U.S.-Saudi Nuclear Agreement Opens Door to Civilian Nuclear Cooperation, with One Major Caveat

A view of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. Credit: Unsplash/Ekrem Osmanogluby Maximilian Malawista (united nations)Monday, July 27, 2026Inter Press Service UNITED NATIONS, July 27 (IPS) - On Wednesday, July 22, the U.S. Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, and Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Energy, HRH Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman bin Abdulaziz signed a civilian nuclear cooperation agreement, best known as a 123 agreement, as well as an accompanying bilateral safeguards agreement, according to the U.S. Department of Energy and the Saudi Ministry of Energy. While the agreement was expected to be submitted to Congress for review, President Donald Trump has conditioned U.S. nuclear cooperation on Riyadh, normalizing relations with Israel in order to receive U.S. nuclear technology. A condition that appears difficult to satisfy given the Kingdom’s hardline stance that it will not normalize relations with Israel until a Palestinian state is established with East Jerusalem as its capital, according to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader.Washington mentions that these two agreements “lay the legal foundation for a decades-long, multi-billion-dollar partnership th...