Name? Benjamin Netanyahu
Westphalian identity? Israeli
Age? 71
Why is he in the news? Rumours have it Netanyahu is about to meet with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi to discuss economic relations and an improvement of diplomatic ties.
Why do we care? This would be the fourth official (and sixth unofficial) high profile meeting between Netanyahu and a Sunni Arab leader in the past few months. Previously, Israel has normalised relations with the UAE, Bahrain and Sudan. With all this movement in relations that have been stagnated for so many decades, we are left wondering why now?
Why should you care? The enemy of my enemy is my friend. A very practical approach to relations and even international relations. But what do Israelis and Sunnis have in common? The discontent with certain Shia Muslim dominated countries, aka Iran. A common front against Iran has always been at the center of all normalisations between Israel and Sunni Arab countries.
Who else cares? Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman. He is another Arab Sunni leader Netanyahu has, allegedly, met in the past few weeks. Especially for MBS, normalisation with Israel would bring a great variety of benefits to the development of his NEOM 2030 vision. In the end, NEOM is where he and Netanyahu met if we can trust the flight routes of BB’s private plane.
Any further comments? This recent development all started when Israel and Saudi Arabia realised a Trump presidency might come to an end and the alternative to the Donald would be someone, Joe Biden, who praised the Iran Nuclear Deal of Barack Obama. Netanyahu is a public critic of any type of relationship with Iran and the Sunni Arabs were not big fans of the deal either. The best way to get around any Biden foreign policy towards Iran is to present a united Sunni Arab-Israeli security policy before Biden does.
