Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. It is a warm January morning and 150 officials and diplomats from six countries are crowded into a large hall for a ritual photo. They all meet together for the first time and although the meeting has only started for five minutes, according to one of the heads of delegations present, that is the most important moment. For the now former director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, Alon Ushpiz, those brief moments of 9 January were in fact fundamental for “pumping fuel into the engine of a new regional mechanism” which, at least in the initial intentions, was supposed to bring peace in the Middle East.
It was in fact the first time since it was established in March last year that the Negev Forum brought together its working groups divided by competence: food and water security, clean energy, tourism, health, education and regional security. Established against the background of the Abraham Accords for the normalization of relations between Israel and four Arab states, this cooperation platform officially aims to «promote growth, stability and prosperity; supporting the interests of all countries in the region and promoting sustainable development, providing solutions to existing challenges in order to achieve a better future for the next generations”. Even if the initial promise was another.
Announced by the then US Trump administration as a “historic peace agreement”, more than two years after the first signing, which took place in September 2020, the commitment ensured by the agreements between the Jewish State, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan has been – so far – completely ignored, given that the pacts seem to have a completely different purpose.
No progress has yet been recorded in the mitigation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but the opportunities to conclude new business and to ensure military cooperation between member countries have multiplied.
Excellent absentees
The head of the Israeli delegation was clear. The Negev Forum, Ushpiz explained to the Axios portal, is about strengthening regional integration and improving people’s lives. “We don’t want him to engage in political discussions on the Palestinian issue.”
On the other hand, the Palestinians have never even been invited. The first historic summit of the Forum took place in the kibbutz of Sde Boker, in Israel, from 27 to 28 March 2022, with the participation of the foreign minister of the Jewish state, his counterparts from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco and the US Secretary of State Tony Blinken. A second meeting, at the level of ministerial officials, took place on 27 June in Manama, Bahrain. Furthermore, ahead of its January 9-10 meeting in Abu Dhabi and after a videoconference summit held in October, the Forum Steering Committee adopted a “Regional Cooperation Framework” on November 10, which was made public only after the summit of this year and which will serve as a basis for the next meeting scheduled for March in Morocco. Palestinian representatives were hosted at none of these appointments, nor will they be in the foreseeable future.
Right from the start, first Egypt and then Morocco proposed integrating the Palestinian National Authority into the Forum, an idea that has so far fallen on deaf ears. The US has also recently pushed in this direction, suggesting however that the Palestinians only participate in working groups to evaluate any economic projects of interest to their people. A proposal rejected to the sender. Out of solidarity, even Jordan – invited by Israel – has so far refused to participate in the summits. But what has been discussed in the last two years? First of military cooperation and then of trade. Never, concretely, of peace.
More fruits
On the sidelines of the last meeting, US State Department adviser Derek Chollet, who co-chaired the regional security working group led by the United States and Bahrain, told the press that those present “have come up with several concrete projects » to strengthen the military capabilities of the member countries. Other US State Department officials told al-Monitor that the hottest issues discussed at the forum were the Covid pandemic, Russia’s war on Ukraine, and food and water security in the region. Specifically, there was talk of direct air links, border control and preparedness for environmental disasters. In short, no political progress on the Palestinian question. So much so that last June, US officials present at the Manama summit had to clarify to the PNA that the Forum does not replace peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians. Of course, since so little is said about it.
A few timid hints are contained in the “Regional cooperation framework” adopted in November by the Steering Committee of the Forum, according to which one of the objectives of the platform is “to develop and implement initiatives that strengthen the economy and improve the quality of life of the Palestinian people”. “The Participants – reads the document – also stated that these relations can be exploited to build momentum in Israeli-Palestinian relations, towards a negotiated resolution of the conflict”.
Beyond this declaration of intent, however, there is no concrete discussion on the issue within the working groups, quite the contrary. Some officials of the Jewish state revealed to the Axios portal that more than one delegation from the Arab countries present asked to mention the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the final statement on the sidelines of the Abu Dhabi summit, a reference removed from the text after Tel Aviv’s objections . It is not surprising given the change in government that took place at the end of the year between former prime minister Yair Lapid and Benjamin Netanyahu, who returned to office for a sixth term at the head of the most right-wing executive ever seen in Israel.
If no results are seen on the peace front, the results from an economic point of view are surprising. According to the Abraham Accords Peace Institute, which processes data from the Israeli statistical institute, thanks to these agreements, in the first seven months of 2022, bilateral trade between Tel Aviv and the United Arab Emirates exceeded 2.35 billion dollars, in 115% increase over the same period last year. All this also thanks to important projects such as the Trans-Israel Pipeline, the pipeline of the Israeli Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company (Eapc) which thanks to an agreement with the Emirate Med-Red will transport the Arab country’s crude oil from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean towards Europe. Tourism has also benefited: in the last two years, according to the competent Israeli ministry, over half a million citizens of the Jewish state have visited Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
An even higher growth in economic relations was instead recorded in trade between Israel and Bahrain, which increased by 164% per annum in the same months. More modest but still very positive percentages also concern bilateral relations with Morocco (+34%) and Egypt (+27%). And that’s just the beginning.
If fully implemented, the Abraham Accords could create up to 4 million new jobs and $1 trillion in new economic activity across the region over the next ten years, according to a study by the Rand Foundation.
The stone guest
If so far the agreements have simply consolidated the status quo in the occupied territories, leaving the Palestinian question on the sidelines and representing at best a step towards a development without justice, overcoming the refusal of some Arab countries to recognize and start open relations direct relations with the Jewish state – a principle on which Middle Eastern geopolitics has been based ever since the 1967 Arab League summit in Khartoum based on the “Three Nos”: «no peace, no recognition, no negotiations» with Israel – undoubtedly constitutes a historic step forward to limit tensions in the region.
As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman pointed out at the time, “the biggest changes in the Middle East come when big players do the right things for the wrong reasons.” In this sense, Israel’s progressive rapprochement with some Arab regimes – also through new economic opportunities – could favor an easing of regional tensions, even if this does not have significant effects on the occupied territories, where people continue to die (over 500 deaths on both sides since the signing of the Accords and the fourth war in Gaza). But, as Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir explained last summer, peace “comes at the end of the process, not at the beginning.” In short, we are still far from a solution.
Primarily because, despite their efforts, neither Israel nor the US have managed to extend the Accords to new members. Even Gulf states such as Oman and Qatar that have long maintained back-to-back relations with Israel have so far refused to follow suit set by the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. Indeed, in early January, Muscat approved a law that criminalizes any relationship or interaction with the “Zionist entity”, while Doha considers the agreements an obstacle to the two-state solution.
Furthermore, despite small but sensitive openings by both sides, such as the lifting of the ban on Israeli aviation from the airspace of the Arab kingdom and Tel Aviv’s assent to the Saudi purchase of the Egyptian islands of Tiran and Sanafir in the Red Sea, not even Riad has still adhered to the agreements and does not appear to be intending to change its mind anytime soon.
As emerged from the latest meeting between White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which took place on January 19 in Jerusalem, the first step towards the normalization of relations between Tel Aviv and Saudi Arabia passes from mend relations between Riyadh and Washington, which have deteriorated in the last three months after the agreement reached with Russia in OPEC+ to drastically reduce oil production, an option opposed by the US and excluded by the Saudis during Biden’s trip to the kingdom in last July. And it always comes back to economic interests, privileged over peace.
