DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Israel signed
a free trade deal with the UAE on Tuesday, its first with an
Arab country,
building on their US-brokered normalization of diplomatic relations in 2020.
اضافة اعلان
Israel’s ambassador to the oil-rich UAE, Amir Hayek,
tweeted “mabrouk” — congratulations in Arabic — with a photo of Emirati and
Israeli officials holding documents at a signing ceremony in Dubai.
The Emirati envoy to Israel, Mohamed Al Khaja,
hailed as an “unprecedented achievement” the deal that, according to the
Israeli side, scraps customs duties on 96 percent of all products traded.
“Businesses in both countries will benefit from
faster access to markets and lower tariffs as our nations work together to
increase trade, create jobs, promote new skills and deepen cooperation,” Khaja
tweeted.
The 2020 deal was part of the
US-brokered Abraham
Accords that also saw Israel establish diplomatic ties with Bahrain and
Morocco.
Two-way trade between Israel and the UAE last year
totalled some $900 million dollars, according to Israeli figures.
UAE-Israel Business Council president Dorian Barak
predicted that trade would soon multiply between the regional powerhouse
economies.
“UAE-Israel trade will exceed $2 billion in 2022,
rising to around $5 billion in five years, bolstered by collaboration in renewables,
consumer goods, tourism and the life sciences sectors,” he said in a statement.
“Dubai is fast becoming a hub for Israeli companies
that look to South Asia, the Middle East and the
Far East as markets for their
goods and services.”
Nearly 1,000 Israeli companies will be working in
and through the UAE by year’s end, he said.
Trade diplomacy
The UAE was the first
Gulf country to normalize ties with Israel and only the third Arab nation to do so
after Egypt and Jordan.
Talks for a free trade agreement began in November
and concluded after four rounds of negotiations.
The latest was held in March in Egypt between
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan,
UAE’s long-time de facto ruler who became president this month after the death
of his half-brother Sheikh Khalifa.
Israel had in March hosted a meeting of the top
diplomats from the United States, UAE, Bahrain, and
Morocco.
Sudan in 2020 also
agreed to normalize ties with Israel, but the strife-torn northeast African
country has yet to finalize a deal.
Israel has already struck free trade agreements with
other countries and blocs, including the US, EU, Canada, and Mexico.
In February, Israel signed a trade deal with Rabat
to designate special industrial zones in Morocco.
Palestinian issue
The Abraham Accords broke with long-standing pan-Arab policy to isolate
Israel until it withdraws from the occupied territories and accepts
Palestinian statehood.
Palestinians condemned the agreements struck under
then US president Donald Trump, and the conflict continues to inflame tensions,
including between Israel and the UAE.
Tuesday’s signing came two days after thousands of
flag-waving Israelis marched through Jerusalem’s Old City during a nationalist
procession marking Israel’s capture of
East Jerusalem in the 1967 Arab-Israeli
War.
Israel annexed east Jerusalem in 1980, a move never
recognised by the international community.
The UAE on Monday “strongly condemned” what it
called Israel’s “storming” of Jerusalem’s
Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, one of
Islam’s holiest sites.
The UAE “reiterated its firm position on the need to
provide full protection for Al Aqsa Mosque and halt serious and provocative
violations taking place there”, reported the official WAM news agency.
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