U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday that he plans to let Saudi Arabia purchase F-35 stealth jets, in what would be a significant sale of advanced American military hardware to the Middle East.

"They've been a great ally," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office one day before Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's visit to the United States. "We will be selling F-35 s."

Why It Matters

The arms sale would make Saudi Arabia the first U.S. security partner in the Middle East other than Israel to acquire the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II—a potential shift in Washington's policy of maintaining Israel's qualitative military edge.

Trump previously greenlit the sale of F-35s to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) after it had signed a normalization treaty with Israel in 2020, but t

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