Iran’s growing aggression played a factor in Arab states reconsidering their policy towards Israel, a senior Emirati minister admitted. Iran’s hostile behavior towards its Arab neighbors made them look at the Jewish State “with fresh eyes,” UAE’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Anwar Gargash, said. The UAE, along with Bahrain, signed a historic peace agreement with Israel at a White House ceremony on September 15.
The comment came amid credible terrorist threats made by Iran against the UAE and Bahrain for endorsing President Donald Trump-brokered peace deal. Earlier this week, the authorities in Bahrain reported a foiled terror plot hatched by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Iranian regime’s military and foreign terrorist arm.
Tehran is the world’s biggest state-sponsor of terrorism, arming and funding leading Islamic terrorist groups across the Arab world and beyond — including in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
The Times of Israel, on Stauday, reported the Emirati minister’s remarks:
The United Arab Emirates didn’t need peace with Israel to counter Iran, a top UAE official said Friday, but he said Iran’s aggressive policies over three decades alarmed many Arab countries and made them look at their relationship with Israel “with fresh eyes.”
Anwar Gargash, the UAE’s minister of state for foreign affairs, acknowledged at a virtual briefing on the sidelines of the equally virtual UN General Assembly’s annual meeting of world leaders that this may not have been Iran’s intention. But its actions had an impact in the region, he said, though he wouldn’t speculate on whether other Arab countries would follow the UAE and Bahrain in establishing relations with Israel.
“The only thing I want to say is the more strategic the Israelis look at these relationships, the more doors will open to them,” Gargash said. “If they look at it very `transactionally’, I think that it is not going to send a very good omen for normalizing relations with many of the Arab countries.” (…)
Looking back at the UAE’s decision to normalize relations with Israel, Gargash said the government decided it was strategically good for the country, “and will make the UAE more of a global presence.”
The government also predicted the reaction “very accurately” — enthusiasm in Europe, bipartisan support in the United States and support from Russia and China and many other countries in Africa and Asia, he said.
But the Arab world and the region remain polarized, Gargash said, though “I would like to say we haven’t lost a single friend.”
The UAE minister also rejected the Palestinian claims of alleged ‘betrayal’ over the Israel-Arab accords, saying: “The Palestinians right now are angry, but I think they will see the benefit in the medium term.” The normalization of diplomatic and trade ties with Israel will be beneficial to Arab countries in the region, the UAE officials maintain.
Palestinian rioters, egged on by the PLO and Hamas as well as leaders of Iran and Turkey, have been burning posters of UAE and Bahraini rulers, as well as those of President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu. Hamas-controlled Gaza has been used by the Palestinian terrorist groups for launching rocket attacks on civilians in Southern Israel.
The Arab states are certainly grateful to President Trump for his policy of isolating the Iranian regime. Sanctions imposed by the White House since the U.S. withdrawal from the nuclear deal have reportedly cost Tehran $150 billion since May 2018, thus crippling the regime’s ability to fund Islamic terrorist groups. The “Americans have inflicted 150 billion dollars of damage,” Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani claimed in televised address on Saturday.
If Rouhani’s estimates are to be believed, President Trump has offset $150 billion reportedly handed out to the Iranian regime by Obama-Biden administration for signing the nuclear deal, including $400 million in secret ransom payments for four Americans detained by Tehran illegally.
Bahrain Foreign Minister: President Trump-brokered accords a ‘golden opportunity for peace’
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY