The United Arab Emirates’ permission to normalize ties with Israel should remove “any obstacle” for the United States to sell the F-35 stealth fighter jet to the Arabian Gulf, said a senior official of Emirati.
The US has sold the F-35 to allies – including Turkey, South Korea, Japan and Israel – but sales to the Gulf require an in-depth review of US policy for Israel to maintain a military advantage in the Middle East .
“We have legitimate requests that are there. We need to get them … The whole idea of a state of belligerence or war with Israel no longer exists,” Foreign Minister Anwar Gargash said in an online interview with the Atlantic. Council on Thursday.
However, he said the UAE had not made any new requests to the Americans since the deal with Israel was announced last week.
“The UAE expects its demands to be accepted and we feel that by signing this peace treaty in the coming weeks or months … that any obstacle to this should no longer be here,” Gargash said.
The Gulf state, one of Washington’s closest allies in the Middle East, has long expressed interest in purchasing the fighter jet made by Lockheed Martin Corp., which Israel has used in the fighting.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country would oppose any sale, citing a need to maintain Israeli military superiority in the region.
‘Qualitative military edge’
Ellen Lord, the Pentagon’s Secretary of Defense for Purchase and Maintenance and a leader in the U.S. arms export process, told reporters in general that the U.S. intends to reach an agreement letter for new F-35 sales in about six months .
US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday: “They want to buy F-35s, we’ll see what happens, it’s under review.”
Washington guarantees that Israel gets more advanced American weapons than Arab states, and gives it what is called a “Qualitative military edge” over its neighbors.
In the region, only Israel now flies the F-35 fighter jet, when a planned purchase by Turkey crashed over Ankara, purchase of Russia’s S-400 anti-aircraft system.
Gargash has repeatedly said that the UAE’s decision to open diplomatic ties with Israel had nothing to do with Iran. However, the UAE government has long regarded Iran as its top regional threat.
For the UAE, its pilots have seen the F-35 in action as U.S. Air Force squadrons flying the stealth fighter rotated in and out of Al-Dhafra Air Base near Abu Dhabi since 2019 [File: Kyodo via Reuters]
Netanyahu has repeatedly denied that there was any connection between arms deals and the opening of ties with the Emirates. That was to do with skepticism in Israel, mainly thanks to accusations that he had killed the Israel Defense Forces in agreeing to a past German sale of advanced submarines to Egypt.
Critics have accused Netanyahu of lying about an important element that apparently claimed the deal for the UAE. Netanyahu’s defense minister and governing partner, former military chief Benny Gantz, said he was kept in the dark until the last minute about the UAE deal.
“Israel must never forget, not even for a split second, that every belly in its strength in the long run can pull the rug under its feet,” said Amos Gilead, director of the Institute for Policy and Strategy at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya.
“Intentions are fluid and vulnerable to rapid change.”
‘Defense aspect’
For the UAE, its pilots have seen the F-35 in action as U.S. Air Force squadrons flying the stealth fighter have been rotating in and out of Al-Dhafra Air Base near Abu Dhabi since 2019. The Emirati Air Force has been in service for dozens of F-16s and French-made Mirage 2000s.
But the F-35s would provide a much larger edge over Iran, whose air force largely dates from purchases made before the 1979 Islamic Revolution and includes some locally built aircraft. The stealth capability of the F-35 also makes it much harder for Iranian anti-aircraft batteries, already internationally criticized for firing a Ukrainian passenger jet in January, to pick up.
The UAE has repeatedly sought to buy armed American Reaper drones. It used already Chinese-made armed drones on the battlefield in Yemen, where the Emirates became members of a Saudi-led coalition fighting the Iranian-backed Mundo rebels who have the capital. That war, which began in 2015, has become the world‘s worst humanitarian crisis.
Responding to questions on Thursday about its intentions to buy the F-35, the Emirati foreign ministry said the UAE-Israel agreement would eventually include “a security and defense aspect”.
Meanwhile, Gargash said when the normalization agreement with Israel is formally signed, “Abu Dhabi will have his embassy in Tel Aviv based on international consensus towards a two-state solution” with the Palestinians.
“The embassy will be in Tel Aviv. This is very clear,” he said.
.
