Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) National President Morton A. Klein released the following statement:
ZOA strongly opposes selling powerful F-35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. The sale would substantially impair Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME), and involve severe additional risks to U.S. and Israeli security.
An F-35 stealth fighter jet can reach Israel in mere minutes. Moreover, Saudi Arabia is reportedly seeking forty-eight F-35s, a larger number than Israel currently has. This massive, dangerous sale is likely to violate the U.S. legal obligation under 22 U.S. Code § 2776(h) to assure Israel’s QME – Israel’s ability to counter and defeat any credible conventional military threat from any individual state or possible coalition of states, or from non-state actors, while sustaining minimal damages and casualties.
Notably, Saudi Arabia still has no formal relations with Israel, continues to boycott Israeli products, and prohibits Israelis from visiting Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia continues to make hostile demands on Israel, including conditioning relations on establishing a terrorist Palestinian Arab State on Israel’s lawful land – which would be an existential threat to Israel. Saudi Arabia also co-led the UN summit in September 2025 that rewarded Palestinian terror by ratcheting up the pressure for establishing a Palestinian Arab terror state on Israel’s land.
Even if Saudi Arabia joins the Abraham Accords, this would not overcome the impairment to Israel’s QME. Nations that join the Accords are not excluded from QME calculations, for good reasons. Saudi Arabia is an Islamic dictatorship whose present leaders could be replaced by leaders who are hostile to America, and who have no compunction tearing up an accord with Israel. A signature on a piece of paper – which can be revoked by a future Saudi regime – is not worth trading away tangible weapons capabilities that can be turned against, and severely damage, Israeli and U.S. security.
In addition, Saudi Arabia’s comprehensive strategic partnership and joint military exercises with China, and rapprochement with Iran – both powerful enemies of the U.S. – heighten the dangers of an F-35 sale to Saudi Arabia. The highly advanced F-35 technology could end up in the hands of our enemy China (or even Iran if the rapprochement continues to deepen), endangering American interests.
Just days ago, the Royal Saudi Naval Forces and the People’s Liberation Army Navy of China increased Saudi-China military cooperation by completing “Blue Sword-2025” (a.k.a “Blue Sword-4”) joint naval training drills.
In 2023, China brokered the Saudi-Iranian rapprochement, which restored Saudi-Iranian diplomatic relations, and cooperation and security agreements. The Saudi-Iranian regimes’ rapprochement continues to survive and deepen those nations’ relations. Moreover, the reduced tensions between the Saudi Kingdom and Iranian regime – and the resulting informal cessation of Iranian proxy cross-border attacks on Saudi oil fields and other Saudi interests, undermine the previously-used argument that the Saudi Kingdom needs more advanced weaponry to counter Iranian and Houthi threats to Saudi Arabia.
Further, in September 2025, Saudi Arabia entered into a Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement with nuclear-armed Pakistan. The agreement states that “any aggression against either country shall be considered an aggression against both.” Moreover, according to a senior Saudi official, the agreement “is a comprehensive defensive agreement that encompasses all military means.” U.S. technology provided to Saudi Arabia could thus also fall into the hands of Pakistan – an unstable nuclear-armed radical Muslim state, which harbored Al-Qaeda and other terror groups, and has had a rocky relationship with the U.S.
As ZOA noted regarding the huge U.S. agreement in 2017 to sell $350 billion of sophisticated military equipment to Saudi Arabia, U.S. arms provided to Middle Eastern nations with the best of intentions have too often ended up being turned against U.S. forces and our allies. (See “ZOA Concerned U.S. Arms Sale to Saudi Arabia Harms Israel’s Security,” May 22, 2017.) In sum, the proposed F-35 fighter jet sale is not worth the extreme risks it entails.