Bahrain's Israel deal splits views in region

CAIRO－Countries in the Middle East have had mixed reactions to the move by Israel and Bahrain to normalize their ties, which comes less than a month after the United Arab Emirates and Israel reached a similar US-brokered accord.

A joint statement issued on Friday by US President Donald Trump, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Bahrain's King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa hailed the Bahrain-Israel agreement as "a historic breakthrough".

At the White House, Trump celebrated, calling the progress "very, very important for not only the Middle East but for the world".

In Jerusalem, Netanyahu hailed the agreement.

In the UAE, Hend al-Otaiba, director of strategic communications at the foreign ministry, sent congratulations to Bahrain and Israel.

Senior Bahraini officials welcomed the normalization with Israel as a contributor to regional security and stability.

The National Assembly, the Bahraini parliament, called for achieving a "just and comprehensive peace based on the two-state solution" to end the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

However, the latest deal has enraged Palestine, which strongly condemned it, while blasting the US for pressuring Arab countries into normalizing ties with Israel.

Betrayal of Palestine

Shortly after the announcement of the Bahrain-Israel deal, the Palestinian leadership issued a statement condemning what it called "a betrayal of Jerusalem, Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Palestinian cause".

In separate statements, the Islamic Hamas movement, which controls the Gaza Strip, and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad called the Bahrain-Israel deal "a clear aggression against our people" and "a blatant coup against all Arab, national and Islamic constants of Palestine".

"Washington exploits its political and economic power to force the Arab countries to normalize ties with Israel," said Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive committee.

"The US government is using all means of incitement, intimidation and pressure" to achieve the goal, she said.

Palestinians in Gaza burned pictures of Israeli, US, Bahraini and United Arab Emirates leaders on Saturday in protest over the two Gulf countries' moves.

The Gaza protest, attended by a few dozen, was organized by Hamas.

Iran, the top rival to Israel and the US in the region, on Saturday vehemently condemned Bahrain for taking the step to establish diplomatic ties with Israel.

Bahraini authorities have made a "fundamental mistake" by "seeking shelter" in Israel instead of "gaining legitimacy from its people", Iran's foreign ministry said.

The US presidential election in November is one of the reasons for Bahrain to "sacrifice the cause of honorable Palestine", it said, warning that Iran will hold Bahrain accountable for all the consequences of any action leading to Israel to "create insecurity in the Gulf region".

Turkey also expressed strong condemnation and concern about Bahrain's decision, which it said "violates the Arab Peace Initiative and the commitments made by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation".

However, Egypt, the first Arab country to sign a peace deal with Israel in 1979, welcomed the Bahrain-Israel peace deal.

In a statement issued on his official Facebook page on Friday, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi said that he valued this important step toward establishing stability and peace in the Middle East, in a way that achieves "a just and permanent settlement of the Palestinian issue".

Xinhua - Agencies