Iran’s Nukes Are a Thorn for Saudi-Israeli Peace

Excerpt

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has reportedly made a joint U.S.-Saudi nuclear-enrichment program a top condition for a peace deal with Israel. This is untenable. Putting aside the practical and technical challenges posed by establishing such a facility, the U.S. can’t discount the potential for a future Saudi leader to use an industrial-scale enrichment infrastructure to produce fissile material as part of a nuclear weapons program. Once Saudi Arabia builds an enrichment program, Turkey and Egypt will want one too.

A race to enrich throughout one of the world’s most dangerous and unstable regions is a national-security recipe for disaster. But when any American tells a Saudi official that the U.S. can’t support enrichment on Saudi soil, an obvious question comes back quickly: You’re saying you can support an enrichment program in Iran, which is trying to kill Americans every day, but you can’t support an enrichment program in Saudi Arabia, a close strategic partner?

There’s an easy fix for President Biden to deliver Saudi-Israeli peace without giving in to Saudi demands: Restore the international standard of zero enrichment for Tehran.

Tantalized by the prospect of a historic peace agreement that could change the face of the Middle East, there is increasing pressure in both Israeli and American circles to accommodate the Saudi request. After all, the 2015 nuclear deal and subsequent negotiations have all but normalized illicit Iranian nuclear activity. But instead of making an already flawed nonproliferation policy even worse, Mr. Biden should opt for the more obvious path: opposing Iran’s enrichment, too.