Next week, on September 15, Donald Trump will host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahyan for a ceremonial signing of the Israel-United Arab Emirates deal to normalize relations between the two countries. Termed the Abraham Accord, the deal has been condemned by many for failing to secure even a single concession for Palestinians. But shortly after the deal was announced, another downside — and perhaps the U.S.’s primary motivation for pursuing the deal — came sharply into focus: tens of billions of dollars in UAE weapons sales.
Less than a week after Trump announced the Abraham Accord on August 13, the story broke that Trump’s senior advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner and National Security Council senior director for the Middle East Miguel Correa had been secretly pushing for the U.S. to sell F-35 stealth fighters, weaponized drones, and other advanced military equipment to the Emiratis. Anwar Gargash, the UAE’s minister of foreign affairs, said that his country had placed their request for the F-35 jets six years prior. He denied that the normalization deal was connected to his country finally being granted their request, but Trump administration officials later admitted that the deal had paved the way. On August 18, leading Israeli newspaper YNet News reported that the Abraham Accord included a “secret clause” wherein the UAE would get to buy billions of dollars in advanced U.S. military hardware.
Netanyahu, ever the prince of political drama, feigned outrage that the UAE might get to purchase F-35 stealth fighters from the U.S., thereby threatening Israel’s position as the most mighty armed air force in the Middle East.
Following Netanyahu bluster and claims that he hadn’t known about the arms sale, the deal between Israel and the UAE seemed to be on shaky ground. “Fake news,” Netanyahu cried when Yedioth Ahronoth, the New York Times and other outlets reported that the U.S.-UAE arms sale deal had been the driving force behind the Israel-UAE normalization deal and that Netanyahu had been in the know from the start. But then, after Netanyahu met with Secretary of State Pompeo in Jerusalem during the Republican National Convention, he came to heel and stopped all public complaining about the UAE getting to buy new U.S. arms.
Anyone who follows Middle East news knows what a shrewd politician Netanyahu is. So it should be of no surprise that Netanyahu has parlayed the very deal he agreed to, then lambasted and denied knowledge of, to his own country’s military advantage (as well as to the further advantage of U.S. weapons companies). On September 6, Yedioth Ahronoth reported that Netanyahu will be requesting additional U.S. weapons for Israel to offset the impact of the new U.S. weapons sales to the Emirates. These additional weapons will pile on top of the $3.8 billion the U.S. already gives Israel annually in military assistance (100% of which must be used for purchases from U.S. weapons manufacturers).
On September 7, Trump spoke out against the revolving door of U.S. weapons sales and endless wars. Pushing back against a report in the Atlantic that he had disparaged fallen U.S. soldiers as “suckers” and “losers,” he accused Pentagon leaders of wanting “to do nothing but fight wars so that all of those wonderful companies that make the bombs and make the planes and make everything else stay happy.” But Donald Trump himself is making these “wonderful companies” happy by cutting a deal for them to sell tens of billions in weapons to the Emirates, a country that is mired in the war in Libya and was, until recently, one of the leaders of the brutal war in Yemen.
It isn’t just the White House’s current arms-for-peace deal that contradicts Trump’s new claim that he is the white knight candidate who will finally put a damper on the military-industrial complex. Less than six months after taking office, Trump signed an agreement with Saudi Arabia — the main perpetrator of the war in Yemen — for $110 billion in immediate U.S. weapons sales and $350 billion in sales over the following 10 years. On April 16, 2019, Trump used his veto power to quash a bipartisan Congressional resolution that would have mostly ended American military involvement in the war in Yemen — a war that has killed thousands of civilians, created the worst humanitarian crisis on the planet, and helped companies like Raytheon, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin increase their already enormous piles of wealth. Not only did Trump continue U.S. involvement in the war in Yemen, but the following month, in May 2019, his administration used an emergency declaration to push through — without congressional approval — an $8.1 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the UAE.
With Trump touting himself as the anti-war candidate, Fox News host Laura Ingraham said on her show, The Ingraham Angle: “If you want to rein in the Pentagon, Trump is your only option.” But the Pentagon budget has increased annually every year over the past five years. The fiscal year 2020 saw a colossal $738 billion for the Department of Defense, and for the fiscal year 2021, Trump is seeking a whopping $750 billion DoD budget.
Although the Abraham Accord to formally normalize relations between Israel and the UAE will be signed next week at the White House, the issue of U.S. weapons sales to the UAE isn’t yet set in stone. Such sales will require congressional approval and, according to congressional aides speaking with CNN, the relevant committees in Congress have yet to even be notified. If the American people really want to pursue peace in the Middle East and instead use our taxes to build up U.S. infrastructure, healthcare, education and address the climate crisis, then we must immediately pressure our Congressional representatives to make sure that the U.S.-UAE weapons sales deal does not go through.
The Trump’s and the Kushner’s will be far, far richer, at the end of Trump’s reign. Knowing how deceitful and corrupt they are, you can bet they are going against Congress, to personally benefit from these multi billion dollar deals. America has never, ever seen, such blatant nepotism, and corruption, from any other administration before. They are openly committing crimes, and those who can condemn this, like the Republicans in Congress, are mute, and some are enablers. A sorry state of affairs.
Of course, Trump and the rest of Washington’s establishment are only too happy to see billions of dollars in weapon sales, a fact which tends to overshadow any claims about being motivated by sound policy.
Historians have demonstrated how states armed to the teeth are indeed a cause for great wars, not a preventative measure. That was very much the case for WWI, as European powers stood bristling with weapons and great standing armies. Much like a pile of tinder and firewood waiting for a spark.
The same can be said for America’s post-WWII military monstrosity. All it has done is engender wars simply by its being there, ready to use by vain and ambitious leaders.
But Trump’s pro-war efforts go much farther than big budgets and weapon sales. He is on very friendly and encouraging terms with some of the Middle East’s most terrible characters – Saudi Arabia’s murderous Crown Prince, Israel’s war criminal Prime Minister, and Egypt’s reigning Field Marshal, among others.
He still keeps troops where they are not wanted by local governments, as in Iraq and Syria, and he does so ultimately to please the imperial ambitions of Israel. There is no other genuine reason.
That is hardly anti-war in any sense of the word, Israel having been at the very center of efforts for the Neocon Wars which have seared the region like unquenchable grassfires for two decades. And those are in addition to Israel’s own almost continuous attacks on all of its neighbors. Of course, encouraging Saudi Arabia to make a hell of Yemen represents the same kind of effort.
Israel with the complicit US will do anything to coerce the Arab nations to recognise Israel, arming them so they can attack one another. Anything that is, except nuclear weapons.
It isn’t like the weapons are being donated to the UAE or Saudi Arabia. US weapons sales generate jobs for US workers and taxes for the US government. The last sentence of the article makes zero sense.
The US is moving its focus out of the Middle East to East Asia and needs a strong ally in the region to support its foreign policy interests there. Israel fits the bill.
A big arms deal with the UAE will help hugely with the US budget, providing much money for the causes Ariel Gold is concerned about.