Israel has no better ally than Saudi Arabia. It fights Hezbollah and overthrew the Lebanese prime minister who had lived in peace with that organization for a year. There is no other country in the world, including the United States, that acts with such resolve against Iran. Saudi Arabia even went to war in Yemen, not for the Yemenis, who as far as Riyadh is concerned could die of starvation, but to block Iran’s influence. [...]
It wouldn’t be unreasonable to try to form an Arab coalition made up of Egypt, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia for this purpose. After all, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu never fails to boast of the quality of the relations that he (of course, he) has managed to develop with Arab countries, even those that have no peace treaty with Israel. The alliance with Egypt is working well along the southern border and there is quiet and excellent cooperation with Jordan, while the UAE has recently become a silent partner. On the face of it, there could be no better combination of forces for the State of Israel.
The problem is that even an alliance of interests with Saudi Arabia has a fatal flaw. It requires that Israel pay too heavy a political price. Israel believes it is permitted to cooperate with Arab states against common enemies, but not in return for a chance at real peace. The enormous security and economic benefits that would derive from a diplomatic process that has the participation of anti-Iranian Arab states is apparently worthless in Israeli eyes. It prefers to pay the economic and security costs of taking care of half a million settlers, not to mention the collapse of Israeli democracy. An alliance with Saudi Arabia or other Arab states? Only if it’s free.
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