Trump’s Middle East tour boosts Arab states at Israel’s expense

His embrace of leaders in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates stood out as Trump bypassed Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with whom he has turned more distant in recent months.

Even before Trump arrived in the region, moves including the administration’s unilateral deal with Hamas to secure the release of the last remaining American hostage in Gaza either sidelined or surprised the Israelis, underscoring the two allies aren’t fully in sync on the region’s biggest flashpoints.

The moves also highlighted a difference with his predecessor, Joe Biden, who focused on wooing Netanyahu, months of often-fruitless diplomacy to halt the Gaza war and mending his relationship with Saudi Arabia, which he had called a “pariah state" before taking office.

The question for Trump is whether the shift from Israel is anything more than tactical. The U.S. remains Israel’s closest ally and main arms supplier. Israel’s support in Congress, though damaged by its war in Gaza, makes it tricky if not impossible for any White House to significantly downgrade the relationship.

Trump has long had a wary relationship with Netanyahu. He hasn’t gotten over Netanyahu’s public congratulations to Biden after his 2020 presidential election victory, associates say. But their current disagreements have more to do with Trump’s agenda than any long-term divergence, analysts said.

“The differences are real and the tension is real," said Steven Cook, a Middle East expert at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. But “folks are making too big a deal that Israel has been left off the itinerary." Netanyahu has had two meetings with Trump and Israeli leaders remain in close contact with their American counterparts, he noted.

For Arab governments, even a temporary swing in their direction was welcome.

“To those in the Gulf who thought that the only way to America was through Israel, now we see an opening where we can go directly to the States," said Bader al-Saif, an expert on Persian Gulf and Arabian affairs at Kuwait University. “We have access to the number one guy. He listens."

Gulf countries are “becoming the partner of choice," Joel Rayburn, Trump’s nominee to be the State Department’s top Middle East official, said at a Senate confirmation hearing Thursday. The president’s trip “proves it is time we expand on our relationships in the Gulf, expand them from security to prosperity," he added.

But in a reminder that the region’s conflicts have often soured optimism about transformed relationships, Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry condemned Israel’s war in Gaza as Trump departed the region, denouncing what it called “repeated assaults by the Israeli war machine on the Palestinian people."

Gaza had drawn drew little mention as the oil-rich Gulf nations paraded Trump through grand palaces and an ornate mosque, committed to trillions in U.S. investment, invited top business leaders for opulent gatherings, lined streets with mounted camels and horses, and lighted up buildings—including the world’s tallest skyscraper in Dubai—with projections of the American flag.

Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the United Arab Emirates, welcomed President Trump upon his arrival Thursday in Abu Dhabi.

His hosts heaped praise on Trump, who avoided delivering what had become familiar messages by past administrations about human rights. Arabs didn’t need Westerners “giving you lectures on how to live," Trump said.

No one pulled out the stops more than the Saudis, the deep-pocketed regional heavyweight that has begun to flex its muscle after decades of passivity. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman guided Trump throughout the entire 36-hour visit, ending with Trump bidding the monarch farewell on the tarmac.

“The U.S.-Saudi relationship has been a bedrock of security and prosperity," Trump said during his stay in Riyadh. “It is more powerful than ever before, and, by the way, it will remain that way."

Trump added that it was his dream for Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel, which would amount to a diplomatic masterstroke that could transform the Middle East and was a major unfulfilled goal of Biden’s presidency. Trump told a large gathering in Riyadh, with Prince Mohammed in the front row, that the kingdom could reach that decision on its own time, an acknowledgment that a formal diplomatic rapprochement was unlikely as long as the Gaza war continued.

Arab governments have heard vows of U.S. support before—including from Trump during his first term—only to see Washington stay more closely aligned with Israel than with them. In 2019, during his first term, Trump vowed to retaliate against Iran after a drone attack on a Saudi oil facility that the U.S. blamed on Tehran but he canceled the strike, angering Saudi leaders.

Qatari military jets escorted Trump’s plane as it prepared to land in Doha Wednesday.

But it has been Netanyahu who has found himself on the outside recently, starting in April when Trump announced nuclear talks with Iran during the Israeli leader’s visit to the White House.

Although Trump says he would prefer an agreement with Tehran not to develop a nuclear weapon, he has threatened that Iran could face attack if no deal was reached. That approach would align Trump more closely once again with Netanyahu’s view about how to halt Iran’s nuclear program. Yet that is only one of the disagreements between him and Israel.

Earlier this month, he struck a deal with Houthi militants to stop attacking U.S. ships, but not Israel. Before arriving in the Middle East, he negotiated the release of Israeli-American hostage Edan Alexander with Hamas while Israeli hostages remained in captivity, and during the trip this week he agreed to lift sanctions on Syria after a personal appeal by Prince Mohammed, breaking with Israel, which has been skeptical of the new government in Damascus.

When Trump came to the Middle East during his first term, he also made Saudi Arabia his first stop, but he later flew to Israel, met with Netanyahu and prayed at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, becoming the first sitting president to do so.

This time, in Abu Dhabi, Trump made his first visit to a mosque as president, a stunning turnaround for a politician who once declared, “Islam hates us."

Write to Alexander Ward at alex.ward@wsj.com, Alex Leary at alex.leary@wsj.com and Stephen Kalin at stephen.kalin@wsj.com