Initiated under the former administration of US President Donald Trump, Israel was under the illusion that it would easily find new Arab friends under the Abraham Accords.
The regime occupying Palestine was also under the delusion of a new anti-Iran alliance or an Arab-NATO if you like. Some other think tanks and institutions colluded with the idea. The idea that Arabs and Muslims would warm to Israel which has committed war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and murdered tens of thousands of children were unimaginable even at the time.
Nevertheless, rather than uniting against Israel, Arab countries appear to be uniting with Israel, some institutes said more than two years ago.
The other purpose of the failed initiative was to isolate Palestine, according to US officials who alleged that during Israel’s short honeymoon period, if more Arab states can normalize ties with Israel, the aspect of an occupied Palestinian territory would be accepted among Arabs and Muslims.
At the time, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu lauded the accords as a breakthrough because they separated normalization with Arab states from any peace for the Palestinians.
More than two years later, the states that normalized ties with Israel have gained nothing apart from emboldening Israel to further violate Palestinian rights.
The occupation has killed around 250 Palestinians in year 2022 alone, while injuring tens of thousands of others. The Palestinian death toll in the occupied West Bank in 2022 has already reached its highest total in seven years while armed Palestinian retaliatory operations have also sharply increased.
There has been an increase in raids on occupied Palestinian towns and villages and more settler incursions in the al-Aqsa Mosque compound - Islam’s third holiest site.
It is said that the normalization deals had some strings attached. For example, more support in the form of security or advanced arms sales from the United States or even Israel for the monarchies and states that normalized ties.
The Trump administration formally notified Congress that it intends to sell 50 stealth F-35 fighter jets to the UAE as part of the normalization deals.
Reports then emerged that the UAE informed the US it was suspending discussions to acquire the jets, which was part of a US$23 billion package that also includes drones and other advanced munitions.
The sale of 50 F-35 warplanes made by Lockheed Martin to the UAE had already slowed; reportedly over concerns in Washington over Abu Dhabi's relationship with China, including the use of Huawei 5G technology in the country. Two years later, 50 F-35 warplanes remain grounded in the United States.
The agreements signed at the White House some two years ago between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco tried to open the door to improve relations with Israel’s neighbors. Instead, it has firmly shut the door in Israel’s face and has seen rising anger against the regime in the region and beyond.
Over the past two years, support for Palestine has increased even more than before the Abraham Accords. Nowhere has this been more evident than at the Qatar World Cup over the past two weeks. Footage has captured Palestinian flags being waved both inside and outside stadiums, national teams carrying the Palestinian flag, and chants at stadiums in support of Palestine.
This is while Israeli settlers and journalists who traveled to Qatar have felt threatened while facing and witnessing firsthand, the hatred of the people of the region towards the regime and its atrocities against women and children.
In occupied Palestine, Tamar Weiss an Israeli author acknowledged “at the end of the day, there isn’t such a difference compared to before the Abraham Accords, always when there is change, it raises hope. But until now, things have not changed. All that is left is hope.
Meanwhile, we haven’t changed anything in our approach toward the Palestinians. Nothing has changed. As I see it, the feeling of the person on the street is that things are the same.
Despite the propaganda campaign, there has been little tourism between Israel and the states that normalized ties with it. That is because Arabs feel there is no security for them in the Israeli-occupied territories and Israeli settlers feel there is no security for them in the Arab world.
There are some nations in West Asia where the rulers are open to relations with Israel but their people are opposed to such moves. There are also some nations in West Asia where the governments and their people are firmly opposed to any form of normalization.
And there are some nations in West Asia where the governments and their people are not only strongly opposed to any form of normalization but are openly and officially calling for the delivery of weapons to the oppressed Palestinian people.
