It’s said that the Middle East is a graveyard of dreams. Every glimmer of home for peace and the region’s development is too often snuffed out.But there are exceptions.
In 2020, as President Donald Trump was ending his first term, he helped coordinate the Abraham Accords. They were a series of agreements normalizing relations between Israel and four Arab States: the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco.
Since then, they have fostered diplomatic ties, trade, and regional stability, although plans to expand them to other countries were tragically cut short by Hamas’ invasion of Israel in October 2023. But there is now a chance the Abraham Accords can begin expanding again. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will visit Baku, the capital of the republic of Azerbaijan, on May 8 with the goal of adding a secular, Shiite-majority nation to the roster of Arab Sunni states that are already part of the Abraham Accords. Last month, Netanyahu told Israel’s parliament he even envisions a trilateral alliance with Azerbaijan and the United States. A few days after Netanyahu’s speech, Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, visited Baku to work toward expanding regional cooperation and countering Iran’s influence in the Muslim world. Azerbaijan’s geographic location would be useful in this strategy. It shares a 428-mile border with Iran to its south.
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