Since fighting broke out in Gaza, Bahrain has found itself walking a political tightrope as it attempts to appease widespread outrage over a conflict that has resulted in the deaths of thousands of Palestinians while still attempting to maintain a pact with Israel that has pushed the Gulf state closer to the United States.
Iran is a substantial Muslim Shi’ite nation across the Gulf from Bahrain. Manama has long accused Iran of stirring up its majority Shi’ite people against Bahrain’s Sunni monarchy. Close connections with the United States are a critical bulwark against Iran for the tiny island nation of Bahrain, home to the United States Navy Fifth Fleet.
The agreement to normalize diplomatic ties with Israel that Bahrain signed in 2020, when Donald Trump was still president of the United States, delivered minimal financial benefits to Bahrain. In contrast, the agreement brought many business benefits to the United Arab Emirates, a regional commercial powerhouse signed simultaneously with Bahrain. According to insiders and analysts, the other strategic advantages that Bahrain won are too significant to put in jeopardy at this time.
Even if parliament, which is a body that remains submissive to the monarchy, has issued a harsh declaration implying that relations with Israel are in the freezer, six individuals familiar with the subject told Reuters that Bahrain will not break its connections with Israel.
According to one of the insiders, Bahrain is attempting to maintain its ties with Israel while also attempting to manage public sentiment.
Concerning the current state of ties with Israel, the communications office of the Bahraini government did not reply to any queries emailed to them.
A scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington named Kristin Smith Diwan stated that “they can’t abandon normalization with Israel without endangering this whole strategic framework.”
She stated that the framework was not just about having tight ties to the United States but also that Bahrain’s signature of the pact moved it closer to the affluent United Arab Emirates and gave a counterweight to the power of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has long financed Bahrain, even though Bahrain’s oil resources have shrunk to nearly nothing. She added that the framework was not just about keeping close ties to the United States.
She used the phrase “Abraham Accords” to refer to Israel’s normalization arrangements with Bahrain and the UAE. “Bahrain’s adoption of the Abraham Accords is as much about its relations with other countries as it is with Israel,” she added, using the word for the agreements.
However, to maintain the integrity of the agreement while simultaneously expressing its profound disagreement with Israel’s harsh military campaign in Gaza, Bahrain must perform a delicate balancing act. This can be done in several ways, including the criticism of Israel by the Bahraini crown prince at a security summit in Manama earlier this month, statements made by parliament, or the government allowing public protests.
IN CONCLUSION, REGARDING ISRAEL
On November 2, the elected parliament, which does not have any control over foreign affairs, released an unprecedented statement declaring that the embassies of Israel and Bahrain had withdrawn and that commercial links had been severed.
In the days that followed the announcement, a member named Mamdooh Al Saleh stated in parliament that “the Zionist entity’s” (Israel’s) ambassador had departed from Bahrain and that he “hopefully will not return.”
The fact that the proclamation on diplomatic and economic connections came from the parliament rather than the minister of foreign affairs contributed to the confusion over whether Bahrain had legally severed its ties.
Israel responded that relations remained stable, while Bahrain’s government stated that the envoys had already left without providing any further details on the reason for their departure. The Bahraini administration did not note the relatively weak economic links between the two countries.
Six people familiar with the situation claim that the parliament’s declaration does not reflect the government’s policy.
According to the sources, it appears that the public misunderstanding regarding connections with Israel has relieved the pressure on the administration in its efforts to strike a compromise between local fury and relationships with Israel.
A senior Israeli official told Reuters in Jerusalem that the envoys will return “when the situation allows.”
On the streets, people’s feelings are running hot as a result of Israel’s assault on Gaza, which began when members of the Palestinian group Hamas carried out a deadly attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of around 1,200 people. In Gaza, the death toll currently stands at over 14,000 people.
RALLIES AND PROTESTS
Demonstrating in a nation that has generally cracked down on any protest, mainly if it concerns official policy, hundreds of Bahrainis have marched at rallies to demonstrate sympathy with Palestinians and protest at the kingdom’s relations with Israel. These demonstrations have occurred in Bahrain, located in the Persian Gulf.
“Most people are upset. “The government needs to release the pressure,” said Smith Diwan, about a decision by the authorities to enable citizens to conduct weekly protests. Smith Diwan was alluding to a decision by the authorities to allow citizens to stage weekly protests. She used the word “jarring” to characterize the apparent governmental tolerance of the protests, which reflects the contrast with Bahrain’s typically stringent security.
When protesters in Bahrain, many of whom were part of the country’s Shi’ite majority ros, sought the overthrow of Bahrain’s monarchy in 2011, the government responded with a harsh crackdown on the demonstrations. Iran was accused of having some responsibility for the uprising in Bahrain; however, Iran refuted this charge.
When Bahrain signed the Abrahamic Accords nearly a decade later, concerns about Iran again constituted the security backdrop. Gulf Arabs continue to view the Islamic Republic as an expansionist security danger to much of the Middle East.
Western officials stated that the treaties strengthened Bahrain’s connections to the United States and pointed to a defense pact that was struck earlier this year as evidence.
Israel, which had been chiefly isolated economically and politically from its neighbors in the Middle East for decades, viewed the agreements as a shift in the dynamics of the area and an opening for new commercial connections.
“I’ve seen here clear signals from the Arab Gulf countries that they don’t want to let go of what has been achieved in the last three years,” Tobias Lindner, a German foreign office minister of state, told Reuters at a summit this month in Manama. The event took place in Bahrain.
“The government of the Kingdom of Bahrain is a staunch supporter of the Abraham Accords,” added the minister.
According to the sources, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a regional power, aims to retain its connection with Israel, resulting in billions of dollars in commerce and close collaboration on security matters.
According to data provided by the Israeli government, the volume of commerce between Bahrain and Israel has remained low, hovering around thirty million dollars since 2021.
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