Win or lose next week, Donald Trump deserves credit for the historic rapprochement that has led to yet another Arab state abandoning decades of support for terrorism and normalising relations with Israel. Between 1991 and 1996, Sudan, an impoverished North African nation of 41 million people, was Osama bin Laden’s home and al-Qa’ida’s main global operational base. It was also used by Iran as its principal pipeline to channel deadly weapons to Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists attacking Israel.
Yet on Friday, under new rulers trying to lead the country to democracy, it became the third Arab nation in recent weeks, after the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, to formally renounce terrorism and agree to peace with the Jewish state. In doing so, it aligned itself with earlier peace deals concluded between Israel and Egypt in 1979 and with Jordan in 1994.
Mr Trump says another five formerly hostile Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, are about to conclude similar treaties. There may be even more in what is a massive strategic blow to the misguided presumption that there could never be any normalisation of relations with Israel before the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. “HUGE win today for the US and for peace in the world,” Mr Trump tweeted as he announced the Sudan deal while on the phone to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Given Sudan’s impoverishment and its eagerness to grab whatever incentives were offered by Israel, it may not be quite that.
Read the editorial in The Australian.