The United Arab Emirates warned Israel on Wednesday that any annexation of the West Bank would be a red line for Abu Dhabi, threatening to undermine the Abraham Accords that normalised ties between the two states.
Lana Nusseibeh, Assistant Minister for Political Affairs and Envoy of the UAE Foreign Minister, said the accords were signed with the understanding they would support the Palestinians’ path to statehood.
“From the very beginning, we viewed the Accords as a way to enable our continued support for the Palestinian people and their legitimate aspiration for an independent state,” Nusseibeh told Reuters.
“That was our position in 2020, and it remains our position today.”
The remarks are the sharpest criticism from Abu Dhabi since Israel’s war in Gaza erupted in 2023. They follow an announcement by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich that construction would begin on a settlement project cutting across the West Bank, a step his office described as one that would “bury” the idea of a Palestinian state.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Israel’s new settlement plan ‘undermines the two‑state solution while being a breach of international law’.
Foreign ministers from the EU, UK, Australia, Canada, and others condemned the plan, saying it violates international law and threatened regional stability.
Palestinian officials and rights groups have denounced the project as illegal under international law, arguing that it fragments territory and leaves no room for peace.
Nusseibeh urged Israel to halt the plans, saying “Extremists, of any kind, cannot be allowed to dictate the region’s trajectory. Peace requires courage, persistence, and a refusal to let violence define our choices.”
The Abraham Accords, brokered during Donald Trump’s first term as U.S. president, brought the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco into formal diplomatic relations with Israel.
Trump had sought to add Saudi Arabia to the framework, but the devastation in Gaza and the ongoing humanitarian crisis have shifted attention away from those ambitions.
Israel’s prime minister’s office has yet to respond to a request for comment on the UAE’s remarks.
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A huge fire still burning in a Hong Kong apartment complex that has killed at least 44 people and left almost 300 missing may have been spread by unsafe scaffolding and foam materials used during maintenance work, police said on Thursday.
Tunisian President Kais Saied summoned the European Union’s ambassador on Wednesday to express a “firmly toned protest” regarding a perceived breach of diplomatic protocol, the presidency said.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has reached a staff-level agreement with Ukraine to provide $8.2 billion over four years under a renewed Extended Fund Facility (EFF) programme.
Thousands of Bulgarians took to the streets of Sofia on Wednesday to protest the government’s draft budget for 2026, the first to be prepared in euros ahead of the country’s planned eurozone entry on 1 January 2026.
Former President Martin Vizcarra is sentenced to 14 years in prison after a Peruvian court found him guilty of accepting bribes while governor of the southern Moquegua region from 2011 to 2014.
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