President Barack Obama praised the United States' long strategic relationship with Saudi Arabia today and said his visit was to seek King Abdullah's advice before making his much-heralded speech to the Islamic world in Cairo.
"I thought it was very important to come to the place where Islam began and to seek his majesty's counsel and discuss with him many of the issues that we confront here in the Middle East," Obama told reporters as he met with the king at a farm near Riyadh.
Mr Obama's meeting and scheduled speech in Cairo on Thursday drew condemnation from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who said in a taped message aired by Al Jazeera television that the US leader had planted seeds for "revenge and hatred" towards the United States in the Muslim world.
The message, which aired shortly after Mr Obama's arrival in the kingdom, came a day after bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, called Mr Obama a criminal and warned Muslims not to fall for his polished words, part of a propaganda effort to pre-empt Mr Obama's Cairo speech.
After sipping Arabic coffee at an airport welcome ceremony, Mr Obama travelled to the king's farm for talks expected to cover the Arab-Israeli conflict, US overtures to Iran and oil.
Mr Obama praised the king's "wisdom and graciousness," noting that the two countries have a long history of friendship and a strategic relationship. King Abdullah thankedMr
Obama and noted that close ties between the two countries go back to president Franklin Delano Roosevelt and King Abdul Aziz.
"I am confident that, working together, the United States and Saudi Arabia can make progress on a whole host of issues of mutual interest," Mr Obama said.
The meetings between King Abdullah and Mr Obama, which were expected to cover the Arab-Israeli conflict, US overtures to Iran and oil prices, came on the eve of the US leader's speech in Cairo.
Mr Obama, whose father was Muslim and who lived in Indonesia as a boy, hopes to mend a US image damaged by Mr Bush's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the treatment of US military detainees.
"I am confident that we're in a moment where in Islamic countries, I think there's a recognition that the path of extremism is not actually going to deliver a better life for people," Mr Obama told NBC News before he left Washington.
King Abdullah was expected to express his worries that Mr Obama's diplomatic outreach to Iran may rejig regional relationships at Riyadh's expense, diplomats and analysts say.
Saudi Arabia wants Mr Obama to get tough with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has balked at Palestinian statehood and rebuffed US calls to halt settlement building.
Mr Obama has hinted he would like Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, to offer some confidence-building measures to Israel.
"I think we have not seen a set of potential gestures from other Arab states, or from the Palestinians, that might deal with some of the Israeli concerns," he told the BBC.
King Abdullah sponsored a 2002 peace plan offering Israel collective Arab recognition in return for an Israeli withdrawal from land occupied in the 1967 war, a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and a just solution for refugees.
The Saudi adviser said it was "completely unrealistic" to expect any concession from Riyadh, at least until Israel stopped all settlement expansion and accepted the Arab peace plan.
Washington hopes Saudi Arabia will play a moderating role in the Organisation of Petroleum Exporters (OPEC) after oil prices hit a seventh-month high, threatening Obama's efforts to lift the United States out of recession and hasten global recovery.
Mr Obama has said he would discuss oil with King Abdullah and would argue that price spikes are not in Saudi interests.
On Monday, the Saudi cabinet reiterated it saw "the fair price" at $75-$80 a barrel - 17 per cent above current levels.
Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest crude exporter, has a nearly 60-year-old bond with the United States based on assured oil supplies in return for US protection for the kingdom.
Saudi Arabia, which has more than a fifth of global crude reserves, wants to hear how serious Mr Obama is about plans to lower US dependence on Middle East oil and diversify energy resources away from fossil fuels, analysts say.
After Cairo, the US leader will travel to Europe for visits steeped in World War Two symbolism - the Nazi Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany and the beaches of Normandy in France to mark the 65th anniversary of D-Day.
He will meet German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicolas Sarkozy during his European trip as part of his effort to improve trans-Atlantic ties.
Reuters