Henrique Cymerman

Washington Is Key To Saudi-Israel Normalization

By Henrique Cymerman

The Middle East is currently undergoing its largest geo-strategic revolution in decades, and Israel is at the heart of it.

From being a country surrounded by enemies calling for its elimination, the Jewish state has become a potential strategic partner for the most powerful Sunni-Arab state in the region, Saudi Arabia.

Saudi officials give four reasons when asked why they changed their mind about Israel:

The two states have common enemies, the 1973 Yom Kippur War demonstrated once and for all that the Arabs have no military option, Israel has blossomed into the start-up nation, and could help jump-start a start-up region, and finally, 70% of Saudis are under 30, and are not bogged down by 20th-century historical baggage.

In May, I visited the Saudi capital of Riyadh to meet with senior Saudi officials, just as a new escalation erupted between Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza and Israel.

My concerns that the meeting would be canceled in light of the escalation were unfounded. The opposite occurred, and the meeting went ahead.

At the same time, it is impossible to ignore the fact that the Palestinian issue is an elephant in the room of Israeli – Saudi relations, casting a shadow.

When Jake Sullivan, the United States National Security Advisor, asked the Saudis what conditions are needed for normalizing relations with Israel, most of what he was told by Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman, related to obtaining sophisticated American weapons, resuming that strategic Saudi alliance with the US, obtaining nuclear power for civilian purposes, and for the US to stop condemning Saudi Arabia on human rights issues, or to keep bringing up the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

This shows that the Palestinian issue is a factor in normalization, but not a main one. For Saudi Arabia, Jerusalem and the future of the Haram Al-Sharif (the Temple Mount) is paramount.

It is an important issue for nearly two billion Muslims – and it also forms an opportunity for the Saudis to play a role in Jerusalem.

Most critically, however, any future normalization agreement between Riyadh and Jerusalem will have to run through Washington, not Gaza.

Furthermore, the Saudis make clear that the recent Iranian – Saudi normalization agreement does not come at the expense of normalization with Israel.

“Not everything happens through you the Israelis. The fact that 7 years after the break with Tehran we reopen the embassy, has to do with various national interests. The UK, Spain, Germany, France, they all have an embassy in Tehran,” a Saudi minister explained with a smile.

The Saudis are insulted when they are compared with smaller Gulf states, through the question of whether they will follow the UAE and Bahrain in joining the Abraham Accords.

This is due to the fact that the Saudis are the custodians of Mecca and Medina, the holiest sites of Islam, and where Islam was born, as well as being the world's main oil producer.

“With all the respect to our neighbors, we Saudi Arabia are the Israeli gateway to the Arab and Muslim world,” said one official.

And he is right. Unofficial normalization has long been underway. Security cooperation appears to be occurring in the Red Sea, for example.

Saudi officials point out that it is no coincidence that the phenomenal futuristic city of Neom is being built only 350 km from the Israeli border.

They are also happy that there are currently about five hundred monthly flights between the UAE and Israel, all full, and that a million Israelis have visited that country in the last year.

The danger to this trend comes from "spoilers" being plotted by Iran, which supports Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian territories. This axis wants nothing more than to spoil the party of agreements between Israel and the pragmatic Arab countries.

For Israel, a new chance is emerging for a type of second independence. The new geopolitical situation, despite the dangers of a confrontation on several fronts between Israel and Iran's proxies, forces decision-makers in the region, in many capitals, to reevaluate all the previous paradigms.

While tensions and doubts exist in some Arab countries due to the presence of extreme right elements in the current Israeli government coalition, the chances of a new coalition in Israel gives those rooting for normalization in the Arab world some hope.

Despite the risks and potential traps along the way, Israel and Saudi Arabia are only in the opening chapter of a long book.

Henrique Cymerman is a journalist of global renown whose writings regularly appear in media publications in Europe, the USA, Latin America and Israel. He lectures in five languages. Henrique has covered current affairs in the Middle East for over 30 years and has been nominated "Comendador," a title of nobility, by the King of Spain and the President of Portugal. Read full bio here.

Founding a Middle Eastern NATO

By Henrique Cymerman

The Middle East is experiencing a geostrategic earthquake, and its epicenter is in Saudi Arabia. This seismic shift is leading to the creation of a military alliance between countries that, at least technically, are still enemies.

The political and commercial contacts between Israel and the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries, led by Saudi Arabia, stopped being a secret in August 2020 when the dramatic signing of the Abraham Accords between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain took place. Later, Morocco and Sudan joined the framework.  

Now, however, the new alliance is on the cusp of evolving into a regional NATO-type system, with states cooperating under an all-for-one and one-for-all logic. There have been a series of recent reports regarding regular meetings between military chiefs from Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Jordan, as well as ongoing discussions about joint defense agreements against missile and drone attacks from Iran, or its proxies.

The publicizing of joint Israeli–Emirati air force drills employing F-15 and F-16 fighter jet pilots flying side by side would have been the stuff of science fiction just a few years ago. Today, it is a concrete reality.  

During recent trips to the Gulf cities of Jeddah, Abu Dhabi, and Doha, I received explanations that cast light on these developments. The Iranian threat – both nuclear and conventional – is the glue that binds together this unique coalition.

According to senior military officials say, as early as 1973, after the Yom Kippur War, the Arab powers already understood that there is no military option against Israel. A former Saudi intelligence chief explained this reasoning to me in detail, saying, “We surprised you on your Day of Atonement. You started the war on your knees, but in the end, you won it. And now Israel is much stronger, it is the greatest power between Indonesia and Gibraltar."

The rulers of Abu Dhabi, the capital city-state of the UAE, do not hide their dream of turning the Israeli "startup nation" into a "startup region.”

"What we are looking for is not to buy and sell like in a bazaar, but to do joint ventures," a prominent Emirati businessman told me. According to him, for the UAE, peace with Israel is a strategic bet on the future.

Many secret and private flights have occurred in recent years between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and heads of the Mossad have reportedly made such journeys.

Even a few weeks ago, a private jet with prominent Israeli businessmen and women was reported to have made this journey. All of them first landed in Jordan just for a few minutes so that they could not be tracked by any app and so that no questions were raised, and then they continued to Saudi Arabia.

In his first tour as American president in the Middle East, Joe Biden, who ultimately understood the extraordinary potential of the Abraham Accords achieved by the previous Republican administration, decided that Air Force One would be the first plane to fly directly from Tel Aviv, Israel to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where a summit was scheduled to take place under the leadership of the Saudi kingdom.

Some say that Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS), Crown Prince and strong man of the kingdom, is carrying out a revolution and that if his grandfather and some of his uncles saw it, they would roll over in their graves.

Many of the internal Saudi dynamics that enable this change are tied to a demographic factor that is so noticeable on the streets of Jeddah, Riyadh, and the rest of the Gulf’s capitals: 70% of the population is aged under 30. And for most of them, the 20th-century wars between Israel and the Arabs are as ancient and irrelevant as the wars of the Romans.

The Saudis have removed all antisemitic references from their school curriculum textbooks, and even the Secretary General of the Muslim World League, Mohammed al-Issa made it a point to visit Auschwitz and maintain close relations with rabbis from Israel and from around the world. His critics call him "the Zionist Imam". Last week, he was chosen by the Saudi authorities to deliver the main sermon for the festivity of Eid Al-Adha.

MBS, together with his Abu Dhabi mentor and the new Emirati President, Mohammed Bin Zayed (MBZ), Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, and Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, are now betting on Biden's help to push the Abraham Accords into a new phase.

The American president is seeking to reach an agreement that will be a win-win for the four countries.

According to this arrangement, Saudi Arabia will grant Israel complete freedom of flights over its airspace for all Israeli and foreign airlines operating out of Israel, effectively shortening all flights from Tel Aviv to many Asian capitals.

On the other hand, Saudi Arabia will receive approval from Israel for the transfer of two strategic Egyptian-controlled islands in the Red Sea, Sanafir and Tiran, off the coast of the Sinai Peninsula, to Saudi hands (Israel’s approval for this is stipulated by the 1979 Egypt – Israel Peace Treaty).

Cairo will be financially rewarded significantly by Riyadh, and this will pump plenty of financial oxygen into the very poor and fragile Egyptian economy.

Finally, the US will achieve an increase in oil production from Saudi Arabia, which is necessary to replace the black gold lost by the West as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Biden, who throughout his political career was one of the champions of the 80-year-old strategic alliance between the United States and Israel, also visited East Jerusalem and Bethlehem, to remind the region that the Palestinian issue remains pending. The Palestinians do not hide their concern that they have been relegated to the sidelines in world politics by the new cold war, the global energy crisis, and the ongoing normalization process between Israel and a growing number of Arab and non-Arab Muslim countries.

It is said that what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. The events of recent times prove once again that what happens in the Middle East does not stay in the Middle East. And that, although American presidents want to leave the region, the Middle East will pursue them wherever they go.

Henrique Cymerman is a journalist of global renown whose writings regularly appear in media publications in Europe, the USA, Latin America and Israel. He lectures in five languages. Henrique has covered current affairs in the Middle East for over 30 years and has been nominated "Comendador," a title of nobility, by the King of Spain and the President of Portugal. Read full bio here.

Does the Abu Dhabi attack signal the budding of a Middle East NATO?

By Henrique Cymerman

The January 17 missile and UAV attacks on Abu Dhabi carried out by the Houthis in Yemen were a kind of ultimatum.

The message from the Iranian-backed Houthis to the UAE was: Stop attacks on us in Yemen or deal with our attacks. The deadly strike claimed three innocent lives, but also caused extensive damage to the UAE’s image, psychology, and economy that goes beyond the incident itself.

The UAE and Dubai’s stock market are seen as an island of stability and sanity unlike other states in the Middle East. Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, and Somalia all ceased existing as we previously knew them as the Middle East declared war on itself over the past decade. Yet investors always saw Dubai and Abu Dhabi as safe zone emirates for tourism, real estate, business, and shopping.

Twenty-two million tourists visited the UAE in 2019. Undoubtedly, every new Houthi attack can harm the UAE’s brand as a safe place for business and investment.

The Houthi spokesman even threatened to target Dubai’s Expo, which opened in October and has attracted 13 million visitors so far. Such an attack would be a game-changer for Dubai’s tourism and business hub perception.

After seven years of fighting stronger armies, the Houthis are acting as if they’ve already won their war. Despite accounting for just 35% of Yemen’s population, they control an area that is home to most of the country’s 30 million people and are in the process of strengthening their regime under the influence of the Iranian political model – the same Iran that arms them.

 On January 31, the Houthis fired again on Abu Dhabi, just when Israeli President Isaac Herzog was visiting the UAE. An Iranian message here was carried by the missiles – punishment for joining the Abraham Accords.

These events represent the seeds for a new regional defense arrangement, NATO-style, which could take shape in the coming years.

The pact between Israel and several Sunni states could begin with a joint effort to deal with suicide UAVs.

A dialogue underway between Israel, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and other countries could lead to a situation in which every state that identifies the threat of a UAV attack on another state will alert it and assist in preventing the attack. The same cooperation could be extended to deal collectively with ballistic missile threats.

Such an arrangement would be hugely significant. It would have been difficult to imagine two years ago, and yet now it is approaching reality.

Israel’s February 3 defense agreement with Bahrain is, similarly, all about dealing with Iran and its partner.

The shock that residents of Abu Dhabi experienced last month – which I saw firsthand as I was visiting the emirate when the attack occurred – signifies the change underway in the region.

Authorities could not deny the attack as images of the damage spread like wildfire on social media.

Saudi Arabia, in contrast, has grown accustomed to these attacks from Yemen, and to intercept them.

The Abraham Accords present moderate states in the Middle East with the ideal platform on which to plan out the response to their collective security. Currently involving Israel, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan, many more countries could join. The Accords are the most significant development for Israel concerning its regional status since the signing of the peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan.

They do not cancel out the big danger of a de facto war between Israel and Iran, but they do solidify cooperation against the common threat posed by the radical regime in Tehran.

Russia, a military neighbor of Israel, may change its attitude toward Israeli operations against Iranian targets in Syria – another key unknown – following the war in Ukraine.

But Israel can be counted on to continue its surgical strikes against Tehran, whether in Syria or by covert means in Iran itself, where it targets nuclear threats, likely with the assistance of other states.

Iran’s proxies and partners, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza, occasionally remind Israel that they can harm it.

Now, the Houthis have joined this map of threats from the distant south. Can they target Eilat, the Israeli popular resort at the northern tip of the Red Sea? Are their threats to hit Israel credible? Although attacking Israel has always been popular among public opinion across the region, no one knows yet.

Is Israel now facing a new ‘southern Hezbollah’? It seems that Jerusalem is getting used to that possibility and that it has begun to gather intelligence on the Houthis, despite having no connection to Yemen in the past, as opposed to Lebanon, where Israel’s intelligence coverage of Hezbollah is phenomenal.

As the war in Yemen drags on, its horrific proportions seem lost on an indifferent world. An estimated 400,000 casualties of war, starvation, and disease have led the UN to declare Yemen the worst humanitarian disaster since the Second World War. Yet the international community is aloof.

The Houthis are clearly on an upward trajectory since taking over the Yemeni capital of Sanaa in 2014. They have yet to attack Israel, 2000 kilometers away, as this is low down on their priority list and prefer to rely on hostile rhetoric instead. But their attack from eastern Yemen on the UAE – 1600 kilometers away – with precise weapons, is an indication of just how much the Houthi offensive capability has grown.

 In contrast, the Houthi attack on Saudi oil targets in 2019 covered 650 kilometers. 

The Houthis’ proximity to the Straits of Hormuz and Bab El-Mandeb waterways means they can also threaten strategic sea routes for the transfer of a sizable portion of the world’s energy and fuels.

These conditions set the stage for the gradual evolution of a new regional NATO. Israel has been assisting Saudi Arabia, sharing its knowledge and experience, and since the attacks on Abu Dhabi, dozens of Israeli private companies have offered Abu Dhabi their technology.

In October 2021, the commander of the UAE's Air Force made a historic visit to Israel's Blue Flag international air drill, which involved seven countries. In the following month, the navies of Israel, the UAE, and Bahrain took part in a naval drill in the Red Sea, led by the United States.

The region is only at the start of this event. The Houthis are going nowhere, and Iran’s backing is steadfast. Whether or not they direct their fire at Israel remains to be seen.

Henrique Cymerman is a journalist of global renown whose writings regularly appear in media publications in Europe, the USA, Latin America and Israel. He lectures in five languages. Henrique has covered current affairs in the Middle East for over 30 years and has been nominated "Comendador," a title of nobility, by the King of Spain and the President of Portugal. Read full bio here.

VIDEO: Henrique Cymerman Addresses the I-SAP Tour (2019)

The Israel Strategy and Policy tour (I-SAP) is a unique initiative, specifically tailored for military cadets and future officers of the United States Armed Forces. Cadets are recruited from the US Military Academy at West Point, the US Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs and Virginia Military Institute, Virginia. This video was filmed during the I-SAP Tour, 2019.