"I hope my visit shines a spotlight on the Middle East, the opportunities to work constructively with our friends," he said.
ARMS AND PEACE
Bush has also been asking Arab allies to diplomatically and financially support Palestinian leaders involved in peace talks, and to expand relations with Israel.
Saudi Arabia attended a U.S.-sponsored summit in Annapolis, last year aimed at restarting Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts.
But Saudi Arabia has no diplomatic ties with Israel and says "normalisation" will only happen with a final peace deal that returns all Arab land occupied by Israel in the 1967 war.
The Bush administration is expected to notify Congress this week about part of an arms package for Saudi Arabia.
"It's a big package that we have offered to the Saudis. It actually gets sort of negotiated between us and the Saudis in pieces, and those pieces then get notified to the Congress," the official said. One element of the arms package will be notified to Congress on Monday, he said.
The administration last year proposed supplying Gulf Arab states with some $20 billion (10.2 billion pounds) in new weapons, including Joint Direct Attack Munition bomb kits for the Saudis.
The plan had angered Israel's backers in Washington but Israeli security sources said on Sunday the United States would provide the Jewish state better "smart bombs" than those it plans to sell Saudi Arabia under the regional defence plan.
It was unclear what may be discussed on the subject of oil prices when Bush meets King Abdullah, or whether that issue would be left mainly to U.S. Energy Secretary Sam Bodman when he visits Saudi Arabia later this month.
Oil prices near $100 per barrel have nearly doubled since Bush, a former oil man, walked arm in arm with King Abdullah, then the crown prince, at his Texas ranch in April 2005.
Washington rarely makes public criticism of Saudi Arabia over its political and human rights record, but Bush spoke out against a court verdict condemning a gang rape victim to 200 lashes. King Abdullah pardoned the woman who was accused of being with an unrelated man when she was snatched by seven attackers.
