Two years ago, UAE citizens were barred from entering Israel. No longer. The inaugural Emirates flight touched down in Tel Aviv last week, a Boeing 777 carrying 335 passengers. For much of the 20th century, the only thing that the Middle East could agree on was the destruction of the Jewish state. But attitudes are changing. The purported reason is the so-called Abraham Accords, signed in 2020 after Donald Trump decided to solve the seemingly intractable problem of the Middle East. If Don the Dealmaker couldn’t do it, who could? Seven decades of antagonism had failed, the White House argued, and the Palestinian cause seemed as troubled as ever, so why not try a different approach? The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain formally recognised Israel in September that year, signing a document that declared a new era of ‘peace, security and prosperity in the Middle East’. Sudan and Morocco quickly followed, agreeing to normalise relations with a nation that the Arab world had once committed to driving into the sea.
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