The State of Israel and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia have never had formal diplomatic relations. In 1947, Saudi Arabia voted against the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, and currently does not recognize Israeli sovereignty. However, , bilateral negotiations towards Israeli–Saudi normalization are ongoing, with the United States serving as the two sides' mediator.
During the main phase of the Arab–Israeli conflict, Saudi Arabia supported the Arab League against Israel. Likewise, the official Saudi policy towards the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has been supportive of the Palestinian Arabs. However, reports have surfaced in recent years indicating extensive behind-the-scenes cooperation in the areas of diplomacy, intelligence, and security. Warming relations between the two sides are a direct result of the unofficial Arab–Israeli alliance, which came to fruition in light of the Iran–Israel proxy conflict and the Iran–Saudi Arabia proxy conflict. At the same time, the Saudi relationship with the Palestinian National Authority has been deteriorating.
Early years
A charter member of the Arab League, Saudi Arabia has supported Palestinian rights to sovereignty, and called for withdrawal from the West Bank and other territory occupied by Israel since 1967. In 1947, Saudi Arabia was one of several Middle Eastern states that voted against in the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine. Saudi troops were sent to fight against Israel in the 1948 and 1973 wars. The 1981 Israel operation Operation Opera, a preemptive strike on nuclear reactor purchased by Iraq from France in 1976, allegedly took place with the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, as the flight path was over Saudi territory.. In recent years Saudi Arabia has changed its viewpoint concerning the validity of negotiating with Israel, which it previously refused. It calls for Israel's withdrawal from territory occupied in June 1967. In 2002 then-Crown Prince Abdullah extended a multilateral peace proposal based on withdrawal that would follow the borders of a two-state solution. At that time, Israel did not respond to the offer. In 2007 Saudi Arabia again officially supported a peaceful resolution of the Arab–Israeli conflict in which Israel was to concede to withdraw to the borders set in the two-state solutions, which generated more official negative reactions from Israeli authorities, citing the Oslo Accords and the Saudis' deviation from those accords. At this time, no demands were made of any other party other than of Israel.
Saudi Arabia rejected the Camp David Accords, claiming that they would be unable to achieve a comprehensive political solution that would ensure Palestinian Arabs can all move to Israel and the division of Jerusalem. In response to Egypt "betraying" the Arab States and signing peace with Israel, Saudi Arabia, along with all the Arab States, broke diplomatic relations with and suspended aid to Egypt; the two countries renewed formal ties in 1987. Simultaneously Saudi Arabia and Israel initiated their early steps towards a secret dialogue.
Warming (post-2010s) In 2005, Saudi Arabia announced the end of its ban on Israeli goods and services, due to its application to the World Trade Organization, where one member country cannot have a total ban on another. However, , the Saudi boycott was not cancelled. Reports in Arabic-language media suggest that there have been several meetings between Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Israeli officials over the last two years, with at least one of them taking place in Eilat in 2015 and another on the sidelines of the Arab summit in Jordan in March 2017. It has also been reported that Saudi and Israeli officers have been regularly meeting in a joint war room serving as a coordination center for Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United States.
After the Arab Spring, Israel views the Saudi government as "guarantor of stability", according to the New York Times. In 2011, Israel approved a German sale of 200 Leopard tanks to Saudi Arabia. The approval came from Uzi Arad, the national security advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu.