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As the United States of America moves across
the global map, reversing many international efforts made by its former
President Barack Obama, it is on the brink of engineering a treaty that will
shake the Middle East down to its tectonic plates. As anti-Iranian policies and
sentiments reach new heights under Donald Trump’s leadership, reports of an
unlikely alliance between Saudi Arabia and Israel have been surfacing since
last year.
The world is shifting, and in this case not
along socio-religious lines, rather it’s carving its way to new Middle Eastern
alliances, solely based upon economic gain. Many hold crown prince Muhammad bin
Salman responsible for the assumed shift in Saudi foreign policy and yielding
real power instead of King Abbas. It was only last year that Prince Salman
cracked down on many members of the royal family and state officials, under the
guise of ‘corruption’- which many have speculated was only to quash dissenting
views on Kingdom’s policies.
The United States is keen to orchestrate a
deal between these two Middle Eastern powers. It will be interesting to see how
Saudi Arabia is able to justify a mere recognition of Israel as a nation, let
alone push a peace treaty, while the question of Palestine is still unresolved.
How will Saudi Arabia, the keepers of the Kab’ah, and rulers of Islam’s holiest
lands, and previous front-runner in anti-Israel discourse, justify a budding
friendship with Israel, while other Muslim nations such as Pakistan refuse to
acknowledge its existence?
After the Arab Peace offering to Israel in
2002 — negotiations between Israel and the Muslim world have reached more or
less a stand still. Israeli Prime Minister’s former advisor on national
security Yaacov Nagel said that Riyadh was more focused on teaming up with
Israel against Iran, “They just have to say there is an agreement between
Israel and the Palestinians, they don’t care, they don’t give a damn about what
will be in the agreement”.
What has been stalling the ultimate deal
however does not seem to be Saudi hesitation towards the response of the Muslim
world — in fact it is Jared Kushner, the inexperienced senior advisor and
son-in-law of Donald Trump who has been unable to bring anything tangible to
the table in the past eighteen months.
However long the United States may take under
the leadership of its inexperienced government, one thing is clear:
Saudi-Israeli interests are aligned, whether against Iran or for a better
economic deal. And the region is about to undergo policy shifts that could
jeopardize peace in Middle East for a long time to come. Published in Daily Times, July 31st 2018.
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