News- Middle East: An Israeli delegation is reportedly expected to travel to Saudi Arabia to attend the 26th United Nations Tourism General Assembly, which is scheduled to be held in the kingdom.

As reported by the Israeli Army Radio on Sunday, the final approval for the trip has yet to be granted. 

The upcoming professional conference is set to occur from November 7 to 11, marking five decades of collaboration under the United Nations' specialized agency for tourism.

The latest development comes days after far-right Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich dismissed Saudi Arabia’s demand that Tel Aviv must first recognize a Palestinian state as a precondition for normalization, mocking the Arab kingdom by saying they should “keep riding camels in the desert” instead.

Despite efforts by US President Donald Trump's administration to involve Riyadh in the Abraham Accords, Saudi Arabia has consistently maintained that it will only normalize relations with Tel Aviv if it commits to a clear and irreversible path towards a future Palestinian state within a specific timeframe. 

In February, Saudi Arabia announced that it would not normalize diplomatic relations with Israel without the establishment of an independent sovereign Palestinian state with al-Quds as its capital, amid growing outrage over the regime’s genocidal war on Gaza.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is reportedly seeking to finalize normalization agreements with Saudi Arabia before the upcoming legislative elections for the Knesset, slated for November 2 next year.

The UAE, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco signed US-brokered normalization agreements with Israel in 2020, drawing condemnations from Palestinians who slammed the deals as “a stab in the back of the Palestinian cause and the Palestinian people.”

Source: Press TV