Join the Abraham Accords? US allies scoff at Trump’s demand.
President Donald Trump’s demand that more Muslim-majority countries join the Abraham Accords and recognize Israel as part of efforts to end the Iran war is being met by officials in such countries with laughter, dismissal and, often, silence.
Trump’s idea, should he stick to it, could endanger a U.S.-Iran peace deal — governments may walk away from mediating talks rather than risk angering their publics by establishing ties with Israel. But some Middle Eastern officials aren’t taking Trump’s demand too seriously, saying they view it as merely the U.S. president trying to appease hawkish Republicans who worry he will give away too much in talks with Iran.
“It is a smart tactic to calm down the angry base,” a Gulf Arab diplomat said, having been granted anonymity, like others, to discuss sensitive diplomacy. “He will keep bringing it up again and again. But it will not be part of the deal.”
Trump’s assertion, nonetheless, injected uncertainty into an already volatile situation. A spate of new U.S. military strikes on Iranian missile sites and boatssuspected of placing mines as well as Israel’s escalating offensive in Lebanon are adding to concerns that a tenuous U.S.-Israel-Iran ceasefire could collapse and plunge the region into even more fighting. The war has already had economic fallout globally.
Upon hearing of Trump’s demands, one former U.S. official sent mock notes to Arab officials congratulating them on joining the Abraham Accords — and received laughter emojis in response.
The former U.S. official said some of their Arab official contacts view the Trump demand as a “poison pill,” adding that “it creates new conditions for peace that neither Iran nor the states in question will accept.”
A second former U.S. official described the reaction from their Middle East government contacts as “disbelief and frustration.”
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly noted that Trump has wanted to expand the Abraham Accords, which established diplomatic, economic and other ties between Israel and several Arab states, since he launched them in his first term.
“The Abraham Accords have provided massive economic benefits to all countries involved and enabled historic cooperation, so this would be a natural complement to a peace deal between the United States and Iran,” Kelly said.
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Monday that he was “mandatorily requesting” that countries such as Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia sign on to the accords. He noted that he’d raised the idea in a Saturday call about Iran peace talks with leaders of many of the same countries. In his post, Trump suggested even Iran could join the accords, despite the Islamist regime’s decades of hostility toward Israel.
Some of the countries Trump mentioned, such as Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, already are part of the Abraham Accords. Others, such as Egypt and Jordan, have peace treaties or other agreements with Israel.
For others, joining the accords anytime soon could be risky. In the wake of the Gaza war, Saudi Arabia has said it will not establish ties with Israel unless its leaders agree to a serious pathway to creating a Palestinian state. (At the same time, Saudi Arabia, like several other Arab countries, sees Iran’s Islamist regime as a destabilizing force in the region).
A Gulf Arab official said the Saudi position had not changed on either the Iran crisis or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, despite Trump’s entreaties regarding the Abraham Accords.
“The Kingdom is supportive of all diplomatic efforts to resolve conflict, not military solutions,” the official said in a statement. “The kingdom also opposes all forms of aggression. Its position on the two-state solution being the only sensible way forward has not changed.” The statement did not directly mention the accords.
Pakistan, which is among the lead mediators of the U.S.-Iran talks, is also unlikely to join the Abraham Accords. As in many Muslim-majority nations, there is widespread sympathy for the Palestinians in Pakistan, and a government ignores that domestic opinion at its peril.
Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Asif, in an interview on Samaa TV, ruled out joining the accords, though he framed it as his opinion.
“In my personal view, I don’t think we’ll be part of any accords like this,” said Asif, whose social media posts are highly critical of Israel. “It would clash with our fundamental views. And I think no initiative like this has been taken from our side, nor as anyone approached us.”
A spokesperson for the Pakistani Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.
Diplomats and officials from several other countries did not respond to requests for comment or issue public statements at all — a sign of the sensitivity of the topic.
Few, after all, have incentives to risk Trump’s ire by openly defying or questioning him.
“Gulf states all seem to be trying to navigate a highly imperfect end to the war without antagonizing Trump and without Trump caving on their core interests,” said Michael Ratney, a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
المصدر: Politico