Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar has sent the ‘transition team’ of US President-elect Joe Biden some foreign policy advice, encouraging it to scrap the recent normalization deals between Israel and the UAE, Bahrain and Sudan.
In a long-telegram style series of tweets on Donald Trump’s Mideast policy, the lawmaker accused the US president of disguising arms agreements as ‘peace deals’, sputniknews.com reported.
He recently inked so-called ‘peace deals’ between the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, as well as Sudan and Israel. The only problem? They weren’t peace deals. They’re arms sales to human rights abusers, designed to empower the Persian Gulf states and increase the risk of war with Iran, Omar wrote.
“Trump proposed a staggering $23 billion in arms sales to the UAE, which the administration admitted was linked to the deal,” she added, pointing out that she had introduced resolutions in the House to try to stop these arms sales.
Suggesting that the diplomatic agreements have only “normalized the occupation” of Palestinian territories by Israel, Omar lamented that they’ve “made real peace for Israelis and Palestinians increasingly unlikely”.
According to the congresswoman, Biden now “has a tremendous opportunity to reverse” Trump’s foreign policy.
She tweeted, meanwhile, he cozied up to Saudi Arabia, a regime responsible for some of the worst human rights atrocities of our young century — including routing murder of human rights advocates and war crimes in Yemen.
Omar, 38, is a member of the informal group of ‘progressives’ within the Democratic Party known as ‘The Squad’.
In September, the UAE, Bahrain and Israel signed the Abraham Accords, with Abu Dhabi and Manama becoming the first two Persian Gulf Arab states to normalize ties with Tel Aviv, and the third and fourth Arab countries after Egypt and Jordan to do so. In late October, the Sudanese government signed a similar agreement with Israel. Washington sweetened the deals by providing the Persian Gulf states with lucrative arms deals and promising to lift economic sanctions and the ‘state sponsor of terrorism’ designation against Sudan.
Palestinian leaders have accused the two Persian Gulf states and Sudan of ‘selling out’ to the US and Israel, and ‘stabbing Palestinian people in the back’.
Seventeen of the Arab League’s 22 members continue to have no relations with Israel.
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