If Donald Trump’s search for a way out of the Iran war was not difficult enough, he’s added a new goal that threatens to vastly complicate the Middle East’s already splintered politics.
The president said Monday he’d asked Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt and Jordan to join his first-term legacy deal, known as the Abraham Accords, which is designed to forge historic ties with Israel.
The suggestion created yet another storm of confusion as US and Iranian negotiators haggled over language on a proposed memorandum of understanding that might provide an eventual framework for peace talks.
But it’s hard to believe that political conditions in these states, further inflamed by Israel’s role in the Iran war, will allow even strongmen Arab and Muslim state leaders to offer concessions to Israel that Trump wants.
And Trump’s statement that even Iran might join the accords in the event of a peace deal seems a fantasy to match his previous vision of a “Riviera of the Middle East” built on the ruins of Gaza.
“Wow, now that would be something special!,” Trump wrote on social media Monday of his new proposal. “This will be the most important Deal that any of these Great, but always in Conflict Countries, will ever sign.”
It’s unthinkable that the Islamic Republic would recognize its sworn enemy Israel any time soon — let alone considering its raids killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. And there’s no chance Israel would contemplate such a step with an enemy it regards as an existential threat to the Jewish people.
Plus, there must be questions about Trump’s capacity to persuade allies to fall into line after starting a war that has shattered regional stability and caused deep economic damage.
So what to make of Trump’s new gambit, which followed weekend virtual talks with Arab and Muslim leaders about his Iran peace effort?
One explanation is that, despite the disappointment of an inconclusive war that has battered his approval ratings at home, he’s not given up his grand visions for a Middle East transformation. A period of reconciliation and a broadening of economic, political and cultural links is vital to any hopes of draining the historic poison that makes each war a precursor to the next.
But it’s also clear this is hardly the moment. Any genuine belief otherwise on Trump’s part would provoke serious doubts about his grip on current realities in the region. And this would not be new: It has been a consistent problem that led him to underestimate Iran as a military adversary and apparently to assume its regime would quickly fall.
But Tehran remains unbowed. The commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) of Greater Tehran, for instance, now claims his country is stronger now than it was on the first day of the war, according to the semi-official Fars News Agency.
There could be some political art at work. One possibility is that Trump may have hoped to offer incentives to Israelis — in the form of meaningful security benefits — to accept a deal with Iran that is likely to be unpopular in the Jewish state.
Or perhaps he was looking to appease Republican hawks who openly wondered at the weekend whether he was going to cave to Iran in a framework deal that looks likely to make little near-term headway on critical nuclear questions.
Trump’s critics, however, may conclude that he’s looking to fill the ether with another social media post, either to distract from the tortuous pace of talks with Iran or to portray himself as striving for another famous victory after a war that frustrated his expectations of a quick and overwhelming win.
Many Gulf Arab states have higher priorities right now than worrying about their future relationship with Israel.
The conflict, which some states didn’t want, has badly damaged the business model and stability of Gulf nations trying to reinvent themselves as oases for well-heeled Westerners. The region’s economy has been debilitated by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a possibility that every foreign policy expert expected — but that caught the Trump team by surprise.
When the war ends, these US allies will face a new environment that could include a more unstable and aggressive Iran. They may review their national security postures after an association with Washington and US armed forces saw them come under attack from Iranian drones and missiles. The need for regional structures may supersede new compacts with Israel.
And Trump is asking Arab states to take an unpalatable leap. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is deeply unpopular with their people, partly due to political impediments that predate the Iran war.
Saudi Arabia, for example, has long made clear that joining the Abraham Accords would be conditional on a path being established to Palestinian statehood. This seems further away than ever after the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza during the Israeli onslaught after the October 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks on Israeli civilians.
Continued Israeli operations in the enclave and violence by extremist settlers in the West Bank have further narrowed political room for compromise. Israel is showing it believes that maintaining its security will be a perpetual task — a stance that will further strain regional politics. It said on Monday, for instance, that it plans to intensify operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon — a step it says was coordinated with the US.
“A lot of regional perceptions of Israel are not at all flattering,” Hasan Alhasan, a senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told CNN’s Becky Anderson on CNN International on Monday.
“I think a lot of countries in the region see Israel’s actions as highly dangerous, destabilizing,” said Alhasan, speaking from Bahrain. “Israel was one of the two main actors that began this regional war, and I think countries increasingly are coming together to counterbalance Israel’s strategic aggressiveness in the region.”
CNN military analyst Cedric Leighton, a retired US Air Force colonel, described Trump’s plan as in many ways “wishful thinking.” He said on CNN News Central that it “makes sense from a strategic standpoint to get Iran on our side eventually, which is part of what Trump is looking at. But we’re not there yet.”
Leighton added: “And certainly to get the Arab nations to agree to be part of the Abraham Accords and to recognize Israel at this particular point in time, that might be a bridge too far.”
A general election in Israel later this year also makes it unlikely that Saudi Arabia or other states that distrust Netanyahu’s far-right coalition would enter into new agreements even if the war with Iran ends.
The Abraham Accords were signed in 2020 between Israel and four Arab states (Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan) and were regarded by Trump’s aides as one of the great achievements of his first term.
Trump has always envisioned expanding the accords — and this seemed a possibility early in his second term, when his team negotiated a ceasefire in Gaza and laid out so far unrealized plans to solidify a permanent peace.
But the idea of a massive expansion of the Abraham Accords when the US side has so far not secured the opening of the strait, let alone resolved the question of Iran’s nuclear program, seems almost absurd.
Trump envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner have longed grasped for huge goals in the Middle East and Ukraine and have so far fallen short, leading critics to question the wisdom of sending two business tycoons to unpick knotty diplomatic problems. Their relative lack of success has undermined the central conceit of Trump’s presidency: that he’s a masterful negotiator and historic dealmaker who can nail breakthroughs that would have been beyond past presidents.
This could be another case of Washington embracing positions that look logical or possible from the Western Hemisphere but that dissolve on contact with the Middle East. This is not only a failing of the Trump administration; it’s been a flaw of US policy for much of the 21st century, including in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The impracticalities of the strategy are reflected in Trump’s inclusion of Pakistan on his list. Joining the Abraham Accords would require an enormous shift in a Muslim nation with already volatile political conditions. While Islamabad has sought to cosy up to Trump, it has never officially recognized Israel and has no public plans to do so.
The president allowed that several nations in his list might have reasons not to join. A source familiar with the matter told CNN’s Jennifer Hansler that Trump encouraged the Arab and Muslim states to join but did not make it a condition of any deal with Iran. In any case, there is reason to question whether — after he launched a war that has sullied American power and influence — his requests really matter.
“It’s not entirely clear what President Trump himself has to show for, by way of his track record in running or managing this war, that he feels able to impose such a demand on, on regional countries,” Alhasan said.