KT McFarland to Newsmax: Saudis Centerpiece of Trump's Mideast Vision

Saudi Arabia — and specifically Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman — has become the "centerpiece" of President Donald Trump's Middle East policy, KT McFarland told Newsmax on Tuesday as Trump welcomed bin Salman to the White House.

"Saudi Arabia and particularly Mohammed bin Salman is now the centerpiece of Trump's Middle East policy," McFarland told "American Agenda." "And it's not just U.S.-Saudi relations here or U.S.-Saudi-Israeli relations. It's really the whole region."

McFarland emphasized that Trump's personal decision early in his first term to back the then-30-year-old crown prince reshaped the strategic map.

"Because of President Trump's close relationship with Mohammed bin Salman, that goes back to President Trump's first week in office, in his first term, when Trump decided he was going to back this 30-year-old aspirational leader," she said, "President Trump backed him, and now what we have is a close father-son almost relationship."

She credited that relationship with accelerating a dramatic diplomatic shift.

"The Saudis have been instrumental in the Gaza peace plan," she said. "They've been instrumental in not turning away Israel's attack against Iran's proxies. And they've been instrumental in bringing other countries in the region — Qatar, Turkey, others — into the Abraham Accords, even though the Saudis themselves have not yet signed."

When asked whether the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 complicates U.S.-Saudi ties, McFarland said the issue has faded. Trump was asked about the subject by reporters while meeting with the crown prince.

"I think enough time has passed," she said, contrasting Trump and Joe Biden. Biden, she argued, vowed isolation but later approached Riyadh "hat in hand" when oil prices surged.

"I thought President Trump handled it very well," she said. "He didn't have that embarrassing moment for Mohammed bin Salman. He said it's controversial, and then let's move on."

Moving on, McFarland stressed, is strategically necessary: "Without the Saudis, there will be no peace in the Middle East. There will certainly be no peace in Gaza."

McFarland also said Saudi guidance directly shaped Trump's opening to Syria and its new president Ahmed al-Sharaa, who visited the White House earlier this month.

"The reason President Trump met with the Syrian president and has given the Syrian president a chance is because of Mohammed bin Salman, who said to President Trump in May, look, give this new guy a chance," she said.

"He's going to turn away from terrorism. He's going to turn away from ISIS, he's going to turn away from Iran, and he's going to turn toward peace and a good relationship with the United States. That's exactly what's happened.

"So, it's not just the sort of immediate Israeli-Arab peace agreements that we're having. [It] resets the global chessboard."

Saudi Arabia has reportedly increased its planned U.S. investments from $600 billion — the figure discussed when Trump visited Riyadh in May — to as much as $1 trillion, reflecting the deepening alignment between Washington and Riyadh under Trump.

"The Middle East is the linchpin between Europe and Africa and Asia and South Asia, Southeast Asia," McFarland said. "It's the transit point for oil. It's the transit point for goods.

"And to have that region at peace for the first time in thousands of years, but certainly at peace for the first time in decades in modern times, is going to make a huge difference, not just to the region, not just to the Israelis, not just to the Arabs, but it's going to make a huge difference to the entire world."

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