News Briefs: Trump Is Bringing Something New To The Middle East -- Peace

President Trump has, in the space of little more than two weeks, presented a surprisingly strong claim to a Nobel Peace Prize.

Thanks in no small part to the efforts of son-in-law Jared Kushner, the Trump Administration has brokered a full normalization of relations between the United Arab Emirates and Israel, with Bahrain agreeing to do so shortly after. 

As for Donald Trump, he can now boast that he has reshaped the Middle East.

So far,

  1. President Trump has fostered a peace deal between the United Arab Emirates and Israel.
  2. President Trump has fostered a peace deal between Bahrain and Israel.
  3. President Trump has fostered Serbia and Kosovo committing to establish embassies in Jerusalem and recognize the city as Israel’s capital.
  4. President Trump has destroyed ISIS.
  5. President Trump has contained Iran.

Prior to President Trump, there had been no Middle East peace deal in the last 25 years. President Obama fiddled with ISIS and conducted foreign policy as if they were here to stay. Iran was acting with impunity in the Middle East.

Almost simultaneously, Serbia and Kosovo, bitter enemies after the break up of the former Yugoslavia, have agreed to normalize economic relations.

President Trump announced Friday that Serbia and Kosovo have normalized economic ties as part of U.S.-brokered talks that include Belgrade moving its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem, and Israel and Kosovo agreeing to mutual recognition.

Unsurprisingly, the legacy media is trying its level best to ignore these developments, despite their unquestioned historic significance.

You don’t have to channel Simon & Garfunkel’s classic “The Sound of Silence” to conjure up mainstream media response to what is becoming one of the more amazing events, if not the most amazing, of our time:

Donald Trump (with significant help from Jared Kushner and Mike Pompeo) seems to be doing what few thought possible after decades of Oslo Accords failure—bringing peace to the Middle East.

A President that actually delivers actual peace. Has America ever had that before? 

Update:

Add the Sultanate of Oman to the list of Arab countries willing to normalize relations with Israel.

Oman on Sunday welcomed the normalization deal between Bahrain and Israel, saying it hopes it will contribute to peace throughout the region, state media reported.

“The Sultanate welcomes the initiative taken by the Kingdom of Bahrain within the framework of its sovereign rights and the Tripartite Joint Declaration on Relations with Israel,” said a statement published by Oman state television.

The Arab Peninsula is willing to make peace with Israel. "Historic" does not begin to describe what is happening in the Middle East.

Update:

UAE and Bahrain are both allies of Saudi Arabia, the leading Arab power in the Persian Gulf. Saudi Arabia's silence at the normalization deals itself signals a willingness by the kingdom for a broader peace deal with Israel.

The development, billed by Trump as “truly historic,” was unlikely to have happened without the silent endorsement of Riyadh, which holds enormous leverage over Bahrain.

Saudi Arabia, the Arab world’s biggest economy, was among the Gulf powers that pledged $10 billion in financial aid in 2018 to cash-strapped Bahrain, and it sent troops in 2011 to shore up the ruling family following an Arab Spring uprising.

Nor should anyone overlook that Israel has been sharing intel on Iran with Saudi Arabia since 2017.

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gadi Eisenkot has offered to share Israeli intelligence about Iran with Saudi Arabia, in remarks published in a rare interview with a Saudi newspaper published in London.

“We are ready to exchange experiences with Saudi Arabia and other moderate Arab countries and exchange intelligence information to confront Iran,” Eisenkot told the Elaph newspaper, adding, “There are many shared interests between us and Saudi Arabia.”

The deals between Israel and UAE as well as Bahrain are part of a longer trend towards rapprochement between Arabs and Israelis.

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