The Saudi nuclear deal Trump didn't seem ready to announce - opinion

ByDOUGLAS BLOOMFIELDJULY 30, 2026 17:00After the fumbled rollout of a nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia, US President Donald Trump should understand what president Ronald Reagan was thinking when he famously joked, “Sometimes our right hand doesn’t know what our far-right hand is doing.”In a series of snafus, Trump was embarrassed, the Saudis blindsided, the region trembled, Israel worried, and everyone was confused.Energy Secretary Chris Wright appears to have caught his boss off guard by not telling him he was about to sign a 30-year nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia potentially worth tens of billions to American industry. That’s the kind of really big deal Trump likes to take credit for by announcing personally. It would be a welcome diversion from all the bad news about his Iran war fiasco.Trump seemed to contradict himself the next day when he said, “nobody got out ahead” of him in the announcement, although when reporters asked if he had authorized Wright to sign the deal, he said they had not discussed it, CNN reported.US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright speaks during a press conference discussing fertilizer policy at USDA Headquarters in Washington, DC, US, May 19, 2026. (credit: REUTERS/Eric Lee)Wright also embarrassed Trump by leaving out key provisions that two presidents had insisted upon. In 2023, former US president Joe Biden linked a Saudi nuclear agreement to the kingdom normalizing relations with Israel, and Trump insisted the deal “is totally subject to Saudi Arabia joining the very respected and successful Abraham Accords,” his crowning achievement.Without both provisions, a White House spokesman said, “the deal is off.” Neither element was in the documents that Wright signed with his Saudi counterpart, nor is it clear they can, or will, be added formally to the agreement before it is sent to Congress for approval.The Saudis have rejected both conditions, insisting nothing can happen until the Palestinians are on “a credible and irreversible path” toward statehood.Another troubling provision that could create problems in Congress and throughout the Middle East is that the agreement appears to give the Saudis unprecedented authority to enrich uranium and reprocess spent nuclear fuel in their own country.“A previous US nuclear deal, with the United Arab Emirates, imposed tightened inspections and did not allow the Emiratis to enrich their own uranium, severely limiting their path to a bomb. The deal with Riyadh appears to be different,” the New York Times reported.The Trump-Saudi deal is likely to provoke demands by the UAE and others for similar treatment. More importantly, with the Saudi kingdom enriching its own uranium, it raises fears that Riyadh could produce weapons-grade uranium if it wished.Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto Saudi leader known as MBS, said in 2018 that “without a doubt, if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we would follow suit as soon as possible.”Read that alongside reports that Iran’s new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei may not share his father’s qualms about building nuclear weapons. That is likely motivated by a feeling that if Iran had already had the bomb, the US and Israel would not have attacked in February and killed his father, sister, and other family members.Asking the questionsAn Israeli diplomat I knew liked to tell the story of how he got an urgent cable from his home office, telling him, “Start worrying. Details to follow,” a message just as relevant to the current diplomatic embarrassment.Last week’s deal signing struck a chord of paranoia in Israel. The New York Times said it “appears to sidestep Israel entirely.”Since normalization was not part of the announced deal, Israelis are wondering: Did Washington just sell us out? Is this another element of what seems to be a US pivot against Israel?Jerusalem would prefer no Saudi nuclear program. It fears it would be too easy to divert enriched uranium to build a weapon, a concern shared throughout the region and one likely to ignite an arms race.Under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s stewardship, Israel has seen its support plummet here in the West Bank of the Atlantic Ocean. And not just among Progressives, Democrats, and many Jews. It is also endangered on the other side of the spectrum, where the America First isolationists and some of the MAGA followers are blaming Israel for pushing Trump into a very unpopular and seemingly unending war with Iran.Early on, Trump cut Israel out of talks with Iran, belittling his erstwhile partner, saying that Netanyahu “will do whatever I tell him to do.”Israel and its loyal AIPAC foot soldiers have become pariahs in many parts of campaign 2026. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani is fomenting anti-Israel demonstrations in the city with the world’s largest Jewish population to greet the leader of the Jewish state if he comes for the United Nations General Assembly this fall. It won’t be pretty.Another reason to be nervous is Lebanon. Trump, for all his claims of victory, is anxious to cut a deal to end the disastrous Iran war, reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and claim victory when gas prices drop. He called Netanyahu “crazy” for waging that war.Iran is insisting that any deal must include a ceasefire in Lebanon to protect its Hezbollah client. Netanyahu worries whether Trump will demand the IDF withdraw (it has already begun at his insistence) before Israel has defeated the terrorist group and the Lebanese army can take control.Netanyahu is in no hurry to leave; he has an election coming up, and so does Trump, which helps explain why they hold their opposing views. Netanyahu may have forgotten that after the First Lebanon War in 1982 to drive the PLO out of Israel’s northern neighbor, Israel stayed too long and Hezbollah took root.With its enormous oil and natural gas reserves, does Saudi Arabia really need a nuclear power program? Is the American interest here strategic or transactional? Does this deal serve the interest of regional and national security? Or is it driven by the administration to funnel billions of dollars of business into American companies to build, train, maintain, and supply the Saudi civilian nuclear program?As Congress and the American people examine this deal, they should be asking: Who benefits?Start with what role the highly conflicted Trump family may have played in making this deal, particularly his son-in-law, Jared Kushner.The family is doing billions of dollars’ worth of private business in the kingdom. Forbes reported the president and his family made an estimated $50 million from their dealings with Saudi Arabia in 2024. Reuters noted that two Trump-branded luxury projects valued at $10 billion, are being planned in Riyadh and Jeddah.Kushner’s role in the deal is unclear. He became friends with MBS during Trump’s first term, when he handled several White House diplomatic chores, particularly in the Middle East. After Trump left office, MBS invested $2 billion from his country’s sovereign wealth fund in Kushner’s private investment company.Once the nuclear deal is formally presented to Congress, lawmakers will have 90 days to examine it.These are just some of the questions they should be asking: What does it say and what does it mean? What’s in the secret side letters? Who benefits?The writer is a Washington-based journalist, consultant, lobbyist, and former legislative director at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.Follow us on Google