Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomes ‘new era of peace’ in historic deal with UAE,
Agreement could lead other Arab countries to forge similar alliances
Israel and the United Arab Emirates reached a landmark accord sealed by U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday that could presage a broader realignment in the region as the two agreed to “full normalization of relations” in exchange for Israel suspending annexation of occupied West Bank territory.
In a surprise announcement at the White House after a three-way phone call with Israeli and Emirati leaders, Trump said the deal would lead to greater co-operation on investment, tourism, security, technology, energy and other areas while the two countries move to allow regular direct passenger flights, open embassies and trade ambassadors for the first time.
If fulfilled, the pact would make the UAE only the third Arab country to establish normal diplomatic relations with Israel after Egypt, which signed a peace agreement in 1979, and Jordan, which signed a treaty in 1994. It could reorder the long stalemate in the region, potentially leading other Arab nations to follow suit in forging an increasingly explicit alliance with Israel against their mutual enemy in Iran while taking Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s annexation plan off the table, at least for now.
“This deal is a significant step toward building a more peaceful, secure and prosperous Middle East,” Trump told reporters in a hastily arranged event in the Oval Office.
But the agreement generated an immediate backlash in the region from opposite sides of the ideological spectrum. At least some Israeli settlers and their political allies were disappointed that Netanyahu would give up his plan to claim sovereignty over West Bank territory, while Palestinians felt abandoned by an Arab nation leaving them to remain locked in an untenable status quo even without the threat of annexation.
“This is a black day in the history of Palestine,” Ahmad Majdalani, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s executive committee, said in an interview shortly before the Palestinian ambassador to the UAE was recalled in protest. “This agreement is a total departure from the Arab consensus. The Palestinian people have not authorized anyone to make concessions to Israel in exchange for anything.”
Israel and the UAE have long maintained a thinly veiled secret relationship over mutual interests, and the idea of formalizing it had come up several times over the past year. But the two sides essentially took it into the open after six weeks of indirect talks through Jared Kushner, the president’s sonin-law and senior adviser, culminating in Thursday’s phone call between Trump, Netanyahu and Mohammed bin Zayed, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi and de facto ruler of the UAE. The deal gave Trump a muchwelcomed breakthrough at a time when he has been struggling at home with a deadly pandemic and economic collapse amid a re-election contest that polls show he is losing. Both Israel and the UAE, each for its own reasons, were happy to credit Trump to advance their positions in Washington, and the president plans to stage a celebratory White House signing ceremony in coming weeks.
The delicacy of the accord was on display after the announcement as the Emiratis maintained that it was contingent on Israel living up to its pledge to forgo annexation even as Netanyahu emphasized that it was only a temporary pause in deference to Trump. But both sides were playing to domestic constituencies to minimize concessions, and officials expressed optimism that the deal would hold.
“This is a historic evening,” Netanyahu said at a news conference. “Today, a new era began in the relations of the state of Israel with the Arab world.” President Reuven Rivlin of Israel invited Prince Mohammed to visit Jerusalem, while the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality building was illuminated with the flags of Israel and the UAE.
In a statement, Prince Mohammed emphasized the annexation suspension. “During a call with President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, an agreement was reached to stop further Israeli annexation of Palestinian territories,” he wrote.
A team to set up a lab was on the first public direct flight to Israel from the UAE, although a plan to publicly declare co-operation in the battle against the pandemic in June proved too much too soon, as the Emirati government distanced itself shortly after Netanyahu announced it.
The impetus for Thursday’s agreement, however, can be traced back to around the same time, when Yousef al-Otaiba, the UAE’s ambassador to the United States who has worked closely with the Trump administration, wrote an op-ed article in Israel’s popular Yediot Ahronot newspaper appealing directly to Israelis, in Hebrew, not to annex occupied territory.
“Annexation will definitely, and immediately, reverse all of the Israeli aspirations for improved security, economic and cultural ties with the Arab world and the United Arab Emirates,” al-Otaiba wrote at the time. The headline boiled it down to a clear tradeoff: “It’s Either Annexation or Normalization.”
Kushner said that proved a turning point. “After that, we started a discussion with UAE saying maybe this is something we can do,” he said. The Emiratis were open to the idea, he said, and so he then approached the Israelis, who likewise expressed a willingness to consider it. Talks then proceeded through Kushner and the Americans.
The negotiations were closely held in the White House, with only a limited number of officials aware. Meetings and Thursday’s phone call were either omitted from schedules or listed with obscure language, according to an administration official. Kushner said a preliminary agreement was reached a week ago and final details completed Wednesday.
Aaron David Miller, a longtime Middle East peace negotiator now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the agreement was “a win-win-win-lose,” in that it provided diplomatic victories for the UAE, Netanyahu and Trump. “The big losers are the Palestinians, who have watched the Arab world move closer to Israel, seemingly rewarding Netanyahu for ignoring the Palestinians and undermining Palestinians interests,” he said.
Daoud Kuttab, a Palestinian journalist, argued that the deal was overhyped by both sides. “UAE was already normalizing relations & the annexation plan was already postponed,” he wrote on Twitter. “No one is a winner in this despite the hoopla that we will hear about for some time.”
In Israel, the development came at a perilous moment for Netanyahu, who is leading a fragile, fractious coalition government and faces trial on corruption charges. His annexation promise, made repeatedly throughout three recent elections, had left him in a box after Kushner opposed his moving forward without working through Trump’s official peace plan. But shortly after the agreement Thursday, Netanyahu and his domestic rivals announced that they had made progress in coalition talks.
Martin Indyk, who served as special envoy for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations under former U.S. president Barack Obama, said the deal gave both Trump and Netanyahu a way to escape a political box of their own making with the president’s stalled peace plan and the prime minister’s politically problematic annexation drive.
Palestinian leaders have long opposed normalization of relations between Israel and Arab states because it would legitimize the continuing occupation.
Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas, called Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, and said that the agreement was “not binding on the Palestinian people.” Fawzi Barhoum, a spokesperson for Hamas, called it “dangerous and tantamount to a free reward for the Israeli occupation for its crimes and violations at the expense of the Palestinian people.”
On the other side, some on the Israeli right expressed anger at Netanyahu for breaking his annexation promise. In a televised news conference, he said annexation had been only “temporarily” postponed. “Just as I brought peace with an Arab country,” Netanyahu declared, “I will bring sovereignty.”
“The Palestinian people have not authorized anyone to make concessions to Israel in exchange for anything.”
AHMAD MAJDALANI PALESTINE LIBERATION ORGANIZATION