Report dwells on Palestinians’ gains from UAE-Israel deal

Rubeir al-Fares

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy has published an important report about the latest peace deal between the United Arab Emirates and Israel.

The writer of the report, Ghaith al-Omari, who is a senior fellow in The Washington Institute’s Irwin Levy Family Program on the U.S.-Israel Strategic Relationship, describes the deal as a diplomatic win-win-win in the Middle East.

He says the deal will open the door for the normalization of relations between the UAE and Israel.

Al-Omari describes the deal as a “historic breakthrough” in which Israel will drop its plan to annex parts of the West Bank that Palestinians claim for a future state.

The Palestinian leadership will inevitably denounce the development, but it would be wiser if they didn’t: This agreement could benefit them, too, he says.

Al-Omari adds that until now, Israelis and Palestinians have been locked in a moribund process to trade land for peace after the initial euphoria of the early 1990s that followed the signing of the Oslo agreement between the Palestinians and Israel, and the Wadi Araba peace treaty between Jordan and Israel, gave way to repeated failures.

Despair and conflict soon ensued, and the prospects for progress began to quickly fade, al-Omari says.

With this grim landscape as a backdrop, the announcement of the deal holds the potential of breathing life into the peace process, he adds.

He says Oslo also stands as a painful reminder of how opportunities and hopes can be quickly dashed.

Al-Omari notes that the new agreement is rooted in the national interests of both the UAE and Israel, but its implications go far beyond that.

Until now, Israel has enjoyed normal relations—i.e. recognition of its existence and the perks that entails, such as embassies, trade, travel and cooperation on security, water and more—from just two Arab countries, Egypt and Jordan, he says.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, like every Israeli premier before him, has made normalizing relations with Arab and Muslim countries a key piece of his diplomatic agenda, he adds.

Al-Omari notes that this reflects a deeper, long-standing Israeli desire for a normal place in the region.

For Netanyahu, the agreement is a major diplomatic win, al-Omari says.

Plus it also gives him a way out of a politically tricky corner he had painted himself into, strengthening his tenuous hold on power, he adds.

He goes on to say that in the last two Israeli elections, Netanyahu had promised his supporters on the right that Israel would annex parts of the West Bank—a move that the Palestinians and the overwhelming majority of the international community consider illegitimate.

Due to international pressure and concerns within the Israeli security establishment over the security and diplomatic implications, Netanyahu has been unable to advance annexation, al-Omari says.

Now he can claim a political victory while extracting himself from the annexation bind, he adds.