Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman speaks during the Jeddah Security and Development Summit in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, July 16, 2022. Photo: Bandar Algaloud/Courtesy of Saudi Royal Court/Handout via REUTERS

Israeli renewable energy company SolarEdge and Saudi Arabian investment conglomerate Ajlan & Bros Holding (ABH) announced earlier this week a joint venture for developing solar energy infrastructure in the oil-rich kingdom as it undertakes to phase out fossil fuels.

Established in 2017, Ajlan & Bros Holding began as a textile business in the 1970s and expanded to become one of the largest holding companies in the Middle East and North Africa, spreading into real estate, manufacturing, and finance. According to its website, Ajlan & Bros placed all its assets under one umbrella after Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman announced “Vision 2030” — an initiative aimed at modernizing Saudi Arabian economy and civil society — in anticipation of forming a public-private sector partnership for furthering its goals.

The joint venture between ABH and SolarEdge follows numerous reports that formal establishment of diplomatic relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia is imminent, a development that would open a new chapter in the history of Middle East geopolitics. On Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said the two countries are “the closest we have ever been to peace agreement.”

Separately,  David Barnea, head of Israel’s intelligence agency, met with the Biden administration in July to discuss a potential normalization deal, according to Axios.

“We are honored to partner with Ajlan & Bros Holding to support Saudi Arabia’s journey towards ‘Vision 2030,'” CEO of SolarEdge, founded in 2006 and headquartered in California, Zvi Lando said in a press release.

Lando added, “SolarEdge is committed to driving the clean energy transition on a global scale, exemplified by this joint venture which will provide local enterprises in Saudi Arabia with the support they need to rapidly transition away from fossil fuels to clean solar energy and meet their aggressive renewable energy goals.”

In 2021, AHB invested over $13 billion in the kingdom’s National Industrial Development and Logistics Program (NILP), a corollary initiative to Vision 2030 that was created by the Saudi government to improve the kingdom’s industry, mining, energy, and logistics sectors.

Saudi Arabia has refused to recognize the State of Israel since it was founded in 1948 and before then, opposing in 1947 the United Nations plan to partition British Palestine and create states for both the Jewish and Palestinian peoples.

On Monday, the day of the ABH-SolarEdge announcement, Reuters reported that a national security adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the path to normalization Israel and Saudi Arabia is “still long.”

Saudi Arabia has, however, taken steps toward reforming its approach to presenting Judaism and, to a lesser extent, Israel, to its youth. In May, Israeli education watchdog Impact-se reported that government officials removed “practically all antisemitism,” from K-12 textbooks, noting that “highly inflammatory hadiths and texts” describing Muslims and Jews as interminably in conflict have been excised as well. Gone also are condemnations of gays, infidels, and Christians, reflecting “a reasonably consistent step-by-step progress an improvement.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.