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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a normalization agreement between his country and Bahrain on Friday, prompting condemnation from the Palestinians, less than a month after agreeing with the United Arab Emirates to establish diplomatic relations.
“Citizens of Israel, I am moved to tell you that tonight we are reaching another peace agreement with another Arab country, Bahrain. This agreement adds to the historic peace with the United Arab Emirates,” Netanyahu said in Hebrew. -language statement.
Speculation among the Israeli media had been widespread since the early hours of Friday night that a deal with Bahrain had been reached.
The agreement, also announced by US President Donald Trump and confirmed by a senior Bahrain official, means that Bahrain becomes the second Gulf state and the fourth Arab nation to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
Egypt made peace with the Jewish state in 1979 and Jordan did so in 1994.
The United Arab Emirates and Israel announced that they would establish diplomatic relations on August 13.
“It took us 26 years to go from a second peace accord to a third … but 29 days to go from a peace accord with the third Arab state to the fourth Arab state,” Netanyahu said.
“And there will be more. This is a new era of peace.”
The Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and the Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, condemned the agreement between Israel and Bahrain.
The deal was “a stab in the back of the Palestinian cause and the Palestinian people,” like the agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Israel announced last month, Palestinian Authority Minister of Social Affairs Ahmad Majdalani told AFP.
Hamas said it was an “aggression” that caused “serious damage” to the Palestinian cause.
Following the agreement between the UAE and Israel, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo embarked on a regional tour, seeking to convince countries like Bahrain, Sudan and Oman to follow suit.
A high-level Israeli source suggested to an AFP this week that a deal with Bahrain was the closest to being secured.
Bahrain, a small Gulf oil monarchy, participated in a January ceremony in Washington when Trump unveiled his Middle East peace plan, which in effect gave the green light to Israel’s annexation of large swaths of the occupied West Bank.
Under the normalization agreement with the United Arab Emirates, Israel agreed to suspend its planned annexations in the West Bank, but Netanyahu has insisted that the plans remain on the table.
alv-gl / sw / hkb
