At the White House this afternoon, President Donald Trump presided over a ceremony in which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed a peace treaty with the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) represented by Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al Nahyan, and a declaration of peace with Bahrain, represented by its Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid al Zayan. Describing the event as “historic,” Trump announced that very soon several other countries will sign onto the agreement, either before the November elections or right afterwards. The agreement lays the basis for security and a lasting peace in the Middle East, he said, “a peace without blood"—a way to address the problem not through the back door but through “the smart door.”
What eventually comes out of this agreement remains to be seen, particularly in the context of global financial and strategic crises in which conflicts and related economic destruction derived from British geopolitical doctrine are rampant. Southwest Asia is fraught with crises, as seen in Yemen, the Gaza Strip, Syria and Iraq. But Trump was upbeat, insisting that the problems of the region would be resolved, because countries such as Saudi Arabia would eventually sign on, and that a solution to the Palestinian problem would also be forthcoming. Both Arab speakers underscored the necessity of establishing a “two-state solution” to the Palestinian problem which Bahrain’s Foreign Minister insisted must be “the bedrock of any peace.”
