The United Arab Emirates, apparently “outraged” that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has voiced his opposition to the sale of the state-of-the-art F-35 Stealth fighter jets to the Emirates, cancelled a public meeting that was to be held jointly with American and Israeli representatives. The story is here.
A planned public meeting between the UN ambassadors of Israel, the United Arab Emirates and the United States scheduled for last week was canceled by the UAE after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed opposition to a potential US-UAE arms deal.
According to an Axios report, US Ambassador to the UN Kelly Craft invited the Israeli and Emirati ambassadors to the meeting, which was meant to be a public show of goodwill following the announcement of a normalization accord by Israel and the UAE two weeks ago. It was intended to be held at the UN headquarters in New York.
However, after Netanyahu publicly voiced opposition to a proposed US-UAE arms deal in which the latter would receive the state-of-the-art F-35 fighter jet, thus potentially undermining Israel’s “qualitative military edge” in the Middle East, the UAE nixed the meeting indefinitely.
Axios reported that sources claimed the Emiratis had believed that the F-35 deal was part of the agreement to normalize relations with Israel, and Netanyahu’s public statements against it were seen as a violation of the accord. Furthermore, they were said to be outraged that Netanyahu had mentioned he would bring up the issue with members of the US Congress.
As a result, the UAE canceled the meeting in order to send a message to Israel. In addition, high-level public meetings will be postponed until the issue is resolved….
Reuters reported on Monday that at a press conference in Jerusalem, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo pledged to preserve Israel’s regional military edge.
“The United States has a legal requirement with respect to qualitative military edge,” he said. “We will continue to honor that.”
This behavior by the UAE is not merely unpleasant, but outrageous. This “normalization of relations” that the UAE has said it is establishing with Israel no longer looks like what we all hoped – a Middle Eastern version of Rick and Captain Renaud walking off together into the night for what promises to be “the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” The UAE cannot have been surprised by Prime Minister Netanyahu’s expression of opposition to its purchase of the F-35 Stealth fighter jets. For decades it has been official American policy, enshrined in the law by Congress, to maintain Israel’s “qualitative military edge.” This QME is the first thing any arms-buying Arab state finds out about when it goes arms-shopping in Washington. The UAE has been trying for six years, by its own admission, to buy the F-35s; during all that time the American policy of QME has prevented any sale from going forward. As Secretary of State Pompeo said in Jerusalem, reminding the world, and the UAE, “the United States has a legal requirement with respect to [Israel’s] qualitative military edge.” Even if Pompeo wanted to sell the planes to the UAE, it’s out of his hands. If such a sale is deemed to violate the American commitment to maintain Israel’s QME, it will not go through.
The Emiratis claim to have been given to understand that the F-35 deal was an integral part of the agreement to normalize relations with Israel. Should we believe that? Was it anywhere stated in any of the back-and-forth communications, written and oral, between the three parties? Wasn’t it really a hope that the UAE on its own elevated to a promise, hoping it might be treated as such by Washington and Jerusalem, only to be disabused by Netanyahu’s objection to such a sale? The Israeli prime minister is now only doing what he had a duty to his country to do, which was to remind the Americans – if any needed reminding — that the QME policy was still in effect. As for the UAE’s outrage that Netanyahu mentioned that he would bring up the issue with members of Congress, why shouldn’t he have done so? Discussing the matter with Congress is exactly what Israel’s leader should be doing, because it is Congress that made the bipartisan commitment, a policy observed through many administrations – even that of Obama — to preserve Israel’s QME.
By refusing to attend a meeting with the American and Israeli ambassadors at the U.N., with its obvious symbolism, the UAE is doing itself no favors. It leaves an unsettled feeling among some of the very people who have been so enthusiastic about this supposedly new chapter in UAE-Israel relations. The UAE not only cancelled the meeting in order to send a very public message to Israel – it could, after all, have made its objections in private — but has also made it known that all other high-level public meetings with Israel will be postponed until the issue is resolved. By which the UAE surely means: “resolved to the UAE’s complete satisfaction.”
The UAE has armed itself to the hilt. It is one of the leading customers for American weaponry, and has bought billions of dollars worth. Israel has never objected to any of the other weaponry the UAE has bought from America. It continues to share intelligence with the UAE about Iran. It may even, in the future, sell its own advanced drones to the UAE. But the F-35 is a state-of-the-art game-changer that the Israeli military insists not be sold to any other MENA state.
The UAE sees the F-35s and an arms agreement with the US in general as essential to defending itself against Iranian aggression.
An “arms agreement” with the U.S., of course, with all sorts of weapons made available to the UAE, is one thing, but the F-35s are a QEM-destroying bridge too far. The UAE’s defense against Iranian aggression is best undertaken in close collaboration with the most powerful state in the region, that most effective enemy (from Stuxnet to Natanz) of Iran – Israel. Israel’s F-35s will be used to defend not only Israel against Iran, but if necessary, the UAE as well.
Besides, in that most volatile and violent part of the world, can Israel entrust its security to the continued existence in the UAE of the same regime? Can Israel be quite sure that those F-35s will never be used against it by the UAE? Israel well remembers that the two states that are most anti-Israel today, vociferous in their denunciation of the UAE’s “normalization of relations,” are Iran and Turkey. Under the Shah Iran was an ally of Israel. It was plied with weapons by the U.S. When the Shah fell, all that weaponry fell into the hands of Israel’s archenemy, the Khomeini regime. Before Erdogan came to power, Turkey was an ally of Israel. Under Erdogan, whose deep animus to Israel is clear, Turkey’s American weapons are now a threat to the Jewish state. Given that history, the Israelis cannot take a chance that if those F-35s are sold to the UAE, they will never be used against Israel.
The last word should go to the Israeli military, whose top brass and defense analysts are united in their opposition to the American sale of F-35s to the Emirates. “Israel must never forget, not even for a split second, that any dent in its strength is liable to pull the rug out from under its feet in the long term,” Amos Gilad, former head of the Defense Ministry’s political-military affairs bureau, wrote in the leading daily Yedioth Ahronoth on August 19. “It is imperative that Israel prevent the sale of F-35 planes to any country in the Middle East and that it reserves its capabilities and similar ones for itself.”
RichardL says
if one agrees on religious things, one doesn’t have to agree on political issues. I am a Catholic who disagree with the current Pope on every single political issue. I think that reading the tea leaves is mostly overrated.
mortimer says
Troubles in paradise. Pompeo said it well: ‘to preserve Israel’s regional military edge’.
Carl says
There is no need to profit from sales to Arab states. After all, we destroy our economy over partisan ping pong and the politicians lust for murdering their own citizens ( withholding HYDROXYCHLOROQUINE). The sale of f-35 equals peanuts in comparison.
Steve says
Why in God’s name would the U.S. give ANY Muslim/Arab nation the F-35? Is the U.S. stupid enough to arm our enemies and the enemies of Israel? The U.S. needs to wake the Frick Up. There is NOT ONE SINGLE ARAB/MUSLIM country that is an Allie of the U.S. To believe otherwise is suicidal.
gravenimage says
Good question, Steve.
Donovan Nuera says
Heck! We cannot even trust our “ally” Saudi aircraft mechanics being trained on our military bases on our new planes to not sit in their classroom seat and not massacre the American military instructors!
gravenimage says
Grimly true, Donovan.
juleonly says
Same should go for Turkey or any Muslim country. I don’t see why this is not understood. It is quite clear even to a person like me after reading the Qur’an and hearing a few sermons, a little history and watching actions in my lifetime. Is it really the lure of quick money or are our people so naive? I really don’t understand.
juleonly says
I agree Steve. Its the same mistake USA makes allowing any Supremacist group congregate. Allowing Supremacists is not part of Freedom at all. The Nature of Supremacists is to knock out all others. Its is what Supremacist means. It means the End of Freedom. To allow it or play with it or have any relations with it is Stupid beyond belief of a rational mind.
Debi Brand says
“Why in God’s name would the U.S. give ANY Muslim/Arab nation the F-35? ”
Answer: “Money, money, money, money…”
Wellington says
Best to consider any deal made with a Muslim state as an example of hudna, a temporary truce that can be broken at a moment’s notice by Muslims.
James Lincoln says
Wellington,
Correct.
And if that truce is broken, the UAE would still have those state-of-the-art F-35 aircraft to use however they desired.
To your point, the Iranian air force in 2019 still operates around 24 F-14 Tomcats that they acquired from the United States in the mid-1970s before the Islamic revolution.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/why-irans-f-14-tomcats-would-be-americas-first-targets-war-163467
Wellington says
Thanks for that info, James. And I could not not reflect upon the capacity of the Islamic world to have produced such planes on its own, if indeed it could have even achieved what the Wright brothers accomplished, so very narrow minded is the Islamic world in general.
Islam is a recipe for the closing of the mind. Any achievements it had in the medieval Islamic period—much really due to non-Muslims living in said time under Islamic control or to mere nominal Muslims (e.g., Averrores)—has been, way, way overemphasized. It has to be PRECISELY because the Islamic world, from its inception onward, has functioned as a dismal prospect for mankind. Started with Mo and has been a descent ever since, the whole way down to Dante’s lowest circles of Hell.
Yes, still is. More than ever, arguably, because in sheer numbers, or as a percentage of mankind, never has Islam had so many stupid and foolish defenders. And which moronic defenses overlook your standard “features” of Islam such as parasitism, threats of all kind, and sheer mendacity in order to sustain its wretched totalitarian ideology which, given the chance, will destroy the very freedom which made Western Civilization the greatest civilization of all time.
Islam, at best, is like the Moon, i.e., merely reflecting the light of the Sun, i.e., Western Civilization. To anyone, I say, grasp this metaphor and you will understand just how deficient the entire Islamic world truly is. Don’t grasp this and one will remain in intellectual darkness and other kinds of darkness, e.g., the animosity toward romantic love and which antipathy to such is so Islamic, forever and beyond.
P.S. My apologies to the Moon for in any way comparing it to Islam. The Moon most certainly deserves better. Mea culpa.
Daniel Triplett says
Excellent metaphor
ELI says
It is Israel that just blocked it’s new ally. If the roles were reversed your position would not change.
You only accept slaves and then you throw them away like the Kurds.
gravenimage says
This is not Israel’s ally, as ELI here well knows.
And the idea that equitable relationships is ‘slavery’ is just sickening. Note the ELI has never said a critical word about Muslims actually enslaving their victims–but then, why would he?
Daniel Triplett says
Right. And no one who hasn’t studied the Islamic trilogy source doctrine has any business at all sitting down with the Ummah to discuss arms deals, alliances, or peace treaties. Moreover, a Kafir expert on Islam like Robert Spencer should be sitting down at the table too as part of any such delegation.
I doubt Jared Kushner has ever cracked open a Koran, yet he seems to nepotistically place his self at the front of all these new Middle East policies, self-confident and satisfied with his own qualifications and judgment in such matters.
If we can send a 15 agent FBI Special Task Force to Alabama to investigate a garage door pull that offends Bubba Wallace, seems to me Trump could order a task force composed only of Kafirs to spend a few weeks studying and investigating Islamic source doctrine, then brief the President, who could then share the report with the world. Robert Spencer ought to be involved with that investigation too. This should’ve been done decades ago.
There’s no excuse anymore for our ignorant and self-delusional national policy about Islam being a Religion of Peace, minsinterpreted and hijacked by a Tiny Minority of Extremists (TMOE), and aside from this TMOE and Iran, Islam is a peaceful, wonderful, benevolent, and valuable world religion.
Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and John Q. Adams had it figured out. America had enormous problems with the Ummah from 1776 – 1815. Clinton and Bush should’ve tuned into what they had to say. So should Trump.
ELI says
What does that have to do with them wanting to buy F-15s which by the way would not exactly hurt the US economy?
I know you don’t have any problems with another country dictating what the US should or shouldn’t do but it’s worth a shot.
Daniel Triplett says
Evidently you didn’t read what I said.
First, UAE doesn’t want to buy F-15s.
Second, the political and strategic consequences of selling a squadron of fighters to an Islamic state have a far greater affect on US security than the imperceptible affect doing so would have on our economy.
Finally, I’m a strong proponent of US hegemony, sovereignty, and superiority, and always have been.. Nothing I’ve ever said has indicated otherwise.
Daniel Triplett says
I’ve stated before about this issue, that a win/win for everyone — US security, US economy, UAE, Israel, NATO allies, and all Sunni Gulf states — would be for UAE to pay the US to construct, equip, staff, and operate a stand-alone US air base in UAE.
We could install a permanent USAF Air Wing there, under the sole control and authority of the US. UAE gets the security and defense. US gets the money, control, Middle East influence, and global strategic reach. Israel gets increased security with forward based US forces.
Arming and training people who’ve pledged to their deity to pursue our enslavement and extermination is a foolish idea. The US has military forces deployed to 177 out of the 195 countries on Earth. We operate US military installations all over the world, for benefit to the hosts, but mostly for US strategic advantage. We can easily do so in UAE as well.
juleonly says
No Muslim country can be trusted and they TOLD us so. They tell us straight out & so does their Supremacist Qur’an (Warlord manual for conquest & complete control of its own members to do the dirty work…for Allah of course)
gravenimage says
Good posts, Daniel.
manzoor alam says
I agree with you. Thomas Jefferson who has been paying lot of protection money to Babary Pirates who told Jefferson that it is their right to get money from infidels according to our Quran, knew more than our current presidents and policy makers except Trump. Even this multiculturism is going to fail eventually which is comprised of roughly about 70-85% of muslims of 57 Islamic countries. BLM is front of Islamic brotherhood and all other organizations. I am born and raised among that society, Humanity is embeded in human beings. When used humanity everybody is nice and good The problem with muslim countries is that they all are based on religious teaching …This is the reason these countries have not produced any intelectuals, scientists for the last 500 years except terrorism. This is unfortunate that we have to live with it..
Janice Mermikli says
True. “Hudna” is Quranic.
manzoor alam says
true
john smith says
Thats exactly what it is Wellington, any deal or any peace keeping treaty will never be honoured if signed by Muslims. A hudna is a fine example, they can never be trusted.
Charlie in NY says
Aside from the fact that the underlying Axios story is unsourced, publicly the UAE just announced that it was rescinding all anti-Israel boycott and anti-normalization laws in advance of sending high level economic missions to Israel. The Israeli position on the F-35s has been a matter of discussion since the day the accord was announced and these sales are covered by US law and the US alone makes the decision. Articles have already appeared reminding one and all about the advanced (at the time) F-15s and AWACS that were sold over Israel’s objection.
As to the F-35s, my concern would be Iran overrunning the UAE before these fighters could get airborne and head to a US base nearby. Then again, as the Iranians already know from their weapons haul from the Shah, they are only as good as the maintenance and spare parts available and those will prove in exceedingly short supply. As everything these days is infected with politics, lets just see how this plays out.
The US might very well be dangling this type of sale to appeal to other Sunni Arab countries to work with Israel openly rather than behind the scenes. If successful, that could very well change the region’s dynamic in a manner favorable to the West.
juleonly says
Its a totally stupid thing to do. Israel is correct. It was stupid to have a base in Qatar and Turkey.
ELI says
Here are the rules in the Middle East: Whatever Israel says goes and if you don’t like it you’re a disgusting terrorist.
UAE learns a lesson today. Know your role.
juleonly says
Oh gee, Guess why? Islam is a Supremacist snake whose nature is to eat us all.
gravenimage says
Another Reason to Curb Your Enthusiasm About the UAE Promise of ‘Normalization’
…………………
As I said previously, luckily my enthusiasm was pretty curbed from the get go…
Frank Anderson says
GI, I treasure the 16 weeks of the first Dale Carnegie course for many pieces of wisdom he collected. One that comes to mind here is to “Expect ingratitude”. People rarely give a damn about their receipt of kindness or generosity; and DC was not even thinking about muslim teaching and practice. Kafirs have the duty to give to muslims; muslims have no duty to be grateful; on the contrary, their duty is to subdue and humiliate kafirs at all times reminding kafirs of their worthlessness and powerless state. Any promise to a kafir is meaningless; and is effective only so long as it is convenient to the believer. So, OUR enthusiasm for this sham pulled off by criminally ignorant meddlers is no surprise. “Deliberate ignorance constitutes knowledge of the truth.” Wyle v. R.J. Reynolds.
When I was MUCH younger, I read a paperback book entitled Lords of the Starship. It was decades later that I recognized the possibility that it could be symbolic of one vision for the modern state of Israel. I hope not.
gravenimage says
Frank, many people are indeed grateful. I have been profoundly grateful for help that I have received.
But Islam does not teach gratitude, and Muslims usually consider helping people to be a sign of weakness.
I do agree, though, that it is best not to *expect* gratitude from any quarter.
I have not read “Lords of the Starship”, but I will look for it.
Frank Anderson says
I first read Lords in the 1960’s (?), as I remember. About 20 years ago it came up in a discussion at the Temple and I was able to find a used copy on the internet. Look for the surprise conclusion.
We agree that gratitude to worthless kafirs is totally out of any muslim teaching. But for us worthless kafirs, we should understand that what we would like has nothing to do with what islam likes. It is our expectations that need to be considered and changed if necessary to deal with the reality we will never see a day when our actions are appreciated.
I am pretty sure I told you some time ago about a group of friends who did a great act of charity only to be highly insulted by the ingratitude in response. The lesson learned is that our good deeds to not need the approval of others.
gravenimage says
All true, Frank. You are right that e have to be realistic about Islam–all too rare these days.
And I’m sorry about your charitable friends. Certainly, even in the civilized world many people are ungrateful. Even when they are not as hostile as those you describe, a lot of people take charity for granted or do not much recognize it in the first place.
As I see it, we should still give when we can, but be cautious and not always expect a lot of recognition.
Frank Anderson says
GI, I am very proud of my friends for doing something they had never attempted before and learned a valuable lesson for the future. “Can’t make omelets without breaking eggs.” 🙂
Ivan Johnston says
war is deceit, they are only your friends until they have the upper hand
Giacomo Latta says
So let’s complete the circle already. Bring UAE pilots to Florida for training, let them kill a few American colleagues, then send them all home.
gravenimage says
Grimly spot on, unfortunately.
Larry says
Seems to me they should have hashed that issue out before they signed any “deal.” The issue never came up before now? Not buying it.
gravenimage says
Israel may indeed not have been notified about an arms deal between the US and the UAE.
But this deal was no doubt instrumental in the UAE’s sudden ‘friendly’ stance towards Israel.