Less than a month after the normalization of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), formalized on August 13, a second monarchy in the Persian Gulf, Bahrain, takes the step of diplomatic recognition of the Hebrew state. The announcement was made Friday, September 11, in a joint statement from the US presidency, the Bahraini Crown and the Israeli government. The small archipelago becomes the fourth Arab state to establish official relations with Israel, after the UAE, Jordan (1994) and Egypt (1979).
Like Abu Dhabi, Manama has chosen to break free from the 2002 Abdallah plan, a former benchmark text for Arab diplomacy, which made any normalization with Israel conditional on the creation of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital. The joint declaration, which boasts a “Historic breakthrough to advance peace in the Middle East”, does not even include a reference to Israel’s West Bank annexation plan, which the UAE has demanded suspension of in return for recognition. “Israel obtains peace for zero concessions”, summarized on Twitter Elham Fakhro, Gulf specialist at the International Crisis Group.
Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of the Hebrew state, greeted “A pivotal moment in history”. Bahrain’s decision, after that of the UAE, gives a second time reason to the one who has been repeating for years, almost alone against all, that the Palestinian question is not an obstacle to the normalization of Israel’s relations with the Arab world . “It took us twenty-six years between the second peace agreement with an Arab country and the third, but only twenty-nine days between the third and the fourth, and there will be more”, rejoiced the leader of Likud.
“A stab in the back”
The Palestinian leadership, it fulminates, with the feeling of being let go again by a brother country. Ahmad Majdalani, Minister of Social Affairs of the Palestinian Authority, denounced “A stab in the back of the Palestinian people”. On Wednesday, during a meeting of the Arab League, the Palestinian delegation blocked a lip-service to the principles of the Abdallah plan which did not include a condemnation of the Emirati gesture.
Manama’s decision to follow in his neighbor’s footsteps is all the more worrying for Ramallah as there is no doubt that it received a green light from Riyadh. If the UAE has relative diplomatic autonomy vis-à-vis Arabia, this is not the case with Bahrain, a principality of only 760 km2 and 1.4 million inhabitants – half of them foreign workers -, placed under the de facto tutelage of the Saudi kingdom. This relationship of dependence has increased in recent years, due to the collapse in the price of black gold, which forces the archipelago, in a situation of virtual bankruptcy, to be bailed out at regular intervals by Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.
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