Trump Orchestrates UAE Recognition of Israel:
A Green Light for Genocide Against the Palestinian People, Ominous Dangers for the Middle East and the World
| revcom.us
On August 13, Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced the establishment of full diplomatic relations in a deal brokered by Trump. This has immediate and ominous implications for the Palestinian people, and for humanity.
The state of Israel was never “a land without a people for a people without a land” as Israel’s supporters claim. It was established in 1948 by Jewish European settlers on land inhabited for centuries by Arab Palestinian people. In 1948 and into 1949, almost a million Palestinians were violently driven from their land, villages, and homes through systematic rape, torture, and terror (for documentation, including references to accounts of these atrocities in pro-Israel sources, see Bastion of Enlightenment… or Enforcer for Imperialism: The Case of ISRAEL). Those Palestinians who remained in what became the state of Israel continue to be subjected to overt discrimination, arbitrary confiscation of their land, and brutal repression.
In the Palestinian region of Gaza, two million people are locked down in a massive outdoor prison, with 70 percent youth unemployment, lack of access to basic necessities like drinkable water, and a health care system that has been destroyed by Israeli blockades. And Israel has launched repeated one-sided “wars” on Gaza over the past 12 years, purposely massacring hundreds of children and other non-combatants.
In the West Bank region of Palestine, Israeli “settlements” include upscale suburban housing surrounded by walls and connected by highways from which Palestinians are banned. And they include highly militarized encampments of violent, genocidal Jewish fundamentalists who have declared their determination to drive all Palestinians out of Palestine. On May 28, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu declared, with Trump’s backing, that he was committed to annexing Israeli settlements and the areas that connect them. This could amount to up to 30 percent of the West Bank, home to 2.8 million Palestinians, and an area mandated by UN resolutions as the core of a future Palestinian state.
A Stab in the Back
Israel is widely and correctly seen in the Arab world as an outpost of Western domination in a region with a long history of subjugation by colonialism and imperialism. For that reason, most of the reactionary regimes in the Middle East, even those with extremely close relationships with the United States and Israel like Saudi Arabia, have found it necessary to not establish formal diplomatic relations with Israel and to take stands in international bodies like the U.N. condemning Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians.
While this diplomatic isolation of Israel by most of the regimes in the Arab world has been transparently flimsy and symbolic for decades, the formal recognition of Israel by the UAE serves as a green light for Israel to intensify the oppression of the Palestinian people. And the recognition of Israel by the UAE may well pave the way for Saudi Arabia, the richest Arab state, to recognize Israel. Trump said, after the announcement, “Now that the ice has been broken I expect more Arab and Muslim countries will follow the United Arab Emirates.”
As a fig-leaf to cover the betrayal of the Palestinian people, the U.S., Israel, and the UAE packaged recognition of Israel with claims that Israel is dropping plans to formally annex the West Bank settlements. But Netanyahu announced he only agreed to delay the annexation plans as part of the normalization deal with the UAE, and annexation was Israel’s right and remains “on the table.”
A Complex Mix of Contradictions and Dangers
Trump’s orchestration of the UAE-Israel deal is meant to shore up the interests of the U.S. as top dog in a strategic region of a dog-eat-dog world of imperialist exploitation and oppression. But the move also carries with it potentially explosive consequences for all involved.
- In Israel, Netanyahu, arguably Trump’s closest international ally, is beset with serious scandal investigations and crises. UAE recognition (and the possibility of more to come) bolsters his position within the Israeli ruling class, and bolsters the position of the most virulent, rabid Zionists aligned with him.
- In the region, Israel as well as U.S.-aligned Arab states are confronted by the rising influence of Iran and forces aligned with it. Many pro-U.S. Arab states, many with vast oil reserves, are ruled by obscenely corrupt lackeys who stay in power on the basis of hangings, torture, and promotion of draconian Islamic fundamentalism. The UAE-Israel agreement creates further openings for Iran to advance its own predatory ambitions under the guise of championing the cause of the Palestinians; Iran’s foreign ministry declared the Israel-UAE agreement would “undoubtedly strengthen the resistance axis [forces aligned with Iran] in the region.”
- Hovering over this volatile mix are global challenges to the U.S. empire posed by the rise of capitalist-imperialist China, which relies on the Middle East for much of its oil and is contending economically and diplomatically with the U.S. in the region and around the world. In this situation, the U.S. rulers, specifically Trump, are operating like a mob boss tightening up his alliance with underlings as he confronts emboldened rivals big and small, and perhaps prepare for an all-out war. The Trump/Pence regime has ripped up pretenses of looking out for the interests of the Palestinian people and has put pressure on Arab states to more openly cooperate with and lend legitimacy to Israel.
- Add to all this the reality that there is a fascist madman in the White House with his finger on the nuclear button, who is moving frantically to fix or even postpone the upcoming election under some pretext, which could include a war with Iran or a blow-up with China. If war does break out, whatever the instigating incident or rationale on the part of the U.S., people need to understand that this would be an unjust war on the part of the U.S. to enforce its position atop a world of brutal oppression.
So how can people act in the interests of humanity here?
For over 70 years, the very existence of the Palestinian people has been a thorn in the side of capitalism-imperialism, and their resistance an inspiration to oppressed people everywhere. Today, it is critically important that as people challenge this system in the streets, and as students in particular (but others too) are beginning to learn about the reality of the crimes this system has committed here and around the world, the true history of Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people and the role of the U.S. in enabling that needs to be exposed, and opposed as part of organizing for an actual revolution in the U.S.
Palestinians burn pictures of Donald Trump, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to protest UAE's deal with Israel, in the West Bank city of Nablus, August 14. (Photo: AP)
The following, on why Israel is such a key ally for the U.S. in the Middle East, is from Bringing Forward Another Way, a talk given by Bob Avakian in 2006. This groundbreaking analysis, made during the George W. Bush years, continues to be very relevant, especially in the context of sharpening contradictions centered in the Middle East and aggressive U.S.-led moves against Iran. This work is an illustration of applying the scientific method to approaching international conflicts and understanding social and political contradictions—and identifying where the fundamental interests of humanity lie, providing concrete leadership and guidance for the strategic repolarization for revolution and a thoroughly internationalist orientation. Given the current situation in the world, we urge our readers to study, discuss and share the entire important work.
If you look at any other regimes in the region, Saudi Arabia and Egypt are big allies of the U.S. But in Saudi Arabia and in Egypt, the situation is very unstable and potentially very volatile: there are serious tremors beneath the throne, so to speak—there is the growing danger of "social earthquakes" that could threaten to topple, or actually topple, those regimes. You don't have that in Israel. Hopefully, as things develop overall, there will not be just a "loyal opposition peace movement" among Israelis but the development of a much more powerful progressive movement with a much more radical view in Israel—and this is something that progressive people in Israel, or with ties to people in Israel, should work to foster and develop. But right now a positive and truly radical movement of that kind does not exist in Israel, and the dynamics with regard to Israel are not now such that the more that the regime in Israel is hard-core, the more it is going to run into antagonism with the bulk of its population. In the short term, the dynamic is essentially the opposite, unfortunately.
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