Kushner will be joined by Middle East envoys Avi
Berkowitz and Brian Hook and Adam Boehler, chief executive of
the US International Development Finance Corporation.

Kushner and his team helped negotiate normalisation deals
between Israel and Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Sudan
since August. The official said they would like to advance more
such agreements before President Donald Trump hands power to
President-elect Joe Biden on Jan 20.

Concerns over Iran

US officials believe enticing Saudi Arabia into a deal
with Israel would prompt other Arab nations to follow suit. But
the Saudis do not appear to be on the brink of reaching such a
landmark deal and officials in recent weeks have been focusing
on other countries, with concern about Iran’s regional influence
a uniting factor.

Kushner’s trip comes after the killing on Friday of Mohsen
Fakhrizadeh in Tehran by unidentified assailants. Western and
Israeli governments believe Fakhrizadeh was the architect of a
secret Iranian nuclear weapons program.

Days before the killing, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu travelled to Saudi Arabia and met with bin Salman, an
Israeli official said, in what was the first publicly confirmed
visit by an Israeli leader. Israeli media said they were joined
by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Strategic realignment

The historic meeting underlined how opposition to Tehran is
bringing about a strategic realignment of countries in the
Middle East. Bin Salman and Netanyahu fear Biden will adopt
policies on Iran similar to those adopted during Barack Obama’s
US presidency which strained Washington’s ties with its
traditional regional allies.

Biden has said he will rejoin the
international nuclear pact with Iran that Trump quit in 2018 –
and work with allies to strengthen its terms – if Tehran first
resumes strict compliance.

The senior administration official, speaking to Reuters on
condition of anonymity, declined to give more details of
Kushner’s trip for security reasons.

The official said Kushner met at the White House last week
with the Kuwaiti foreign minister, Sheikh Ahmad Nasser
Al Mohammad Al Sabah. Kuwait is seen as critical in any effort
to resolve a three-year rift between Qatar and other members of
the Gulf Cooperation Council.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates,
which comprise the GCC, cut diplomatic ties with Qatar in 2017
and imposed a boycott over allegations that Qatar supported
terrorism, a charge it denies.

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