It was hard to predict in January 2020 that, by the end of
the year, Israel would have relations with four more Arab countries. In Israel,
January’s news cycle in some ways looked the same as today’s – the country was
heading toward election in a March, but the diplomatic agenda was drastically
different.
There were three big stories: 1) Naama Issachar, the Israeli
woman in a Russian prison for alleged drug smuggling; 2) preparations for the
Fifth World Holocaust Forum, which brought leaders of 49 countries to Israel;
and 3) speculation about the Trump peace plan, which came out at the end of the
month. A week later, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s trip to the White
House to hear about the peace plan, along with a quick stop over in Moscow to
give Issachar a ride home, there was a small hint at what was to come.
Netanyahu went to Uganda, ostensibly on a regular diplomatic
visit to Africa of the kind the prime minister has made before, but there was a
surprise, Netanyahu met with Sudanese leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. Sudan
authorized Israel to fly over its airspace, shortening flights to South
America, but in the ensuing days, Burhan said this was not a step toward
normalization.
A week and a half later, Jason Greenblatt, who had resigned
months earlier from his position as US President Donald Trump’s envoy to the
Middle East, announced that he was “very inspired” by ties between Israel and
Gulf states and planned to promote them – but still said time was needed for
them to move into the open. Meanwhile, the Trump peace plan train was chugging
along, with the emphasis on application of sovereignty, as its supporters
called it, or annexation, as its detractors said.
Netanyahu promised in one campaign speech and statement
after another that he would take the plunge, with the Trump “Peace to
Prosperity” plan supporting Israeli sovereignty over up to 30% of the West
Bank, including all settlements and the Jordan Valley. Blue and White leader
Benny Gantz made statements that were vague enough to make voters think he may
support annexing the Jordan Valley, as well.
But COVID-19 got in the way, and the plan could not be
implemented as speedily as Netanyahu intended. Whether he ever intended to
extend Israel’s sovereignty or not is a matter of great debate, but he
certainly spoke and, to some extent, behaved like he did. Israel and the US
established a committee to draw an annexation map, and it met a couple of
times, but didn’t get very far. At the time, senior US sources said talks
between Jerusalem and Washington were much more focused on joint coronavirus
policy than anything else, and those kinds of comments continued even after a
so-called unity government between the Likud and Blue and White was formed. A
clause in the coalition agreement said Netanyahu could bring sovereignty moves
to a cabinet vote in July.
That unity coalition was anything but united, and the Trump
peace plan was one of many areas where Netanyahu and his partners didn’t see
eye to eye. Gantz, who was defense minister at that point, and Foreign Minister
Gabi Ashkenazi spoke enthusiastically about the Trump plan – but they wanted it
all, as a whole. The plan itself would have allowed for Israel to extend its
sovereignty as a first step, so what they were really saying was they needed
major adjustments. Ashkenazi especially worked to block the annexation element.
Netanyahu had the votes in the cabinet to push it through without Blue and
White’s support, but the Trump administration wanted a more united Israeli
front.
In June, the world was watching Israel to see what its next
steps would be, in swooped United Arab Emirates’ Ambassador to the US Yousef
al-Otaiba. In an op-ed for Yediot Aharonot, which in and of itself was a unique
event, Otaiba dangled the possibility of normalization of ties between Abu
Dhabi and Israel if the latter would drop its annexation plans.
Since 2015, there had been more and more steps, public and
secret, toward ties between Israel and Gulf states, including intelligence
sharing and cooperation in combating the Iran nuclear threat, ministers and
other officials visiting the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, Israeli athletes
participating in sporting events in Arab states, and tens of thousands of Israelis
touring Morocco each year. But these were gradual and had been happening for
years. While Netanyahu and some other politicians talked openly about warming
ties with Gulf States, the statements were vague.
So Otaiba’s op-ed, offering what he called the “carrots” of
greater normalization and expanded ties in the Middle East, came as a surprise to
many observers of the Middle East – though apparently not to Trump’s peace
team. Looking back at Greenblatt’s statements and remarks by Trump’s Senior
Advisor Jared Kushner, it seems they were hinting at what was coming all along
and what seemed like bluster or campaign rhetoric from Netanyahu was the real
deal. Kushner and Avi Berkowitz, who replaced Greenblatt, saw an opportunity in
what Otaiba wrote, and jumped on it.
July 1 came and went without any sovereignty moves and very
little talk on the matter. There was an oblique reference here and there by
Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, but no movement. And then came
the moment that changed everything, A phone call between Trump, Netanyahu and
Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, leading to the
announcement of peace on Trump’s Twitter account. The deal was called the Abraham Accords, named
after the forefather of Jews and Arabs.
The love affair between Israelis and Emiratis began
immediately. There was an effusive outpouring of support and excitement on
social media from regular people in both countries. On the diplomatic level,
the governments immediately took action to make normalization a reality. Less
than two weeks later, the first-ever Israeli delegation to the UAE landed
in Abu Dhabi, led by National Security Adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat. Israeli flags
waved in the airport where an El Al plane landed in Abu Dhabi for the first
time.
The ensuing months have brought a flurry of business,
cultural and diplomatic exchanges, and, of course, many thousands of Israeli
tourists in Dubai this month, when the UAE was one of the only “green”
countries Israelis could visit without having to quarantine when they arrived
home.
Even the talk of a deal to allow the UAE to buy F-35 planes
could not mar the excitement. The US, Israel and the UAE have all said that the
fighter jets were not part of the peace deal and never came up between the two
Middle Eastern countries. At the same time, the US and UAE pointed out that
Israel lifting its opposition to the sale – after Gantz met with his American
counterpart and they reached an arrangement that satisfactorily maintained
Israel’s qualitative military edge – was what greased the wheels on something
the UAE had been seeking for the past six years.
Over the last few months, the world has seen a veritable
domino effect. It took the UAE’s courage to be the first Arab country in
decades to take the plunge and establish diplomatic relations with Israel to
inspire more to follow. Bahrain’s announcement came less than a month later,
and its foreign minister took part in a peace-signing ceremony at the White
House a few days later.
In mid-October, Ben-Shabbat led another delegation, this
time to Manama. The Bahrain peace deal didn’t come with any strings attached to
date, and has been purely about normal diplomatic and business ties, which have
moved at a rapid pace, as with the UAE. The next two dominoes to fall were
Sudan and Morocco, but in a somewhat different way. In both cases, ties with
Israel came together with a major shift in US policy in favor of those
countries.
Normalization with Sudan is highly symbolic for Israelis.
Khartoum was the site of the Arab League’s “three noes” of 1967: no
negotiations, no recognition, no peace with Israel. For Khartoum to overturn
those three is truly momentous. The business opportunities in Sudan are fewer
for Israelis, but Israel has already offered help in the areas of agriculture,
water use, solar energy and more.
For Sudan, the normalization story was something else
entirely. The announcement of steps toward ties with Israel came in late
October, after pressure from Pompeo during negotiations to remove the African
state from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism. That removal came over a
year and a half after Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir was removed and Burhan,
a Sudanese Army general, and civilian leader Abdalla Hamdok formed a government
aimed at transitioning toward democracy. Getting off the list will likely
drastically help Sudan’s economic recovery and access to international aid.
While the US denied making an ultimatum – recognize Israel
or you stay on the list – it’s clear that Khartoum felt serious pressure.
Hamdok was opposed to ties with Israel, while Burhan was more in favor – after
all, he had met Netanyahu already – and both realized it was risky while their
country’s situation was so shaky, but in the end they did it. Normalization
with Israel was a small step to take toward something that was much bigger and
more important for Sudan.
The same could be said about normalization between Israel and
Morocco, announced in December. In King Mohammed VI’s announcement, a few short
bullet points on renewing diplomatic relations with Israel came after seven
lengthy paragraphs on the Trump administration’s agreement to recognize
Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara. That recognition is the big prize
Morocco wanted.
If the king had not been holding out for a big prize – as he
saw Sudan and to some extent the UAE received – ties with Israel would have
been easy. Israel and Morocco had secret ties, including intelligence sharing,
for decades, and partial diplomatic relations in the 1990s. Those relations
were officially suspended in 2000, but some level of ties has always continued,
and many Israelis visit Morocco each year.
Still, since a million Israelis have roots in Morocco, and
many have fond, positive feelings for the country and its royal family, this
move was celebrated in Israel. And Morocco’s tourism minister expects 200,000
Israeli visitors a year, post-corona.
With 2020 behind us and 2021 beginning, there is discussion
of even more dominoes falling, and even more countries joining the Abraham
Accords. Trump administration officials have said they’re working to even make
it happen in the next three weeks, before President-elect Joe Biden takes office.
Mauritania, Oman and Indonesia are the names on Israeli and
American officials’ tongues these days, which makes sense, because Israel has
or has had some level of ties with all of them.
Mauritania declared war on Israel in 1967, but the countries
established diplomatic relations in 1999, which were suspended in the wake of
Operation Cast Lead in 2009.
Former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin visited Indonesia, the
most populous Muslim country, and thousands of Israeli and Indonesian tourists
visit each other’s countries each year.
Netanyahu visited Oman in 2018, and Israel and Oman are part
of the anti-Iran axis in the Middle East.
But the big hope is for Saudi Arabia. This is where Biden
comes into play. Biden and his foreign policy advisers have spoken positively
about the Abraham Accords, without commenting on the strings attached. At the
same time, they have been very critical of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record.
If the Trump administration doesn’t find a way to quickly make it worth
Riyadh’s while in the next few weeks, which seems unlikely, MBS and King Salman
will probably wait to see what benefit they can exact from the Biden
administration to go with peace with Israel. After all, the thought is, why
shouldn’t they get something out of the deal, as the UAE, Sudan and Morocco
did?
A very senior official told The Jerusalem Post that Riyadh
is expected to get on board in 2021. Netanyahu and MBS met in the Saudi city of
Neom weeks ago. Salman is still reticent on the matter, holding on to the Arab
Peace Initiative, also known as the Saudi Initiative, which requires peace with
the Palestinians before normalization with the Arab League.
Looking ahead at the unfolding 2021, it seems likely that
the Abraham Accords domino rally will continue, and it seems almost inevitable
that it will feature the biggest coup of all, Saudi-Israel peace. But if
there’s anything we learned from 2020, it is that January can be drastically
different from December in ways we never expected.
