Most moderate Arab states have either welcomed the peace agreements signed between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain, or at the very least refrained from condemning them or encouraging widespread protests against the move.
However, Palestinian leaders in Ramallah and the Gaza Strip continue to attack the leaders of the UAE and Bahrain for normalizing with Israel, hurling insults that called the diplomatic step "shameful" and "a knife in the back of the Palestinian people."
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Despite the official Palestinian stance that the tripartite deal will deal a major blow to the two-state solution and the Palestinians' demand for an independent state along the 1967 borders, Israel Hayom has learned that high-ranking officials in the Arab world, as well as in Ramallah, are pressuring Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to moderate his position. The officials are reportedly urging him to prepare for the possibility that Israel and the PA could relaunch peace negotiations.
According to various Arab diplomats and officials in the PA, it was no coincidence that US President Donald Trump, as well as the foreign ministers of both Bahrain and the UAE, said in their speeches on Tuesday that the Palestinian issue had not been left out of the Abraham Accords signed at the White House.
One senior member of the Emirate delegation to Washington told Israel Hayom that Abbas is "starting to realize that if he continues with his recalcitrance, he will only hurt the Palestinian national interest."
"The peace train has pulled out of the station and can no longer be stopped. The Palestinian leadership can and should make an informed decision about whether to join the historic process, like Bahrain and other countries that will soon be participating, or repeat the mistakes of the past, as [former PLO leader Yasser] Arafat did when he opted to support Saddam Hussain in the 1991 Gulf War, causing massive harm to relations between the Palestinians and the Gulf Emirates," the official said.
A high-ranking official in Ramallah told Israel Hayom that the "massive" pressure on Abbas, as well as the unceasing messages he has recently received from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, Bahrain, and other Arab countries had "not fallen on deaf ears."
The Ramallah official said that a few days ago, Abbas had signed a special presidential order forbidding Palestinians to insult the royal families or governmental institutions of the Emiratis or the Bahrainis, and even ordered Palestinian officials to stop personal criticism leveled at leaders in Abu Dhabi and Manama.
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