Avi Berkowitz: ‘More peace deals to come’

A year after US president Donald Trump tweeted the announcement that Israel and the United Arab Emirates were making peace and establishing diplomatic relations, former assistant to the president and special representative for international negotiations Avi Berkowitz looks back with satisfaction of a job well done.

Berkowitz, who over the Trump administration’s four years went from a relatively anonymous adviser to the role of senior adviser to presidential adviser Jared Kushner to a key player in Trump’s landmark foreign policy initiative, spoke with The Jerusalem Post Podcast in honor of the first anniversary of the Abraham Accords.

“I’m really, really proud of the Abraham Accords and the success of our team,” Berkowitz said. “As it relates to the Israeli-Arab conflict, I think that we’ve had just tremendous success. Of course, there are still a lot of significant countries that need to normalize relations with Israel, but we were making progress toward those, as well.”

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Berkowitz expressed amazement at some of the milestones the accords have brought about, with 200,000 Israelis visiting the UAE, and Israel-UAE trade topping $570 million in the past year, despite the setbacks that could have derailed the Abraham Accords – corona, changes in leadership in Israel, and Operation Guardian of the Walls between Israel and Palestinian terror groups in Gaza in May.

“When you look at the people-to-people interactions – not only business but also on a personal level – that to me is when you win,” Berkowitz said, pointing to direct flights as a major element. “I’m really excited for Israelis to get to visit these countries.”

Berkowitz said he and the team he worked with were initially focused on Israel and the Palestinians. The turning point came “in the fourth quarter” when Trump presented his peace plan at the White House in January 2020, and the ambassadors of the UAE, Bahrain and Oman attended the event.

“That’s not to say we weren’t pushing toward normalization throughout the administration; but our significant focus up until that point was definitely working on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But slowly but surely, we pushed forward on this normalization track until we had the breakthrough in June, July of 2020,” he recalled.

Asked about the claims that the Abraham Accords are less about Arab states wanting relations with Israel and more about wanting to get things from the US – F-35 jets for the UAE, sanctions relief for Sudan, and recognition of the Western Sahara for Morocco – Berkowitz said he would separate those things from the normalization deals.

“I don’t think somebody could have pushed president Trump to do one thing or not to do something. All of these decisions required US approval… So I would almost remove Israel from the equation,” he said.

With the UAE, Berkowitz pointed out that they had wanted to buy F-35s from the US for a long time, and the US would not have approved the purchase if not for the normalization, because of the legal requirement to consider Israel’s security and maintain its qualitative military edge.

“Yes, those things are extremely important components,” he said. “They’re complicated deals, negotiations where each country is required to do something – perhaps Israel less than anyone, which I think is a tribute to president Trump for not putting Israel in a difficult position to make peace with its neighbors.”

Berkowitz expressed gratitude to Trump and Kushner, as well as to then-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and former foreign minister Gabi Ashkenazi, and praised Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid who continued making progress, including Lapid’s visits to the UAE in June and Morocco this week.

“The fact that they have picked this up and with the same real excitement that the prior leadership did is really impressive, and I hope to see them continue,” he stated.

As for the Biden administration’s attitude toward the Abraham Accords, Berkowitz said “there is still much to be done, and if it’s going to be done, it will require the current administration and future administrations to… prioritize this, perhaps at the expense of other things.”

He said that what makes the Accords “so unique and so special is that it retains bipartisan support. I’ll just thank the Biden administration for working to ensure that the countries that are currently signatories have stayed on as signatories and are working very closely with Israel in positive ways. And for that, I’m very appreciative.”

With four countries signing the Abraham Accords in a matter of a few months last year, there was widespread speculation that more would join in.

“I was personally working with Jared Kushner on three countries specifically that we felt that we were close to bringing on board,” Berkowitz recounted. “Close could still mean a year or so away, as these negotiations are extremely complex.”

In some of those cases, Berkowitz and Kushner thought the countries could initially allow Israelis to enter, as a step that would eventually lead to diplomatic relations, in a “piecemeal, step-by-step approach.”
Berkowitz said he and Kushner met with members of the Biden administration as they were entering office, but that he does not have insight into where they are with bringing more countries on board.

“As it relates to taking the momentum forward, I can only tell you that things are extremely complicated, and so if it were taking this amount of time, I can understand why that might be the case. And I just wish them luck and I’m always happy to help in any way I can,” he said.

Berkowitz expressed hope that the benefits reaped by the countries that have already recognized Israel will motivate more countries to do so.

“There are people in the Middle East who get their media the same way that people in Morocco get news and people in the UAE get news, and they have seen the $570 million [in trade] between Israel and the UAE; they’ve seen the tourism boom; they’ve seen the security agreements; they’ve seen the opening of consulates to fanfare both in the United States and in the Middle East. They’ve seen the people-to-people rugby matches, soccer matches and the ways in which the people have grown to get to know one another and do business with each other. And I am sure that it is having an impact on the daily lives of your average [resident of an] Arab country that is not yet a signatory to the accords,” he said.

Berkowitz is working with Kushner to establish the Abraham Accords Institute, meant to advance peace between Israel and Arab countries and deepen existing ties.

“I hope to stay close to the people of Israel, the people of the Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan in the coming years, as we work to make peace and advance the Accords,” he said.