Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that the US would continue to push Arab states to normalize relations with Israel. This month marked the one-year anniversary of the signing of Trump administration-brokered agreements that normalized relations with Israel and the UAE, and Bahrain, known as the Abraham Accords.
Following the UAE, Morrocco also normalized with Israel. Sudan agreed with Israel to open relations, but Khartoum has been slow to establish diplomatic ties. “We will encourage more countries to follow the lead of the Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco,” Blinken said during a virtual meeting with the countries’ ministers.
While touted as peace deals, the Abraham Accords will lead to an influx of more US arms in the region and have failed to slow Israel’s de facto annexation of the West Bank through settlements and Israel’s brutality against the people of Gaza.
For agreeing to normalize with Israel, the UAE was awarded a $23 billion weapons deal that includes F-35 fighter jets that the Biden administration briefly paused but then decided to proceed with. For Morrocco, the US recognized Muskat’s sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara region, another move President Biden will not reverse.
The Trump administration pressured Khartoum into normalizing with Israel by adding it as a condition to get Sudan removed from the US terror list. To be removed from the list, the US made Sudan pay $335 million in compensation to victims of the 1998 US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania that were carried out by al-Qaeda, even though Osama bin Laden was kicked out of Sudan in 1996. The Clinton administration bombed a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan in response to the embassy attacks, something the US never even apologized for.
A major aspect of the Abraham Accords is to isolate Iran. According to Israeli media, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett floated the idea to President Biden of an anti-Iran NATO-style alliance in the Middle East that includes Israel and Arab states opposed to Iran. Earlier this year, there were reports that Israel was in talks with Bahrain, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia about the idea of an anti-Iran alliance.
How does one normalize relations with awful and grotesque abnormality?
Talk about a lose/lose/lose situation.
Imagine being UAE right now.
1. You just wasted 23 billion dollars on overpriced US military junk.
2. Now most of the Muslim world dislikes/distrusts you.
3. You have now opened the door for Israel to infiltrate and destroy your country.
This “deal” seems more like some type of cruel and unusual punishment.
Amen, brother! In summary:
1. Bad business deal
2. Bad optics
3. Bad military decision
It’s like paying the Mafia for protection, while expecting them to be your friends. Take Saddam as an example. He thought the US was his friend against Iran. He was proven deadly wrong in 1991 and 2003. With frenemies like these, who needs enemies.
No it’s not. Muslim world is divided and only a few have any idea what is happening. Also the people who would oppose them over ideological reason r mostly the ones who r part of the problem within the Muslim lands, so they also lack credibility to the wider populace qnd not only to the corrupt ruling elites of the countries. Sudan is an example Bashir led the so called Islamic party that brought so much misery to Sudan that even when Sudan decided to recognize Israel there was very little rancor.
UAE ruling elite r of the opinion if worse comes to worse that let it all burn down as long as they can rule over the ash so Israel infiltrating uae isn’t a concern for them.
F35 and other overpriced systems r only shown to be junk when faced with cutting edge countermeasures and uae will deploy them against people who simply can’t afford those
Are you sure the UAE will be paying for that $23 Billion or will it be the American taxpayers that are paying for it?
Exactly – and for all the, “under the table” gifts that both sides will get but not the taxpayers.
Always talk about doing things to drive a wedge deeper between the Arab countries and Iran and never any talk about bringing them to the table. And if there is, then generals get assassinated. Israel and the MIC must be appeased
Any ‘normalization’ will only last until Tel Aviv starts the back stabbing which is what it does best. Remember the USS Liberty, Pollards, bogus intel, etc. and that’s just US back stabbing.
This sounds expensive. Egypt and Jordan each get over $1.2 Billion annually for signing their “Peace” agreements.
Exactly. These countries get paid big-time to play nice with Isra-hell.
Normalize relations with a country that regularly assassinated scientists in other ME countries? I don’t think that’s a good idea. Israel may be the 2nd biggest terrorist nation in the world, behind only the U.S.