President Donald Trump praised Saudi Arabia's prince during a meeting on Tuesday, years after a U.S. intelligence report stated that the prince ordered a journalist's death.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump met with interim Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, the first encounter between the two nations’ leaders in 25 years and one that could mark a turning point for Syria as it struggles to emerge from decades of international isolation.

The United States agreed on Tuesday to sell Saudi Arabia an arms package worth nearly $142 billion, according to a White House fact sheet that called it "the largest defense cooperation agreement" Washington has ever done.

Saudi Arabia and Turkey's leaders played a key role in convincing Trump to lift sanctions on Syria and meet with al-Sharaa.

BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, Northern Trust Asset Management, Neuberger Berman and I Squared Capital signed preliminary agreements with the roughly $925 billion wealth fund to invest in its efforts to develop a series of new investment strategies focused on Saudi Arabia and the wider Middle East and North Africa region.

A British Bank of America analyst has been jailed for 10 years in Saudi Arabia apparently over a since-deleted social media post.

Although Trump recently attended the funeral of Pope Francis in Rome, Saudi Arabia was originally intended to be his initial overseas destination, just like in his first term. It served as a gilded debut for a foreign policy focused on securing cash infusions for American businesses.

Executives including Elon Musk and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, were in Saudi Arabia for new investments. That, not tariffs, is what they wanted from Trump.

President Donald Trump has met with Syria’s interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the first such encounter between the two nations’ leaders in 25 years.