Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s surprise visit to Oman pried open a door to the Persian Gulf usually shut to Israelis, and several of his Cabinet members are following him through.
Israeli Minister of Communications Ayoob Kara, an Arab-speaking Druze citizen of Israel, is to attend today a conference in Dubai of the International Telecommunications Union, while Israeli Minister of Transportation and Minister of Intelligence Yisrael Katz is to participate next week in another international conference in the Omani capital, Muscat. Israel Minister of Culture and Sport Miri Regev has been in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) since Friday last week, accompanying Israel’s national judo team at the Abu Dhabi Grand Slam jiujitsu tournament.
“It’s a sign that Israel and the Arab world are moving closer,” said Michael Oren, Netanyahu’s deputy minister for public diplomacy.
Photo: AP
Israel’s ties with Gulf states have warmed in the past few years, primarily over a shared distrust of Iran and its push for regional hegemony.
US President Donald Trump has promoted this rapprochement, seeing Saudi Arabia and other Middle East allies as key to his policy of confronting Iran and advancing the regional peace proposal that he has promised to deliver soon.
That approach has been complicated as its linchpin, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, faces an international outcry over the killing of government critic Jamal Khashoggi in the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul.
Gulf countries are gradually making gestures to accept Israel, prodded by Trump and their desire to participate in international activities that forbid their barring other UN member states.
In a statement after his weekly Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said his visit with Oman’s ruler, Sultan Qaboos Al Said, included “very important talks for Israel’s security,” adding: “There will be more.”
Not everyone welcomed the breakthrough.
“Visits by teams and officials from the Israeli enemy to Gulf capitals pain our hearts,” prominent UAE political commentator Abdulkhaleq Abdullah wrote on Twitter. “If governments see it necessary to welcome them, people still have choices, and I choose to say a thousand times ‘no’ to normalization with the Israeli enemy.”
Oman has often been a go-between to resolve issues between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and its ruler was an important back channel in discussions between Iran, the US and other world powers that led to the 2015 nuclear deal, said Riad al-Khouri, a director of political risk adviser GeoEconomica, which based in Amman.
Last year, when Israeli Tal Flicker won a gold medal at the Grand Slam, Abu Dhabi organizers refused to display Israel’s flag or play its national anthem.
This year, threatened with being stripped of hosting the tournament, the emirate relented: Israeli Sagi Muki won a gold medal on Sunday and with Regev in attendance, Israel’s national anthem Hatikvah was played.
In months, Lo Yuet-ping would bid farewell to a centuries-old village he has called home in Hong Kong for more than seven decades. The Cha Kwo Ling village in east Kowloon is filled with small houses built from metal sheets and stones, as well as old granite buildings, contrasting sharply with the high-rise structures that dominate much of the Asian financial hub. Lo, 72, has spent his entire life here and is among an estimated 860 households required to move under a government redevelopment plan. He said he would miss the rich history, unique culture and warm interpersonal kindness that defined life in
AERIAL INCURSIONS: The incidents are a reminder that Russia’s aggressive actions go beyond Ukraine’s borders, Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said Two NATO members on Sunday said that Russian drones violated their airspace, as one reportedly flew into Romania during nighttime attacks on neighboring Ukraine, while another crashed in eastern Latvia the previous day. A drone entered Romanian territory early on Sunday as Moscow struck “civilian targets and port infrastructure” across the Danube in Ukraine, the Romanian Ministry of National Defense said. It added that Bucharest had deployed F-16 warplanes to monitor its airspace and issued text alerts to residents of two eastern regions. It also said investigations were underway of a potential “impact zone” in an uninhabited area along the Romanian-Ukrainian border. There
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
RSS