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A report by Foreign Policy magazine revealed that Israel seeks to be the new soft power in the Arab region, achieving cooperation with the Gulf states in various fields.
The report highlighted this cooperation between the Israelis and several Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, whose government officially denies doing business with Israel. He insists that normalization depends on Israel’s approval of the Arab Peace Initiative, which calls for a separate Palestinian state, but it does so behind closed doors.
Shmuel Barr, the former Israeli intelligence officer, said he was surprised to receive a WhatsApp call from Saudi Arabia. “It was quite surprising,” he said. It also confirms the gradual progress Israel has made in building relations with historically hostile Gulf states.
Bar worked in Israeli intelligence for 30 years and then founded IntuView, a company that searches social media content for terrorist threats. Intelligence agencies and law enforcement agencies in Europe, the United States and India were among its clients. Now the Saudis were keen to hire an Israeli data expert to help them with counterterrorism policies and more.
Bar said the contract with his company was just one example of the huge shift in Israel’s relations with the Gulf states in recent years.
The magazine pointed out that while US President Joe Biden talks about returning to the nuclear deal with Iran, Israel is working to strengthen an unimaginable alliance with its Arab partners through strategic, technological and trade cooperation.
Last month, Israel called for a defense alliance with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain against Iran. It has signed various agreements with the United Arab Emirates, the second largest economy in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia, in the tourism, health, agriculture and water sectors.
According to a preliminary estimate, bilateral trade between Israel and the United Arab Emirates is expected to increase from $ 300,000 to $ 500 million per year.
Israel has also agreed to strengthen economic ties with Egypt. At the end of last month, during a rare visit, a high-ranking Egyptian minister visited Jerusalem, despite his disputed status, and signed an agreement linking the Leviathan natural gas field in the Mediterranean to the facilities of Egyptian LNG via an undersea gas pipeline to export gas to European countries. .
The magazine pointed out that Israel was also trying to soften the positions of countries hostile to it. He bought the Russian coronavirus vaccine, for Syria, apparently as part of the prisoner swap deal with Syria.
According to the report, Israel is working to strengthen strategic cooperation by establishing pressure groups with a vested interest in the relationship through good trade relations. Israel hopes that instead of being seen as a “nation of war” as it was, it can prove its worth as an ally and not just against Iran.
She explained that Israel is ready to cooperate in various areas, even where US companies are concerned about cooperation, due to the human rights record in the Gulf, for example, social media monitoring.
Analysts say many Gulf states, or at least large segments of their populations, no longer want to be held hostage to the Palestinian cause and see relations with Israel as necessary to diversify their economies.
Saudi-Israel relations analyst Aziz Al-Ghishian said the city of Neom, which will be built on the Red Sea coast at a cost of $ 500 billion, is the new arena in which the two countries could cooperate. thereafter. He added: “In general, Saudi Arabia is transforming its economy and making it more technology-based than oil-based, and Israel can help.”
“What NEOM is indicating is that the incentive for Saudi Arabia and Israel to openly cooperate is increasing. He also indicates that if there is a good relationship between Saudi Arabia and Israel or open relations of any kind, they will be driven by Saudi prosperity rather than by confrontation with Iran.
Joel Guzansky, senior researcher at the Israel Institute for National Security Studies, said that while many deals are still classified, relations are now more public than before. He explained, “Israel is gaining legitimacy. Israel is now in the Gulf. There is no need to hide as it was in the past.
He pointed out that the dispute between Biden and Mohammed bin Salman over the murder of Saudi opposition journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and in general due to human rights violations in the Kingdom as well as in the United Arab Emirates and in Egypt, in fact aims to strengthen relations with Israel.
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