WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain on Tuesday signed agreements to normalize with Israel, fitting the first Arab states in a quarter of a century to break a long-standing taboo as a component of a strategic realignment of Middle Eastern countries opposed to Iran.
U. S. President Donald Trump organized the rite in the White House, ending a dramatic month in which the United Arab Emirates and then Bahrain agreed opposing decades of w without resolving Israel’s dispute with the Palestinians.
Faced with a crowd of several hundred people on the White House lawn, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed agreements with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Emirati, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahyan, and Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Abdullatif Al Zayani.
The agreements, denounced through the Palestinians, make them the third and fourth Arab states to take such steps to normalize since Israel signed peace treaties with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.
In a previous meeting with Netanyahu in the Oval Office, Trump said he “will have at least six countries coming very quickly” to forge his own agreements with Israel.
Later, Trump told reporters that a third Arab Gulf state, Saudi Arabia, would reach an agreement with Israel “at the right time. “The Saudi cabinet under pressure in the desire for a “fair and complete solution” to the Palestinian problem.
Saudi Arabia is the largest Arab force in the Gulf, its king is the custodian of Islam’s holiest places and leads the world’s largest oil exporter. Despite his own reluctance, the kingdom’s discreet acceptance of agreements that are considered crucial.
“CHANGE THE COURSE OF HISTORY”
Trump’s rite with valuable photographs as he tries to retain strength in the November 3 presidential election in which flags from the United States, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain abounded.
“We’re here this afternoon to the course of history,” Trump said from the White House balcony.
Trump called the agreements “significant progress in which other people of all faiths and backgrounds live in combination in peace and prosperity” and said the three countries in the Middle East will “paint in combination, they are friends. “
Consecutive agreements mark a diplomatic victory for Trump, who spent his presidency making plans and agreements on problems as intractable as North Korea’s nuclear program to locate elusive results.
The rapprochement of Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain reflects their shared fear of Iran’s growing influence in the region and the progression of ballistic missiles. Iran has criticized both agreements.
The three leaders of the Middle East praised the agreements and Trump’s role in glowing terms, and Netanyahu said it gave hope to “all the other people of Abraham. “
But officials in the UAE and Bahrain tried to reassure the Palestinians that their countries were not abandoning them or in their quest for statehood in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Palestinian leaders denounced the agreements as a betrayal of their cause. .
In a sign that regional clashes will in fact continue as long as the Israeli-Palestinian clash has not yet been resolved, Palestinian militants fired rockets from Gaza at Israel during the ceremony, the Israeli army said.
Israeli ambulance service Magen David Adom said paramedics treated two men for minor wounds through glass fragments in Ashdod, and four others suffered a shock.
“It’s not peace, it’s in exchange for continued aggression,” reads on a tweet posted on the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Twitter account. “There will be no peace until Palestine is free. “
EVANGELICAL SUPPORT FOR TRUMP
As Trump searches for four more years, the agreements can simply help pro-Israel evangelical Christian voters, a vital component of his political base.
Another goal of the White House’s plans, besides Saudi Arabia, is Oman, whose leader met with Trump last week. Oman sent his ambassador to tuesday’s ceremony, a senior U. S. official said. There are no Saudi representatives present.
Meeting with the Emirati chancellor before the ceremony, Trump thanked the United Arab Emirates for being the first in the Gulf to settle for relations with Israel and left little doubt that the Iranian factor eclipses the event.
Trump has predicted that Iran, with strong U. S. sanctions, would like to reach an agreement with Washington, which seeks to renegotiate a foreign nuclear deal. Tehran shows no symptoms of moving.
Netanyahu faces a complaint at home over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and a corruption trial on charges of corruption, fraud and non-compliance to accept as true that they have led to common street protests.
Netanyahu denies misunderstood and describes his trial as a left-wing political witch hunt destined to overthrow a right-wing leader.
In a nod to the coronavirus, the White House encouraged but did not require participants to wear masks, but leaders reached out and did not do so in public, most people in the crowd did not wear masks.
Some differences remain despite the warming of ties. Trump said Tuesday that he would have no challenge in promoting the F-35 stealth fighter jet complex in the United Arab Emirates, which for years have been for them. Israel, owner of the F-35, opposes such a sale.
Frustrated by the Palestinians’ refusal to accept Trump’s Middle East peace initiative, the White House has tried to overcome them in the hope of seeing the agreements with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain as incentives or even a lever for peace talks.
In statements to Fox News hours before the ceremony, Trump predicted that palestinians would forge peace with Israel or be “left behind. “
Palestinian leaders have long accused Trump of pro-Israel bias and denounced arab rapprochement with Israel, even though Netanyahu agreed, in exchange for normalization with the United Arab Emirates, to suspend a plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank.
Although israeli-Palestinian negotiations failed in 2014, some Arab Gulf states and several Arab countries have long maintained quiet and casual contacts with Israel.
(Information through Steve Holland and Matt Spetalnick, additional information through Dan Williams, Aziz El Yakoubi and Maha El Dahan, Doina Chiacu, Stephen Farrell, Jeffrey Heller, Ali Sawafta, Nidal al-Mughrabi, Nayera Abdallah Editing via Howard Goller)
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