The disgusting script is repeated. Hamas and Israel are carrying out another bloody episode, in an unacceptable logic and frequent in the region: waves of violence to sabotage the peace processes. The offensive launched by the Palestinian group, in addition to being responsible for tragic deaths and unacceptable destruction on both sides of the conflict, carries a geopolitical objective, which is to undermine the accords of Abraham, the most relevant pacifying advance. in the Middle East for decades. .
In 2020, in a historic act, four Arab countries (United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan) recognized Israel’s right to exist. Countries like Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994 have abandoned “rejection”, a strategy illustrated by the rejection of resolution 181, approved by the United Nations for the partition of Palestine.
It was in 1947 that the UN gave concrete contours to the idea of two states, one Jewish and the other Arab, side by side. And despite the early days of the Cold War rivalry, the United States and the USSR voted alike, in favor of the victorious Resolution 181.
Arab countries rejected the UN decision and opted for war in 1948 to prevent Israel’s independence. The Israelis won the conflict, supported by weapons then bought in Czechoslovakia.
These historical facts have already been overshadowed by more recent ideological narratives. It is interesting to underline the reversal of the Soviet position. The Kremlin flirted with Israel’s post-independence socialism and wanted to expand its influence in the Middle East.
But in the mid-1950s he was faced with a dilemma. A “third world” soldier named Gamal Abdel Nasser came to power in Cairo. The USSR therefore had to choose between the enemies of Israel and Egypt. Geopolitical calculations led the Soviets to form an alliance with the leading country in the Arab world and to move away from the Israelis for good.
Anuar Sadat, Nasser’s successor, also urged a diplomatic change. Cairo in the 1970s abandoned Moscow, approached Washington, and signed a pioneering peace accord with Israel.
In 1981 Sadat was assassinated by terrorists opposed to pacification. The Egyptian president left a relevant legacy by choosing to live with a former enemy.
In the current scenario of the twenty-first century, the belief in coexistence has gained new impetus, despite the crises and wars of recent decades. Arab leaders, pressed by the overhaul of geopolitics and the international economy, began to review their relations with Israel.
The transformation of the enemy into a partner is due to three factors. First, the post-oil world. With the inevitable decline in the importance of the product, Arab countries are seeking to diversify their economies, betting, for example, on technological innovations and the service sector.
Second: reduction of the North American presence in the Middle East. The region has lost to China, since the Obama era, the priority condition of American foreign policy. Third: the historic rivalry between Sunni Arab countries, like Saudi Arabia and Egypt, with Iran, which is predominantly Persian and Shiite.
Therefore, Arab leaders see Israel as a partner in helping to diversify economic models and build an alliance against Tehran, in the scenario of less American involvement in the Middle East. Abraham’s accords come into play.
Hamas, with its extremist ideology, isolates itself and rejects the advance of treaties based on the idea of coexistence. So he explains the logic of launching the offensive now, seven years after his last war with Israel.
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