With the Abraham Accords, The Times They Are A-Changin’: An Israeli View

Years ago, a survey was done in Japan, where people were asked how many people were there in Israel. The top of the bell curve answer came back with 125 million people, about the same population as Japan itself.

Clearly, the people in Japan were impressed by Israel’s ubiquitous presence in the news and in the halls of power. The evident conclusion: this must be a significant and important nation.

It appears that these Japanese survey takers were on to something. While Israel, for better or worse, is often at the center of international attention, the recent normalization agreements reached with the UAE and Bahrain (which hopefully will be followed by others) have the potential to portend a tectonic shift in international geo-political alignments.

Much has been stated already about the paradigm smashing significance of these agreements, in which the reflexive constructive veto given to the Palestinians has been annulled. This simply has been the product of agreements that do not reference the Palestinians, nor their continuing struggle with Israel.

Instead, as their title connotes, the Abraham Accords demonstrate the significance of the renewed reconciliation between Isaac and Ishmael themselves, and, for the first time, their progeny, the Jews and the Muslims.

Admittedly, this process has been driven by self-interest, the great driver of all international relations. But here, self-interest was not forced to take a back seat to immutable religious differences.

Instead, each party was able to view the other through a half full glass – both are avowedly monotheistic, and both share a major ancestor in common.

FakeNewsMSM barely showed interest in the Israel/UAE/Bahrain news. some said it was a waste of time because Palestinians weren’t involved.

however, they are even less interested in the following (haven’t found any MSM coverage), when the Palestinians are involved:

23 Sept: Reuters: Six states and the Palestinians establish EastMed gas forum
by Ahmed Ismail in Cairo and Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem; Writing by Aidan Lewis; Editing by Gareth Jones and Andrew Cawthorne
Six states signed a charter for an Egypt-based energy forum on Tuesday, giving formal status to a group that seeks to promote natural gas exports from the Eastern Mediterranean and that Israel hopes will strengthen ties with Arab neighbors.
Egypt, Israel, Greece, Cyprus, Italy and Jordan established the East Mediterranean Gas Forum (EMGF) as an intergovernmental organization in a virtual ceremony hosted by Cairo.

The group unites regional rivals of Turkey, which has been locked in a bitter dispute with European Union members Greece and Cyprus over gas drilling rights in the region.

The Palestinian Authority is also part of the forum, Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said in a statement.
France has applied to join, with the United States and European Union requesting observer status.

For Israel, the forum “brings regional cooperation with Arab and European countries, the first of its kind in history, with contracts to export (Israeli) gas to Jordan and Egypt worth $30 billion, and that is just the beginning,” added Steinitz.
Egypt began importing Israeli gas at the start of this year, for possible re-export to Europe or Asia...
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-energy-idUSKCN26D14D

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