There have been two principal progressive critiques of the so-called Abraham Accords—the spate of peace and normalization agreements between Israel and a growing number of majority-Arab and Muslim states. The first is that these states have abandoned the Palestinian cause and have given up their leverage over Israel for a tuppence. The second is that it’s all meaningless theater: Israel was never at war with any of these countries, and has long enjoyed (barely) covert trade and/or security cooperation with nearly all of them.Both criticisms only get it half-right: this is indeed theater, but it is far from meaningless; and far from giving up leverage on Israel, the signatories have increased theirs exponentially.Let’s start with the leverage. Since 2002, the promise of normalization and integration into the region was dangled before Israel, in exchange for the establishment of a Palestinian state: the so-called Saudi Initiative. To those who supported the two-state solution, the offer was as tantalizing as it was a no-brainer: both an end to Israel’s own conflict with the Palestinians, and wide-open travel and trade in a vast region where Israel was hitherto a pariah. But the dominant faction in Israeli politics (then as now) was unconditionally opposed… Read full this story
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