President Trump reiterated on Monday his call for more nations in the Middle East to normalize diplomatic relations with Israel as part of a peace deal with Iran.
“If they don’t, they should not be part of this Deal in that it shows bad intention,” Mr. Trump wrote on social media, urging countries including Saudi Arabia and Qatar to join the Abraham Accords. Mr. Trump said Iran was invited, too, upon signing a deal with the president.
But the prospect of the countries agreeing is unlikely, analysts say, given the conditions they have previously made on normalizing ties with Israel, as well as the diplomatic fallout of Israel’s war in Gaza.
Mr. Trump’s list of countries that should join the accords, which date to his first term, included two that already have diplomatic relations with Israel: Egypt and Jordan.
His administration has tried to get more countries on board since he returned to the White House. The prospect of expanding the accords — unlikely as that may be — could placate some Iran hawks in the Republican Party who have criticized Mr. Trump over the developing peace deal.
“President Trump’s most recent proposal requiring expansion of the Abraham Accords as part of a negotiated settlement to the Iran conflict is simply brilliant and would result in the most significant change in the Middle East in thousands of years,” Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, wrote on X on Monday after he expressed concern about the contours of the peace deal with Iran.
Tyler Pager is a White House correspondent for The Times, covering President Trump and his administration.
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