Israel to open diplomatic office in United Arab Emirates

It will be the first time in more than a decade that there will be an official Israeli presence in the Persian Gulf

RAMALLAH, WEST BANK:

Israel will open a diplomatic office in the United Arab Emirates, officials said Friday, the first time in more than a decade that there will be an official Israeli presence in the Persian Gulf.

The diplomatic mission will represent Israel at the International Renewable Energy Agency, an international organisation with its headquarters outside Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates.

“This is not an Israeli embassy or consulate in the UAE,” said Dore Gold, the director general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who led the effort to open the mission. “It is an office within Irena, which is an international organisation.”

The office, first reported on the website of Haaretz, the Israeli daily, is scheduled to open “soon,” according to Emmanuel Nahshon, the spokesman for the Foreign Ministry. The mission will be led by Rani Hatan, a veteran Israeli diplomat, according to Haaretz.

A statement released Friday by the energy agency, known as Irena, said that an Israeli delegation had visited its headquarters this week, and said that any of the organisation’s members had “the right to establish permanent missions” in its agency. Doing so had “no implication on the relation between the member of Irena and the host country,” the statement added.

None of the agency’s 143 other member states have a diplomatic mission in Abu Dhabi accredited to Irena, said Timothy Hurst, the agency’s chief communications officer, because most other members are represented by their own diplomatic missions. The last official Israeli presence in the Persian Gulf ended in 2000, when the Qatari government shut down Israel’s trade mission there four years after it opened.

Israeli officials have maintained contact with gulf officials at international conferences, and frequently speak to officials from Qatar, which is involved in rebuilding the Gaza Strip after the 2014 war between Israel and the militant group Hamas.

Israel’s effort to open the Irena mission began after the country supported the United Arab Emirates’ 2009 bid to establish the organisation’s headquarters in Abu Dhabi, Haaretz reported. That effort was disrupted after the assassination of a Hamas operative in a Dubai hotel in 2010, a plot for which Israel has never acknowledged responsibility.

The new mission represents a “very concerted effort” by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel “to push for greater normalisation with Sunni Arab states, despite — and I emphasise — despite the lack of progress on the Palestinian issue,” said Yossi Alpher, author of a recently published book, “Periphery: Israel’s Search for Middle East Allies.”

Mr. Alpher said that Israel had made progress in its push to establish official ties with Persian Gulf states because of a shared antipathy toward Iran. Israel and the gulf states opposed the Iranian nuclear deal with the United States and other world powers, and are worried about Tehran’s involvement in regional conflicts including the wars in Syria and Yemen.

“I’m not surprised that somebody on the gulf side finally mustered the courage to make a step toward a more open relationship,” Mr. Alpher said. “But they have covered themselves: These are not bilateral relations.”

This article originally appeared on The New York Times, a partner of The Express Tribune.