Jared Kushner nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in "The Abraham Accords"

Former White House senior adviser Jared Kushner has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in negotiating four normalisation agreements between Israel and Arab nations known as the "Abraham Accords."

Both Jared Kushner, son-in-law of former US President Donald Trump, and his deputy, Avi Berkowit, special envoy for the Middle East, have been nominated for the prestigious award. The pair of former aides to then-President Donald Trump were nominated by US lawyer Alan Dershowitz, who had the power to nominate candidates in his capacity as professor emeritus at Harvard Law School.

Dershowitz, a close friend of former President Trump, reportedly defended him in his first impeachment trial last year. The lawyer has also openly expressed his disagreement with the current "impeachment", through an opinion article, where he said that the Senate should dismiss the impeachment trial against the former president for the assault on the US Capitol on 6 January, as he has become "an ordinary citizen".

In his letter to the Nobel committee, Dershowitz seemed to acknowledge that his nomination of Kushner might be somewhat unpopular but argued that "the Nobel Peace Prize is not for popularity. Nor is it an assessment of what the international community might think of those who helped bring about peace. It is a prize for meeting the daunting criteria set out by Alfred Nobel in his will". 

In his letter to the Nobel committee, Dershowitz also cited the work of former US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman and former Israeli Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer on the normalisation accords.

The "Abraham Accords" are considered to be the most important diplomatic breakthroughs in the Middle East in the last 25 years. After decades of hostilities between Arab countries and Israel, the Trump administration succeeded in getting four Arab nations to normalise relations with the Jewish state: Bahrain, Sudan, the United Arab Emirates and Morocco. Just a few years ago, such agreements were unthinkable without resolving the Palestinian question.

However, the "Abraham Accords" have raised hackles among Palestinians and much of the Arab population who have rejected these agreements as an act of betrayal of their struggle against the Israeli occupation, and since last summer protests have erupted in the occupied Palestinian territories and across the Arab world to express their condemnation of the agreements.

These normalisation agreements thus break the old paradigm in the Middle East, where normalisation of relations with Israel was unquestionably contingent on resolving the Palestinian conflict. The Trump administration has managed to circumvent this dispute and materialise agreements between different Arab states and Israel. For their part, both Kushner and Berkowitz - the Middle East envoy - were key figures in negotiating agreements between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco.

As a result of their role as mediators in the "Abraham Accords", Kushner and Berkowitz have been proposed as Nobel nominees. Still, thousands of people, from members of parliaments around the world to former winners of this important award, can nominate candidates. Nominations therefore do not imply endorsement by the Nobel committee.

Among the most prominent nominees for this year's prize are Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny, the World Health Organisation and young activist Greta Thunberg. All were backed by Norwegian lawmakers who in the past have been the ones to bet on the ultimate winner.