Israel accepts US arms sales to the Emirates
Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has given his approval to the sale of F-35 fighter planes from the United States to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as part of the diplomatic progress made by both developed nations following the famous Abraham Agreement.
In September the Emirates and Israel sealed these agreements establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries at the White House, under the auspices of the United States. This understanding was also supported by Bahrain. All aimed at pacifying the Middle East region and with the aim of getting more Arab nations to join the trend of establishing diplomatic ties with the Israeli state.
The Abraham Agreements have opened the way to attempting to achieve peace in the Middle East and to settle frozen issues such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Precisely, part of the Arab sphere regards these pacts as a betrayal of the Palestinian cause, but recently other players such as Sudan, which also normalised relations with Israel, have been joining the agreements.
In this connection, political progress has been made in the link established between the UAE and Israel in different areas such as economics and, in this case, armaments. "Following a precise evaluation by professionals from the Ministry of Defence, it was decided that Israel is not opposed to supplying certain weapons systems to the UAE, when this issue is anchored in an agreement with the US that enhances Israel's competitive advantage and guarantees its military advantage in the Middle East in the coming decades", an official Israeli state communiqué stated.
Initially, Netanyahu indicated that accepting the sale of military material to the Emirates was not part of the agreements, but this option has now been incorporated. The official note stated that "the new understandings were not part of the peace agreement" with the UAE and that these began to be discussed only a month ago, following the signing of the Abraham Agreements in September, which were mediated by Washington and in which the Emirates and Bahrain agreed to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
Meanwhile, Benny Gantz, the defence minister and main partner of Netanyahu in the government coalition, who is furthermore due to replace him in office next year according to the political agreement reached between the two to form an executive, recently returned from Washington, where on Thursday he negotiated "compensation" for his country for the sale of advanced weapons to the Arab country. Gantz signed an agreement with the US defence secretary, Mark Esper, to maintain the so-called "qualitative military advantage", which will enable the supply of "advanced weapons systems that will significantly improve Israel's military capabilities, maintaining its military and security advantage in the region".
Although both leaders agree that the United States should now give the green light to the sale of F-35 fighters and other advanced weapons to the Gulf, they have exchanged accusations in public, with Gantz assuring that this possible sale of weapons, which would have been negotiated before the signing of the normalisation agreement with Abu Dhabi, was concealed from the defence. Tonight Netanyahu denied these allegations and said that "there was no agreement" prior to the signing of the normalisation agreement.
Various analysts believe that the sale to the Emirates of the F-35s, which had been denied for years, may have been one of the factors that tipped the balance in Abu Dhabi's decision to break the consensus of the Arab League and establish relations with Israel without waiting for a resolution of the conflict with the Palestinians.
"We recently gave our consent to this pact", Netanyahu stated, "and Gantz's claim is therefore unfounded. It is not based on any truth", in statements also collected by El Correo del Golfo.
