The Abraham Accords have enabled Israel and the UAE to address shared interests – security landscapes, threat perceptions and regional priorities – more effectively, both within the MENA region and with partners.
To fully appreciate the opportunities and challenges presented by Israeli–Emirati normalization, it is important first to identify the motivations of each state. As detailed below, there are many instances where the interests of both states align, which means that the prospects for a healthy partnership are good. As one interviewee observed:
“If you set aside the issue of identity, there are a surprising number of similarities between the two countries. Both are small states with high degrees of inward migration that spend the highest proportion of their gross domestic product (GDP) on research and development, so collaboration affords opportunities to leverage their high-tech sectors. Both are reliant on the US but, because of their continued frustration and asymmetries, have been hedging their bets by building alliances with India, China and Russia to give them some leverage and independence from Washington.”
The UAE’s motivations and concerns
For a state like the UAE with bold ambitions to become a major player in regional security – as shown by patterns of increased interventionism in recent years; for example, in Libya, Syria, Yemen and the Horn of Africa – cooperating with Israel provides it with a strong security partnership. It also offers important optical, hard power, and commercial and technological benefits essential for its own national security strategy.
Unlike its GCC neighbours, the UAE has adopted a more flexible posture on external relations, as it seeks to proactively pursue regional and global opportunities. Under the leadership of MbZ, who acceded to the presidency in May 2022 after the passing of Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nayhan, the UAE has developed a national security strategy that seeks to enhance its protection and stability through interlinked policies designed to promote economic openness, social development, religious tolerance and regional security through reliance on partnerships. Normalization then serves the UAE by strengthening regional economic linkages. As argued by one interviewee: the ‘Abraham Accords ticks those boxes for the UAE, helping the country build independent capacity through interdependence with the US and Israel’.
The UAE’s geography places it between regional heavyweights Iran and Saudi Arabia and makes it vulnerable to the impact of radical Islamism. The challenge of a relatively small population compared to those two countries has prompted the Emirati leadership to invest in bolstering its conventional defence capabilities and attracting a large foreign workforce. The UAE sees wider collaboration as necessary to nurture religious moderation in Saudi Arabia, while also constraining Qatar’s support for political Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood. Strong security partnerships are also considered necessary to contain growing threats from Iran and Turkey, two regional disruptors who support state and non-state actors and seek to challenge the stability of status quo powers. Diverse regional and international relationships have helped the UAE contend with these constraints. Such moves are also tied to the UAE’s larger economic agenda of expanding trade links by ‘gaining control of sea routes from the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea’.
The UAE has traditionally channelled its regional strategy via the GCC. Founded in 1981, this organization provided a coordinated structure to manage threats during both the Iran–Iraq war and the 1990 Gulf war. However, the GCC failed to alleviate bilateral tensions or enable greater integration. As such, the UAE since 2011 has taken a more robust approach to managing regional challenges ranging from Iran to the Muslim Brotherhood. This strategy has been led by MbZ, who regards any political Islamist vision – whether those of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood or the extremist ideas of Al-Qaeda and Islamic State (ISIS) – as a threat to the security and stability of the UAE.
As Peter Salisbury explained in his 2020 research paper, Risk Perception and Appetite in UAE Foreign and National Security Policy:
“The ‘UAE model’ integrates economic openness, strong governance and service delivery, and a relatively secular and liberal (for the region) social environment, combined with a closed political system that polices speech and is built around an entrenched security state. Just as important is a rejection of any political or religious ideology that might challenge the supremacy of the state and its leaders.”
To protect this ‘UAE model’, the Emirati government has taken a bolder but adaptive regional approach to push back against perceived transnational and regional threats.
The UAE sees Qatar not only as an ambitious competitor for prestige and influence, but also a sponsor, particularly since 2011, of Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated groups across the MENA region.
Regional and ideological competition with neighbouring Qatar has been an important pillar of Emirati foreign policy relevant to the Abraham Accords. The UAE sees Qatar not only as an ambitious competitor for prestige and influence, but also a sponsor, particularly since 2011, of Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated groups across the MENA region. The 2017 blockade of Qatar, imposed by the UAE alongside Bahrain, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, sought to compel Qatar to accept demands including the revocation of Doha-based broadcaster Al Jazeera’s operating licence, the downgrading of Qatar’s ties with Iran and closing Turkey’s military base in the country. Rather than forcing any change in Qatari policy, the blockade conversely prompted Qatar to strengthen its ties with Iran and Turkey. The Saudi-led 2021 Al-Ula agreement formally brought intra-GCC tensions to an end, but Bahrain and the UAE have yet to resume full diplomatic ties with Qatar. Progress has been made since the death of Sheikh Khalifa, with observers suggesting the exchange of ambassadors could take place in the first half of 2023. Privately, though, Emiratis and Qataris acknowledge both that regional competition between the two states will continue and that the ideological divide will perpetuate mistrust and likely spark further disagreements in the future.
Stemming the tide of Islamist radicalism not only serves the UAE’s domestic security needs but also promotes its ‘secular governance’ model. As part of this strategy, the UAE has sought to cultivate religious moderation in Saudi Arabia, resulting in closer coordination between the two countries on regional campaigns, particularly those in Bahrain, Qatar and Yemen. Moreover, the UAE leadership has strongly endorsed Saudi crown prince and prime minister MbS, supporting his social, religious and economic reforms and seeing his leadership as a moderating influence on religious extremism that is beneficial to the region as a whole.
This relationship is not without its difficulties, though. Having embraced MbS and his agenda, the UAE sought to distance itself after the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Both countries share the view that Iran remains a primary regional threat but have pursued different approaches. They also have demonstrated competing agendas in Yemen, which became apparent after the 2019 Emirati withdrawal from the war. Furthermore, their differences inside OPEC+ over baselines and production has given rise to tensions and led to speculation that the UAE will follow Qatar’s example in the near future and leave OPEC. Divergences over resolving the Qatar rift have seen the UAE initially obstruct resolution to the crisis. Differences with Saudi Arabia and Qatar shed light on the political dissonance within the GCC, alongside growing trends of economic competition. These differences should at the same time not be conflated, as Saudi–Emirati regional security coordination continues to trump tactical divides.
Iran, particularly since the 1979 Iranian revolution, has been seen as a perpetual threat to the UAE and is the biggest security challenge for the state. Lacking the tools to directly manage Iranian pressure, the UAE has maintained a cautious hedging policy vis-à-vis Iran that has long been seen as a strategic challenge. In 1971, Iran seized three Emirati islands in the Persian Gulf, instigating a long-standing and still unresolved territorial dispute with Iran. While it remained neutral during the 1980–88 Iran–Iraq war, the UAE felt vulnerable to potential attack amid Iranian calls to export the Islamic revolution, owing to the UAE’s relatively small size and proximity. This sense of vulnerability increased during the 1990 Gulf war and again during the 2003 Iraq war. The Arab Spring protests from 2011 heightened concerns still further, particularly those around Iranian interference in Bahrain’s uprising. Al-Otaiba captured these anxieties in 2010, stating: ‘Our military, who has existed for the past 40 years, wake up, dream, breathe, eat, sleep the Iranian threat’.
Revelations regarding Iran’s nuclear programme since 2002, coupled with the growth of the Iranian proxy network in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen, have only confirmed Emirati suspicions of Iran’s regional ambitions. The 2015 JCPOA was criticized by the UAE leadership, which accused signatories of inadequately consulting with regional leaders or addressing what the UAE sees as Iran’s malign regional interference. Because of these concerns, the UAE supported Trump’s JCPOA withdrawal and sanctions-based ‘maximum pressure’ campaign that was designed to force Iran into giving further concessions. Instead of follow-on negotiations, though, in the summer of 2019, Iran began its own ‘maximum resistance’ campaign that saw tankers seized, a US drone shot down and Saudi oil facilities attacked.
To manage these heightened tensions, which impacted negatively on the Emirati economy, the UAE called for de-escalation and began its own outreach to Iran, including via visits led by Emirati national security adviser Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Those discussions with Iran have led the UAE to quietly distance itself from anti-JCPOA rhetoric, as well as offering investment in the Iranian economy. Such incentives, however, did not stop the January 2022 Houthi attacks that directly hit airport facilities in Abu Dhabi, demonstrating to the Emirati leadership and its allies both Iran’s regional reach and its limited capacity to thwart such attacks by proxy groups.
The strikes on Abu Dhabi were described by Emirati leaders as the ‘UAE’s 9/11’. When the Biden administration did not respond with immediate condemnation of the attacks, the UAE made its deepening frustration public. Tensions flared through the outbreak of war in Ukraine, when Emirati leaders did not immediately condemn Russian aggression, choosing to remain neutral. This approach was not well received in the US. Here, Israel served as an interlocutor. But the crisis was only averted when Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken engaged directly with the UAE. What ensued was further investment in bilateral dialogue directed towards achieving a long-term US–UAE strategic agreement that, when concluded, intends to define the contours of a ‘longer, stronger relationship’.
Rapprochement between Iran and the UAE also slowed as the Emirati leadership sought to recalibrate. A planned visit to the UAE by Iranian president Raisi was called off. After the March 2022 ceasefire in Yemen, marking an important turning point in the war, relations tentatively improved again. By August 2022, the UAE had agreed to return its ambassador to Tehran, showcasing that tactical hedging remains the best short-term method for managing tensions with Iran. This decision, as articulated by Emirati political analyst Abdulkhaleq Abdulla, comes after a decade of tension and four years of outreach. Abdulla reflects that the new way forward is premised on the belief that ‘[in] continu[ing] the conversation and find[ing] common ground for good neighbourly relations. The ball is in Iran’s court. The UAE is testing Iran’s intentions and closely monitoring its behaviour’. However, de-escalation should not be misconstrued as a change in its assessment of Iran’s destabilizing role. Rather, as one policymaker stated, ‘the UAE is acutely aware that confrontation does not serve Emirati economic and security interests’.
Since the Arab Spring, close collaboration and strategic cooperation with the US have enabled the UAE to be more regionally assertive. The UAE has the second highest military expenditure in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia, with a defence budget of over $19.8 billion in 2020 or 5.6 per cent of its GDP. It has been a partner to every US military mission in the Middle East since 1991 and in operations against ISIS, and is seen by US officials as the most reliable Arab ally in the Middle East. Former US secretary of defence Jim Mattis referred to the UAE as ‘Little Sparta’, in reflection of the country’s investment in defence, single-minded military ambition and outsized role in regional security stability. Emirati activism has been seen in prominent operations in Afghanistan, the Horn of Africa, Libya and Yemen.
Close collaboration and strategic cooperation with the US have since the Arab Spring enabled the UAE to be more regionally assertive.
At the same time, differences that have emerged over the past decade with successive US administrations’ approaches to the region have exacerbated tensions between the US and UAE. For Emirati leaders, the cooling of relations began during the Obama presidency. The pendulum swung in the opposite direction during Trump’s tenure. President Trump not only visited the Gulf, but sought also to reforge ties with Israel, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, providing assurances and hard-hitting anti-Iran policy. However, Trump’s signalling was not matched with action. He continued to elevate geopolitical tensions with China over managing regional challenges in the Middle East, and made calls for burden-sharing among Western allies. His administration struggled to manage the 2017 Qatar crisis and, because of regional competition among Gulf states, failed to advance the collective security objective known as the Middle East Strategic Alliance (MESA). The Trump administration also saw the UAE’s commercial ties with China – amid rumours of a Chinese military facility near Abu Dhabi’s port and the UAE’s use of Huawei 5G telecommunications technology, seen as a threat to data security – as a potential challenge.
In a polarized domestic and international climate, the Abraham Accords are considered by many to be the Trump administration’s most significant foreign policy achievement. The impact of partisan politics made the Biden administration reluctant to champion the accords. As explained above, the Biden team only came around to the agreement after the first anniversary, recognizing the opportunity the accords presented for greater multilateral cooperation in the Middle East. Since then, Biden has consistently signalled his support for regional multilateral initiatives. In advance of his trip to the region in July 2022, Biden stated: ‘Part of the purpose – the trip to the Middle East – is to deepen Israel’s integration into the region, which I think we’re going to be able to do – which is good for peace, and good for Israeli security’.
Israel’s strategic landscape
For Israel, normalization with the UAE has been hailed as an important achievement that addresses three key areas: ending its regional isolation, bolstering its relationship with the US and managing it larger regional security concerns. After two decades of stalled peace efforts and the incremental building of ties, via the Abraham Accords, Israel has gained important recognition from a third and fourth Arab state without having made progress on Palestinian statehood – the accords having formally ended pan-Arab unity on that subject. The accords have also broken decisively with Israel’s ‘periphery doctrine’ that saw it ally with non-Muslim countries to counter pan-Arab unity, confirming that Netanyahu’s vision of ‘peace through strength’ will be a precondition for any future Israeli–Arab negotiations. Indeed, Netanyahu has stated that: ‘We believe in alliances born out of Israel’s value as a technological, financial, defence, and intelligence powerhouse’. More importantly, Israel now benefits from having a partner (in the UAE) that sees cross-regional threats in the same light, ultimately giving Israel an opportunity to achieve greater integration in the Middle East.
Above all, Israel’s strategy is oriented towards the US. Despite the historical nature of the Israeli–US relationship, ties have frayed with growing criticism coming from the Democratic Party. While appearing positive on the surface, bipartisan relations were damaged under the Trump administration with the pursuit of the lopsided ‘Deal of the Century’. Netanyahu’s policy on annexation of territory in the West Bank also drew much criticism among younger generations in the US. The accords offered an important opportunity to improve bipartisan relations. Having taken annexation off the table at the time, the Israeli government sought to rebalance relations.
Managing security concerns is another strategic pillar of the Abraham Accords for Israel. For decades, Iran and its regional power remained the principal foreign policy concern. Israeli policymakers have been preoccupied with Iran’s nuclear ambitions. But Iran’s growing political and military influence in the region (particularly in Gaza, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria), its expanding missile capacity and network of non-state militia partners surrounding Israel are seen as an existential threat. In 2018, Israel began a strike campaign against Iran’s assets in Syria to counter its presence in that country. Inflammatory Iranian rhetoric calling for ‘Israel to be wiped off the map’ further aggravates tensions. Divergences have emerged within the Israeli security establishment and with the US over how to manage threats from Iran. Netanyahu saw Iran as a greater threat than challenges from the Palestinian leadership. In this vein, he viewed Trump’s sanctions-based, ‘maximum pressure’ campaign as a productive strategy to reduce Iranian regional influence and force concessions on its nuclear programme.
While Israel coordinated closely with Trump on Iran strategy, Biden’s pledge to return to the JCPOA has raised Israeli fears that his team will repeat Obama’s strategy of ignoring Iran’s regional activities to focus on the JCPOA. The Israeli–Emirati axis has been in continued consultation with the Biden administration throughout the latest JCPOA negotiations. For Israel, the Abraham Accords present an opportunity to reverse Iran’s proxy-based forward defence strategy designed to project power closer to Israel’s borders, by bringing Israeli military capabilities and ‘Octopus’ strategy to the Persian Gulf. Greater collaboration between Israel and the UAE could also help to manage Iran’s presence in Syria, which has so far been tactically constrained by intermittent Israeli targeting of Iranian facilities and networks in that country. Abu Dhabi’s lead in normalizing relations between Arab states and Damascus is in part aimed at pegging back Iranian influence and, if successful, would benefit both the UAE and Israel. Ultimately, both states seek to use their respective strategies to restrict and reduce Iranian influence over time.
Since the Arab uprisings, Turkey has presented another growing regional challenge for Israel. Despite a history of diplomatic and military ties and a lucrative economic relationship, relations have soured under Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s leadership of Turkey. Turkey’s efforts to project its own political, economic, cultural and military power, spreading from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, have raised deep concerns in Israel. With a military presence in Iraq, Libya, Qatar and Syria, the development of its own network of proxy groups, political interests in Gaza and tensions over natural gas deposits in the Aegean Sea and eastern Mediterranean, Turkey’s forays in the wider Middle East and its support for Muslim Brotherhood groups in the region have been seen by Israel as destabilizing.
In this context, strategies for containing Turkish influence have also been employed. In 2018, Israeli–Turkish relations were downgraded following violence on the Gaza border and Turkish protests over the US decision to move its embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv. Israel has long seen Turkey to be an important balancer in its regional foreign policy. Turkey has had influence over Hamas and is seen in Israel as a bulwark against Iran’s regional activities in Azerbaijan, Iraq and Syria. As the Turkish economy has faltered and in advance of presidential and parliamentary elections in May 2023, outreach towards Turkey is seen as primarily tactical among Israeli policymakers. As stated by one interviewee: ‘through Israel, Ankara can improve its ties with Washington and the Gulf Arab states and that is Erdogan’s first objective’. Another interviewee reflected on the deep mistrust that exists in Israel towards Erdogan, stating: ‘[T]he relationship will not be seen to be stable or bring meaningful changes unless Erdogan fails to be re-elected’. The tactical calibration under way should be seen as part of a broader Israeli strategy of regional integration, with the larger focus directed towards Iran.
The US withdrawal from Afghanistan
The US withdrawal from Afghanistan in October 2021 reinforced a commonly held view among the US’s regional partners that Washington could no longer be depended on to provide unequivocal support. In fact, it was the nature of the US departure, following a 20-year presence of US troops, that sent shockwaves across the Middle East and other regions. Chaotic scenes broadcast from Kabul airport symbolized regional partners’ fears that the US would abandon them, if it deemed that course of action necessary, with little concern for the consequences for its former allies. No matter how much the US administration sought to assure its regional partners that Washington remained committed to their security, the withdrawal from Afghanistan served only to compound well-established concerns that regional states could find themselves facing major threats alone.
The fact that it was the Biden administration, composed of internationalist Democrats, that conducted the departure – although the Trump administration had negotiated the terms and nature of withdrawal – exacerbated fears among regional partners that US reprioritization was now a bipartisan agenda. Although the status of US–Israel and US–UAE relations are qualitatively different – with Israel enjoying much deeper, ideational, historical, technological, institutional and emotional ties – the Israeli and UAE leaderships understood that their relationship would become critical to managing regional security if the US downscaled its military presence and investment, and passed responsibility to regional states. This reading of the US withdrawal and its consequences further consolidated the Israeli–Emirati relationship, while giving a higher priority to the security and defence aspects of their partnership. And yet, both countries continue to share a desire to keep the US engaged in the Middle East.
Securing a stable and long-term, security-based relationship with the US is a primary driver for both Israel and the UAE and key for short-term and longer-term regional security management.
Securing a stable and long-term, security-based relationship with the US is a primary driver for both Israel and the UAE and important for short-term and longer-term regional security management. Following the 9/11 attacks, the UAE sought to strengthen its ties with the US, and under the careful management of MbZ, deepened intelligence, defence and security relations. At the same time, the UAE embassy in Washington, DC sought to emulate Israel’s active and successful public diplomacy in the US. The UAE’s leadership has long since viewed Israel’s US relationship with both admiration and envy.
Neither state wants to be dependent on the US, but defence and security are critical features of their individual relationships. Despite its close relationship with the US, Israel has nearly always exercised a high degree of autonomy when pursuing its national security interests. As such, it has often undertaken independent and sometimes pre-emptive military action, which has occasionally caused the US difficulty. However, such action has been prompted by Israel’s own calculations as to what constitutes a direct existential threat to the country’s national security. Any difficulties have not, however, harmed US–Israel relations at a strategic level. Consequently, Israeli and US officials enjoy a close working relationship, even if interactions are sometimes ‘robust’. As such, there can be little doubt that Israel wants to hold on to its significant margin of manoeuvre when it comes to taking unilateral action in the region, such as carrying out air strikes against targets in Gaza, Iran, Iraq and Syria. But this freedom also depends on the US maintaining a strong military presence and playing an active diplomatic role.
As noted above, one means of achieving Israel’s aim of retaining US backing is by redoubling efforts with the UAE to align public diplomacy campaigns in Washington, coordinating on regional security issues and deepening cooperation on pressing matters, such as energy, technology and investment.
Since the Arab uprisings, the UAE has learned to emulate Israel’s approach of ‘act first and consult later’ and has done just that in Libya, Qatar and Yemen. In the case of Qatar, the UAE was instrumental in galvanizing Bahrain, Egypt and Saudi Arabia into implementing the June 2017 blockade, and the UAE’s actions effectively presented the US with a fait accompli, knowing full well that consultation may have forced them to adopt a less aggressive course of action. The UAE has also sought to follow Qatar’s example of projecting power across the wider MENA region, in the form of military, financial, diplomatic or political support to states or groups that share common interests – most notably, curtailing the influence of political Islam.
By asserting itself more forcibly than in the past – in one sense, responding to Obama’s call for regional states to share the burden of regional security, the UAE has sent a clear message to the US that it is ready to take independent action when its material interests are at stake. But it has also sought to signal that a continued US presence in the region remains vital for the maintenance of the regional and global security orders. In essence, the UAE has bold long-term ambitions for regional power of its own but remains hampered by short-term security challenges that require continued US support.
The Abraham Accords therefore present a solution for both the US and for its regional allies, who share common security interests in countering terror threats and promoting regional stability. Bonded by shared and overlapping concerns – regarding Iran, Islamist extremism and mounting uncertainties about the future of US strategy – the partnership formalized by the accords has enabled Israel and the UAE to assert their mutual interests more effectively, both within the MENA region and in the US. This is best summarized by one interviewee who stated: ‘The relationships are about independence and interdependent capabilities, and about connecting the strategic and the economic in tandem with the US in a deliberate way’.
