US Senator Lindsey Graham spearheaded historic Saudi-Israel normalisation push in final weeks: Report

WASHINGTON: In the final weeks leading up to his sudden demise, senior US Senator Lindsey Graham was actively spearheading a major diplomatic push aimed at brokering a historic normalisation pact between Saudi Arabia and Israel, according to a report by US media outlet Axios.

The 71-year-old South Carolina Republican, who famously transitioned from a vocal critic of Donald Trump into one of the president’s most formidable Capitol Hill allies, passed away late on Saturday evening. His office announced on Sunday (local time) that his death was caused by a heart condition linked to hardened arteries.

Recognised as a towering figure in American foreign policy, the late legislator remained intensely focused on his grandest geopolitical ambitions until his final hours. According to Axios, the veteran lawmaker viewed a formal diplomatic breakthrough between Riyadh and Tel Aviv as the cornerstone of a comprehensive post-war framework for West Asia.

BREAKING: The D.C. medical examiner has released preliminary findings in the death of Sen. Lindsey Graham.

Officials say Graham suffered an aortic dissection due to arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease.

The medical examiner said the death certificate will remain pending… pic.twitter.com/04XaWPp5fQ

— Fox News (@FoxNews) July 12, 2026

In recent weeks, Graham disclosed to the publication that he had personally deliberated the normalisation proposal with Trump, alongside US envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, noting that they had all resolved to advance the initiative collectively.

The report highlighted that Graham believed such an accord possessed the strategic resilience to endure peace after regional hostilities with Iran concluded, fundamentally reshaping the future of the Middle East. The senator had dedicated years to this diplomatic track, maintaining his efforts even throughout the administration of former US President Joe Biden.

The Axios report detailed that around mid-May, Graham urged Trump to anchor a wider “day-after” strategy for the ongoing hostilities around a Saudi-Israel breakthrough. Approximately one week later, during a conference call with leaders from multiple Arab and Islamic nations, Trump expressed his desire for them to forge ties with Israel, provided a comprehensive agreement could be reached to halt the conflict with Iran.

Throughout these deliberations, Saudi Arabia remained the pivotal focus of the American diplomatic drive. To execute this vision, the senator aimed to initiate an aggressive diplomatic surge immediately following Israel’s October polls and the US midterm elections, with the explicit goal of locking in a trilateral agreement before the newly elected Congress convened in January.

Graham had further revealed to Axios that he had conducted extensive high-level discussions with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s trusted confidant Ron Dermer, the Saudi Ambassador to Washington Princess Reema bint Bandar, and Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan.

Furthermore, he was finalising plans to travel to both Saudi Arabia and Israel in the immediate weeks ahead to gauge whether both capitals possessed the requisite political will to revive active negotiations. The late lawmaker had calculated that if a viable window opened, high-stakes diplomacy needed to commence in September to ensure the core frameworks of the treaty were finalised by November.

According to the Axios account, Graham maintained that the success of the initiative hinged on clearing two formidable domestic political obstacles: mobilising sufficient bipartisan consensus within Congress and ensuring the Israeli leadership was prepared to accommodate Riyadh’s baseline stipulations.

A central pillar of this envisioned grand bargain was a formal US-Saudi mutual defence pact, significant portions of which had already been structured under the Biden administration. The publication further detailed the extraordinary sequence of events on Saturday evening during the final hours of the senator’s life.

Graham held a telephone conversation with Trump to brief him on his recent diplomatic mission to Ukraine and to discuss a Russia sanctions Bill that he was pushing for the Senate to debate imminently. During the same exchange, Trump informed the lawmaker that Washington was preparing imminent retaliatory strikes against Iran in response to a fresh assault targeting commercial shipping vessels in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Shortly after concluding his call with the president, an associate who conversed with Graham told the publication that the lawmaker complained of feeling unwell. Despite being strongly counselled to seek immediate emergency medical intervention, the senator declined, stating that he would arrange for a medical evaluation on Sunday morning, right after his scheduled broadcast appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

In a poignant moment of irony, Graham then reportedly quipped to his confidant: “I can’t die now. I still need to do the Russia sanctions, get Iran sorted out and do Israeli-Saudi normalisation”. The influential foreign policy architect passed away just a few hours later. (ANI)