Trump timing for Sudan-Israel agreement?
On October 23 an announcement came from US President Donald Trump, with Chairman of the Sovereignty Council of Sudan, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan; Sudanese Prime Minister, Abdalla Hamdok and Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, that Israel and Sudan have agreed to a deal to normalise relations.
Sudan has been a foe of Israel since the latter’s founding in 1948. The capital city of Sudan, Khartoum, was host to the Arab League summit in 1967 where eight Arab nations approved policy against Israel, which became known as the ‘Three Nos’ – no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel. Sudan’s backing, therefore, carries symbolic value for Israel and on Sunday, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office announced they would be sending $5 million (£3.86m) worth of wheat to Sudan following the announcement. The deal will also include aid and investment from Israel, particularly in technology and agriculture, along with further debt relief.
With Trump tweeting of a ‘HUGE win today for the United States and for peace in the world,’ the deal was praised by some countries such as Germany and Egypt as another step towards stability in the Middle East. Iran, however, condemned the decision and Sudan has seen a mixed reaction from its people with scattered protests in Khartoum. These protests – with demonstrators burning the Israeli flag - follow days of unrest in the capital city over dire economic conditions in recent weeks with widespread shortages of essential goods, including fuel, bread and medicine and almost 10 million people facing food shortages in the country, according to the UN just a few months ago.
Sudan is facing economic turmoil, following the fall of former President Omar-al Bashir last year, after his 30-year authoritarian rule saw Sudan become an international pariah. Sudan was added - as one of only four states the U.S. considers sponsors of terrorism – to the U.S. terror list in 1993 for allegedly harbouring terrorists, such as members of Hezbollah and al Qaeda, including Osama bin Laden. As a result, the country has faced a series of restrictions including a ban on defence exports and sales and restrictions on U.S. foreign assistance. Other countries such as Iran, Syria and North Korea remain on the list. The fact that the normalisation of ties with Israel was a precondition for removing Sudan from the list has led to suggestion that Sudan was somewhat steam-rollered into an agreement by Trump, despite Hamdok’s assertion last month that the dealings are not connected to one another.
With Sudan being saddled by $60 billion (£46bn) in external debt, the delisting is a major chance for the country’s current transitional government to access urgently needed debt relief and foreign financing, as ultimately being taken off the list welcomes Sudan to the international community and holds the key to the country’s economic future. To achieve this, along with the normalisation deal, Sudan agreed to put $335 million (£258m) in an escrow account to be used to compensate American victims of terrorist attacks at the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 and the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000. A U.S. court decided that Khartoum played a key role in the attacks, which were organised by Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden from Afghanistan.
The timing of the deal has been called into question (for a number of reasons). With less than two weeks before the U.S. Presidential election at the time, the African country was the third Arab state to move to normalise relations with Israel in recent months. Until September this year, only two Arab League nations – Egypt and Jordan – had officially recognised Israel. The Trump campaign touted the President’s foreign policy in the Middle East and Trump’s administration recently oversaw normalisation agreements between Israel and both the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain, as the two Gulf states became the first in the Middle East to recognise Israel in 26 years. Pro-Israeli policies are seen by Trump’s advisors as appealing to Christian evangelical voters who make up a key part of his voter base. With Trump asking Netanyahu on an official call, ‘Do you think Sleepy Joe could have made this deal, Bibi, Sleepy Joe?,’ the importance of the deal in Trump’s efforts for re-election was made evident.
For many in Sudan, the decision has been seen to undermine the democratic ambitions of the people whose country remains without a parliament with elections not due until 2022. Could this deal not also have taken place months or years later with a popular mandate from the people of Sudan? There are suggestions of a deep division in the country’s transitional government, between the military and civilian leaders over how far to go in establishing ties with Israel. The civilians appear to be more fearful of domestic public opinion, with senior soldiers more enthusiastic about winning US support. Historically, Arab countries conditioned peace talks with Israel on its withdrawal from territories occupied in the 1967 war and the establishment of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital. The growing number of Arab countries formalising relations with Israel has been condemned by the Palestinians, who see it as a betrayal of their cause.
The question now remains whether the deal with Israel and Sudan will go ahead. It requires the approval of Sudan’s legislative council which currently does not exist. Sudan’s acting foreign minister Omar Gamareldin explained on state TV on Friday, ‘Agreement on normalisation with Israel will be decided after completion of the constitutional institutions through the formation of the legislative council’. If the deal is finalised it will work to further shift the balance of power in the Middle East and northern Africa away from Iran, as Sudan was believed to have served as a pipeline for Iran to supply weapons to Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip. Iran publicly condemned the agreement on Twitter, in English last week, writing: ‘Pay enough ransom, close your eyes to the crimes against Palestinians, then you’ll be taken off the so-called ‘terrorism’ blacklist. Obviously, the list is as phoney as the U.S. fight against terrorism. Shameful’.
Many are sceptical about the success of the deal and whether it will officially be agreed following the creation of a legislative council in Sudan. In the meantime, Trump promised ‘more will follow,’ on Twitter, as he continued his campaign in the leadup to the elections, and it will be interesting to see how the final election result impacts this.
Image courtesy of Ola A .Alsheikh, ©2019, some rights reserved.
