US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, Wednesday, at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York that the confrontations in the occupied West Bank, "including settlement building and settler attacks on Palestinian villages, are making it difficult for the United States to broker a normalization deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia." Despite the interest of Saudi Arabia and Israel in the possibility of normalization.

Blinken added: “It (Saudi-Israeli normalization) is very difficult, and it is not something that can happen overnight, but it is also a real possibility and we are working on it. We have told our friends and allies in Israel that if there is a fire burning in their backyard, it will be even harder. If not impossible, deepening existing agreements, as well as extending them to Saudi Arabia.

Blinken indicated that he had spoken about the issue with Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on Tuesday.