UAE Peace Deal May Ditch for Good Israel's Annexation Project - Lawmaker

WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th August, 2020) Israel may have ditched for good plans to unilaterally extend its sovereignty over territories, claimed by the Palestinians for the state of their own, for the sake of a historic peace deal with the United Arab Emirates, Israeli lawmaker Andrey Kozhinov told Sputnik.

The US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that he brokered an agreement between Israel and the UAE to fully normalize their relations, the third such agreement in existence and the first in over a quarter of century.

"It is clear that this postponed for a completely indefinite time, apparently for good, a unilateral spread of Israeli sovereignty over the territories of Judea and Samaria," Kozhinov said, using an Israeli term for the West Bank.

Kozhinov, a member of the Knesset centrist opposition, praised the achievement.

"From a regional point of view, any formal relationship with moderate Arab Sunni countries is a big breakthrough. Here you need to congratulate [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and Israel on such an accomplishment," he said.

Israel was expected as early as in July to annex nearly a third of the West Bank, but reneged on the move, though it was explicitly endorsed in Trump's "deal of the century" peace initiative.

The White House statement provided a long-awaited explanation saying that "as result of this diplomatic breakthrough and at the request of President Trump with the support of the United Arab Emirates, Israel will suspend declaring sovereignty over areas outlined in the President's Vision for Peace and focus its efforts now on expanding ties with other countries in the Arab and Muslim world."

Netanyahu said that despite the deal annexation plans remain "in the works," while White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and his pointman for middle Eastern endeavors, assured reporters that "the suspension will last."

For Israel it will be the third peace deal with its regional neighbors after accords with Egypt and Jordan signed in 1979 and 1994 respectively. There was also a relatively short-lived and now defunct peace with Mauritania and interim agreements with the Palestinians.

Both ruling Palestinian movements, Fatah and Hamas, have already denounced the agreement. The UAE's move appears to be an erosion of the common Arab position which, as manifested in the regional peace initiative of 2002, offered normalization as a reward for Israel's withdrawal from the occupied territories.