Trump in Riyadh: Will Israeli sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria once again be the sacrifice for peace?

U.S. President Donald Trump’s Saudi Arabia visit has sparked speculation that he could give a nod in the direction of Palestinian statehood in Judea and Samaria, precisely as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to be reviving the possibility of Israeli sovereignty over portions of that territory.

Speaking before a closed-door Knesset committee on Sunday, Israel Hayom reported that Netanyahu said Israel could annex 30% of Judea and Samaria in the near future, while granting autonomy to the Palestinian Authority in other parts of that region, known as Areas A and B.

"But there must be full Israeli security control over the entire territory," Netanyahu said, noting that there will be no Palestinian state.

Areas A and B are already under partial Palestinian Authority (PA) administration. They also include several key biblical sites revered by Jews and Christians, such as the Cave of the Patriarchs, Rachel's Tomb, and Joseph's Tomb.

Nadia Matar, co-chair of the Sovereignty Movement, told All Israel News that reported tensions between Netanyahu and Trump stem from disagreements over normalization with Saudi Arabia. According to Matar, Trump has told Netanyahu that if Israel wants peace, it must at least "in theory" agree to a Palestinian state, and he has asked Netanyahu to do so.

"But Netanyahu understands the Middle East more than Trump, and he understands that if a politician of his stature agrees – even in theory, on paper – it could become reality at any stage," Matar said.

During his first term, Trump himself proposed a peace plan known as the Deal of the Century that would allow Israel to apply sovereignty to 30% of Judea and Samaria. That plan was shelved in favor of the Abraham Accords, a historic series of normalization deals with Arab nations, including the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco.

Now, with Trump back in the White House and longtime Christian Zionist/Evangelical supporters – including newly appointed U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee – publicly backing Jewish sovereignty over the Biblical Heartland, Israeli settlers hope their moment has returned.

But a central question looms: if Trump makes a deal with Saudi Arabia his top priority, will sovereignty be shelved once again?

Trump has been optimistic about Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords. 

"That will happen," he told Time magazine last month.

While he predicted normalization would come "very quickly," reports suggest that Trump has dropped peace with Israel as a requirement for U.S. support of Saudi Arabia's civilian nuclear ambitions and other economic deals, suggesting that normalization with Israel might not be in the offing. 

Over the weekend, rumors that while in Saudi Arabia, Trump planned to recognize a Palestinian state that would not include Hamas were dismissed by Huckabee as "nonsense."

"The president looks forward to embarking on his historic return to the Middle East" to promote a region where "extremism is defeated [through] commerce and cultural exchanges," White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said Friday.

Indeed, Trump appears to be leading with economics. 

In March, he said he would visit Saudi Arabia if it committed to investing $1 trillion in the United States.

"They've agreed to do that, so I'm going to be going there," he said.

While Saudi Arabia has not confirmed that amount, it did announce plans in January to boost trade and investment with the U.S. by $600 billion over four years, with more potentially to come.

However, security and diplomacy are also expected to feature prominently. 

According to Arabic media reports, Trump is set to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman alongside Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, and Syria's de facto leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa. 

The Al-Quds Palestinian newspaper quoted an unnamed source saying the Saudi crown prince "looks forward to Trump's agreement to the Saudi condition of establishing a Palestinian state."

Trump had previously claimed that Saudi Arabia no longer demanded Palestinian statehood in return for normalization with Israel, but Riyadh denied it.

Just before the October 7 Hamas massacre, which triggered Israel's ongoing war and a surge of anti-Israel sentiment across the Muslim world, the Biden administration appeared close to finalizing a Saudi deal that would have included normalization between Riyadh and Jerusalem and a pathway to Palestinian statehood. 

Under the original Abraham Accords, Israel agreed to freeze sovereignty plans for four years – an expired moratorium. If such a clause were included now, it would mean that sovereignty could not happen under Trump and Huckabee and could, therefore, be delayed indefinitely.

Settler leaders are urging Netanyahu to reject any diplomatic deal that may come out of Trump's visit – unless it includes Israeli sovereignty over at least key parts of Judea and Samaria and excludes any promise, even theoretical, of a future Palestinian state.

But for many on the Israeli Right and the settler leaders, even the Trump sovereignty plan from his first term did not go far enough. They rejected it then, and they reject it now, as does the Palestinian Authority.

This week, the Sovereignty Movement released a statement calling on the prime minister to stand firm, despite mounting political pressure to accept a Palestinian state in exchange for normalization with Saudi Arabia, even if it's only symbolic or declarative.

"Such a state would not only undermine Israel's existence but also destabilize the region and serve as proof to other terrorist organizations around the world that terrorism pays off," the movement wrote. They added that this stance reflects "the overwhelming majority of the people of Israel."

The movement’s representative, Matar, argued that Israel should apply full sovereignty over all of Judea and Samaria, as well as the Jordan Valley, immediately.

"Now is the time, when some people are still promoting a Palestinian state, to stop it once and for all," she said. "This land is ours. There is no better victory in this war than applying sovereignty."

Matar added that if Saudi Arabia truly wants normalization, "our condition is only after we apply sovereignty."

Some settler leaders argue that applying sovereignty to only 30% of the territory would be a mistake. They warn that doing so could make it far more challenging to extend sovereignty to the remaining areas in the future.

The settler movement is counting on Huckabee and the evangelical Christian community to support its push for sovereignty. Several prominent Christian leaders and organizations have already urged U.S. officials and Christian media outlets to stop using the term "West Bank" and instead refer to the area by its biblical names – Judea and Samaria – to reinforce the deep historical and religious connection between the Jewish people and the land.

In addition, American Christian Leaders for Israel (ACLI) at the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) convention earlier this year signed a resolution reaffirming the Jewish people’s right to Judea and Samaria and the importance of Jewish sovereignty over the region.

Still, as seen during the signing of the Abraham Accords in 2020, Christian Zionist support for "biblical Israel" has, at times, shifted toward pragmatism, favoring peace over territorial claims. The International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem, for instance, has long maintained that Israel holds a historic and legal right to Judea and Samaria. Yet it emphasizes that the decision to extend Israeli law there is ultimately a choice for Israel to make.

Christian and Jewish supporters often point to biblical texts, such as those in Jeremiah, to justify Jewish claims to the land. 

But for most Christians, these verses are prophecies about the End of Days – the messianic era – rather than a political directive for today. Evangelical leaders have stressed that while the Bible promises the full inheritance of the land, the current priority should be a secure, stable, and peaceful Israel.

Every day, Evangelical Christians worldwide pray for Jerusalem's peace. It was, in fact, Christian Zionist leaders who helped initiate talks with the United Arab Emirates in 2018 that laid the groundwork for the Abraham Accords.

At the same time, not all Israelis are aligned with the sovereignty movement. This week, the Coalition for Regional Security – a network of public figures from the security, diplomatic, business, and research sectors formed after October 7 – issued a warning: Israel must move quickly on normalization or risk being left out of a historic regional shift.

"The reports coming from the White House over the weekend serve as a wake-up call for the Israeli government to take urgent diplomatic action," the coalition said in a statement. "If we continue to hesitate, we will be left behind.

"Government of Israel," the statement continued, "this is the time to seize the historic opportunity presented by President Trump to change the face of the region – it begins with the return of all hostages, an end to the war in Gaza, and includes the replacement of Hamas rule in the Strip, the signing of a normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia, and a path to separation from the Palestinians as part of a comprehensive regional arrangement.

"Get on the regional train now," the statement concluded. "History will not wait."

And it won't. History is already knocking. The question is whether Israel will have to choose between sovereignty and Saudi normalization or whether it can maneuver the situation and achieve both goals.

If it chooses normalization, sovereignty may have to wait for a far-off future, perhaps even the messianic age.

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