TEL AVIV, November 27./TASS/. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes normalizing relations with Saudi Arabia will be possible after the the operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip is finished.

"I think if we beat Hamas, we can go back to peace with Saudi Arabia," the prime minister said in a conversation with US billionaire Elon Musk on the social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter). "I think we can expand the circle of peace beyond anything imaginable. But first we have to win," Netanyahu said.

Earlier, Saudi Investment Minister Khalid bin Abdulaziz al-Falih said that the normalization of ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel is still on the agenda despite what is happening in Gaza. On November 3, the Semafor news portal quoted sources in Arab countries and the United States as saying that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates plan to continue diplomatic and economic rapprochement with Israel despite the escalation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

In September 2020, Israel signed an agreement mediated by the United States to normalize relations with the UAE and Bahrain. The trilateral deal was called the Abraham Accords. Subsequently, Sudan and Morocco announced the normalization of relations with the Jewish state. Prior to that, Israel had diplomatic relations with only Egypt and Jordan among the Arab world.

Musk arrived in Israel on Monday for a visit. He accompanied Netanyahu to visit Kibbutz Kfar Aza, one of the Israeli communities most affected by the October 7 attack by the Palestinian Hamas movement.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 200 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.