Abraham Accords Could Be Trump's Biggest Win

The road to real peace

By proposing that joining the Abraham Accords be “mandatory” for the Gulf states and others participating in the talks, Donald Trump has exposed the ongoing peace negotiations between Iran and the U. S. for what they are—not really about peace.

They are about a time out from a war that would inevitably return, most likely soon.

Real peace, as the president made clear by suddenly bringing up this seemingly awkward subject, would only be achieved by all Middle East nations actually making peace by signing the Abraham Accords, forming a political and economic alliance, and abandoning the hope or pretense (however you want to see it) of putting an end to Israel.

Signing the Deal (once it’s negotiated, if it is) should mean signing the Accords simultaneously. It’s by far the best way, perhaps the only way, to end the Middle East conflict that has persisted since time immemorial. It would be a mammoth turning point in history.

That is why the most surprising part of this already dramatic suggestion is that Mr. Trump included Iran, of all places, in the proposal. From the President’s discussion of the Accords on TruthSocial, May 25:

“It should start with the immediate signing by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and everybody else should follow suit. If they don’t, they should not be part of this Deal in that it shows bad intention. In speaking to numerous of the Great Leaders mentioned above, they would be honored, as soon as our Document is signed, to have the Islamic Republic of Iran as part of the Abraham Accords.”

Iran in the Abraham Accords? What would the result be if there could be a fair democratic vote among the citizens of that country to see whether they wanted to join?

That we will ever find out may be in the “when pigs fly” category, but it would be interesting to know. My guess is that it would be very positive. In any case, Trump has fired yet another shot over the IRGC’s bow.

Unfortunately, Saudi Arabia, presumably under the guidance of MBS (Mohammed bin Salman), has already rejected the proposal until a Palestinian state, or a path to one, is guaranteed.

This comes via a “Saudi source” to CNN, so caveat emptor. It’s been obvious for some time that the leaks we have been getting from various venues about all aspects of these negotiations should be taken with several barrels of salt. We are being manipulated non-stop by competing forces within the countries, not just Iran, and by our own and foreign media.

Nevertheless, that has been Riyadh’s position for some time, even though a Palestinian state has been offered on multiple occasions to the Palestinian Authority, its leaders always refusing it, no matter how generous those offers have been. Just ask Bill Clinton.

Now, a Palestinian state is less likely than ever, given Hamas’ (to put it politely) aberrant behavior, thoroughly documented in the recent Civil Commission Report on October 7th Sexual Violence. It’s hard to imagine Israel, or anybody else, would allow a state next door populated by such people.

MBS is an intelligent man and surely knows this, making his objection, if it’s real, particularly disingenuous. Hasn’t he had enough of this charade? What’s behind his objection? Bin Saman presents himself as a modernizer, but immediate reactions like this make you wonder. We don’t want to think he has, in the President’s words, a “bad intention.” (Trump’s ability to endlessly compliment these potentates, plus Putin and Xi, is fascinating, though what he really thinks of them is unknown.)

So far, we have not heard from Türkiye’s vociferously antisemitic Recep Erdoğan, who is unlikely even to pay lip service to Trump’s idea. But he and the others have been boxed in to some extent by our President, who, besides being unpredictable, can be highly creative. Those two traits tend to work in tandem.

In this particular case, it behooves all of us to support him adamantly. This will not be difficult for many of us, but the media and the Democratic Party are all but ignoring the proposal as a passing fancy, not to mention those (former?) members of the Republican Party who hide their prejudice under the rubric of “America First.”

Most of these people feign interest in world peace, but when a legitimate proposal to advance it is in front of them, they denigrate it or, at best, look the other way, especially if it might make the president look good. The selfishness inherent in this is obvious and appalling.

Thus, the Middle East, that hotbed of global conflict, has been dealt with more or less the same way as long as any of us have been alive, a kind of terminal middle-of-the-roadism. This approach, exemplified by decades of State Department conformism, has yielded exactly nothing, repeatedly kicking the conflict down the road. The Europeans have been, if anything, worse. Now, with small exceptions (Czechia, Slovenia), they are a disaster.

It’s easy to treat Trump’s proposal the same way—with a yawn. Beneath that yawn may be the not-so-secret wish of those same parties that nothing be solved, that we go on with the same old same old. Change is frightening. Imagine a Middle East without conflict. (Hard to do, no?)

But the Abraham Accords came out of left field during the first Trump administration. No one expected them. Not all countries joined them, but a few did.—the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan, and Kazakhstan. It seemed daring at the time. Many thought even that small group would not survive, but it did, and it thrived.

Can we ordinary citizens do something to back up Trump on this matter? In the simplest terms, we can talk about it and put it out into the zeitgeist. That may not sound like much, but I suspect it’s more than we might think. Applaud it on social media, if you do that. A genuine Middle East peace is worth overcoming the normal cynicism most of us have. Besides the obvious financial implications (cheaper energy, etc.), it could do something for the most mysterious thing of all—the human soul.

ICYMI

From Jonathan Leaf’s review of EMET on Real Clear Books: “…a well-told story of the supernatural in the category of novels like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Bram Stoker’s Dracula.”