Now we’re talking about the Art of the Deal!
While it is not uncommon in political circles to describe something as a historic breakthrough, it is unusual if the term is fair. Yet that is the exact way to describe the tripartite agreement announced Thursday by the Trump White House, Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
Due to its direct impact alone, you can call this one an earthquake. In a moment, regional fault lines are redrawn and the door is opened for Israel to normalize its relations with other Arab states.
The agreement also dramatically turns the heat on the Palestinians to make a deal that they no longer find themselves isolated in their standoff with Israel.
“It means they either have to eventually get to the negotiating table, or continue where they are going,” Jared Kushner, the top U.S. official involved in drafting the terms, told me.
Indeed, there is a sweetener in the deal aimed at the Palestinians. Israel’s agreement to suspend its plan to assert sovereignty over much of the West Bank is an enormous concession that buys time for the Palestinians, but not endlessly. Kushner defined the suspension as covering the ‘bright future’. ‘
He said UAE leaders were worried that the Israeli move would be a “major backlog in relations” and thus pushed for the suspension.
Meanwhile, the establishment of formal diplomatic relations and the launch of direct aviation means that Muslims from the UAE can fly to Israel and visit the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. That opening rejects the claim of Islamists that Israel prevents them from worshiping at mosques, among the holiest sites of Islam.
The huge trade-offs include President Trump’s policy of strengthening America’s alliance with Israel and combating Muslim extremists. Critics, including Democrats, most European governments and bureaucrats of the United Nations, predicted that Trump’s decision to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and recognize Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights would lead to greater Arab unity and possible war.
In fact, the critics were crowned with the very policies pursued by the Obama-Biden administration, which yielded only negative results. The former team shook hands with Israel, Saudi Arabia and other traditional allies while wooing the Palestinians and Iran. In return, it received nothing but Palestinian incomprehensibility and an emboldened and aggressive Iran.
By going in the opposite direction, Trump, Kushner and Ambassador David Friedman are using strengthened American-Israeli ties as a meeting point for Arab states that fear Iran more than Israel.
With its signature, the UAE becomes the third Arab nation to establish diplomatic relations with the Jewish state and the first since Jordan and Israel signed their peace treaty in 1994. Egypt and Israel voted in 1979 for a formal peace.
Those deals were certainly monumental and despite tensions, stabilizing factors remain amid regional chaos. The UAE deal could prove to be just as significant and has the added element of coming from close quarters to capture the world by complete surprise.
The UAE becomes the first Gulf Arab state to normalize relations with Israel and although there is speculation that others could soon follow, including the Saudis, Oman and Bahrain.
“This is changing the paradigm of diplomacy in the region,” said Dore Gold, a veteran Israeli ambassador and former adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “While this does not exclude an Israeli-Palestinian relationship, it eliminates the Palestinian veto on peace in the Middle East.”
It also rattles the cow of Iran. Although the Saudis and others have back-channel security relations with Israel, the fact that the UAE, a predominantly Sunni confederation of seven emirates, has formally recognized what Iran calls the ‘Little Satan’ is driving the mullahs crazy.
Once again, that would probably mean that generation Qassem Soleimani would unleash his Quds Force to wreak havoc and try to force concessions in the face of terror. But Trump made the move to oust Soleimani last January, greatly reducing the chances of Iran smelling the pot, along with his economy, thanks to U.S. sanctions.
Of course, this is the Mideast, nothing is ever fully regulated. But there is no denying that Thursday’s pact strengthens the hand of those who want peace and expands the American-led alliance in ways that the naysayers never possibly believed.
Let’s see in this regard if Joe Biden and the hate-Trump media have the integrity to recognize the success of Trump’s diplomacy. Or are they so tainted with anger that they are willing to even sign peace treaties?
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