ABSTRACT
The argument is that securing oil and good relations with the Arab world should be the primary United States goal in the Middle East and that American association with and strong support for Israel impedes this aim. US actions with regard to the Arab-Israeli conflict would depend on, or be linked to, US-Arab relations. This had an impact on Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR). After his famous meeting with Ibn Saud on the USS Quincy in early 1945, FDR clearly feared that US-Saudi relations and access to oil would be jeopardized as a consequence of US support for Zionism. American policy makers who opposed Harry Truman in this regard had accepted Ibn Saud's threat, saying, in effect, that the United States could not be friendly with both Arabs and Israelis, but their fears proved unfounded.
