By Arab Center for Research & Policy Studies
On 14 July, during his visit to Israel, US President Joe Biden held a virtual meeting with the leaders of a new economic group known as I2-U2, consisting of India, Israel, the UAE, and the USA. The announcement of the group’s establishment has raised many questions concerning its objectives, the timing of its formation, and the interests that unite its parties. Although the joint statement issued after the meeting stressed that the goal of establishing the group is a ‘particular focus on joint investments and new initiatives in water, energy, transportation, space, health, and food security,’ the prevailing belief is that strategic goals stand behind the group’s establishment, considering the circumstances that led to its emergence and the nature of the relations and interests linking its members. This was noted by US State Department spokesman Ned Price when he said that the four parties discussed ‘expanding economic and political cooperation in the Middle East and Asia, including through trade, combating climate change, energy cooperation, and increasing maritime security’.
Context
The I2-U2 group was established in October 2021 during a meeting between the US secretary of state and his Israeli and Emirati counterparts to monitor the implementation of the ‘Abraham Accords’, which triggered the normalisation of diplomatic relations between Israel on the one hand, and the UAE and Bahrain on the other. India, which enjoys strategic relations with Israel, joined the group a few days later, during a visit to Israel by India’s foreign minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar. Consequently, the four parties held a virtual meeting while Jaishankar was in Israel to attend the Indian Air Force’s participation in Israel’s Blue Flag exercise. While the tripartite group of Israel, the UAE and the USA appears understandable in light of the Abraham Accords, India’s accession has aroused several questions regarding motives, as well as the reason for choosing Israel as a setting for the announcement of its accession.
Interests
The four state parties are linked to a wide network of economic, strategic and security interests, with shared views on many regional and international issues, most prominently the issue of Islamist movements (although the ideology and practice of India’s ruling party is hostile not just to Islamist movements but to Islam more generally). They do have difference on other issues, such as Iran (with which India entertains friendly relations), and the failure of the UAE and Israel to share the hostile position of the USA and India on China. India, the UAE and Israel have been strengthening their bilateral relations in recent years, eventually making it possible to establish a regional alliance under US auspices.
India-Israel Relations
Following the establishment of diplomatic relations between India and Israel in 1992, relations between the two states have flourished, especially since the ascension to power of India’s nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2014. Trade between them had ballooned to more than four billion dollars by the end of 2016, from one billion in 2000. In 2017, India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, undertook the first visit of an Indian prime minister to Israel, followed by a visit by the former Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to India in January 2018. The progress of Indo-Israeli relations has covered many areas, including research and development and joint manufacturing in the defence sector, science and technology, trade and innovation, agriculture, health, telecommunications, water, and smart cities. But the defence and security sector remains the most important in their bilateral relations. Within a few years, Israel became one of the three most important sources of weapons for India. During the Indian foreign minister’s visit to Israel in October 2021, the two countries signed a ten-year defence cooperation agreement. Previously, in April 2017, the two governments signed the biggest deal in the history of the Israeli military industry, valued at two billion dollars. India is currently the largest importer of Israeli weapons; it imports about 45 per cent of all Israeli produced weapons. Israel is a convenient source of arms for India because, unlike the USA, it does not tie its exports to any conditions.
India-UAE Relations
India’s high economic growth numbers, accompanied by an increase in its energy needs, added a strategic dimension to its relations with the Gulf region. Energy and maritime security have become the glue of these relations, and India has set its sights on strengthening relations with Gulf states, and building a strategic partnership with them to secure the oil and gas for its continued economic growth. India is currently the third largest oil importer in the world, and the Gulf region provides about 70 per cent of India’s imported oil; the vast majority from Arab states, and the rest from Iran. Although India’s relations with all Gulf countries have undergone extensive development, New Delhi and Abu Dhabi are particularly close, especially since the BJP came to power. In February 2016, the then crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed, visited India. In January 2017, he again visited India as the guest of honour for its National Day celebrations. On the other hand, India’s prime minister Modi visited Abu Dhabi in February 2018, and again in August 2019, when he was presented with the Order of Zayed, the highest honour in the UAE. During this visit, the two countries also signed a partnership and strategic cooperation agreement that included energy, investment, defence and maritime security. Meanwhile, trade between the two countries amounted to USD57 billion in 2019.
In February 2022, the two countries signed a comprehensive economic partnership agreement to increase trade from its current level of USD60 billion to USD115 billion within five years. Symbolic of the relationship between the two countries, the UAE insisted on inviting India to attend the ministerial meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) that was held in Abu Dhabi in early 2019, despite Pakistan’s threat to boycott the meeting. Later that year, India abolished Kashmir’s seven-decade self-rule.
While the UAE seeks to enhance its technology, security and defence clout by strengthening its relations with India, ideology is also an important factor in the development of its relations with India, as well as with Israel, The UAE agrees with the Israeli and Indian definition of terrorism, generalising and seeking to eliminate all variations of Islamist forces, and cooperating with them to restrict and shut down Islamic organisations that are active in representing the interests of Muslims in Europe and the United States.
UAE-Israel Relations
Despite a long history of secret relations between the UAE and Israel dating back two decades, according to some sources, security relations have progressed remarkably quickly, especially after the Abraham Accords were signed in 2020. On 18 August 2020, former Mossad chief Yossi Cohen visited the UAE where he met the Emirati national security adviser, Tahnoun bin Zayed, to discuss ‘prospects for cooperation in the fields of security’, and ‘exchanged points of view on regional developments and on issues of common interest’.
In March 2021, the Emirates Defense Advanced Technology Group (EDGE) signed a memorandum of understanding with the Israel Aerospace Industries Company to develop joint security and military production and build an advanced anti-drone defence system. In November 2021, the head of the Arms Export Department of the Israeli Ministry of Defence, Yair Kolas, visited the Dubai International Airshow, accompanied by seven Israeli security, military and cyber companies, in order to enhance the joint security and military cooperation between the two countries, and to design and manufacture unmanned ships capable of implementing M-170 anti-submarine attacks. On the political level, Naftali Bennett made the first visit of an Israeli prime minister to the UAE in December 2021, and returned in June 2022 with reports that Israel had installed radar systems in the UAE to intercept any attacks from Iran. Economically, the volume of trade between the UAE and Israel increased from USD125 million in 2020 to USD700 million in 2021. In March 2022, the UAE announced the establishment of a USD10 billion fund to invest in strategic sectors in Israel, including energy, water, space, healthcare and agricultural technology.
The Tripartite consensus and the US position
Thus, the Abraham Accords prepared the ground to bring together India, the UAE, and Israel as partners within the framework of an Asian-Middle Eastern regional alliance based on shared interests and sponsored by Washington. As soon as normalisation between Israel and the UAE became public, the International Federation of Indian-Israeli Chambers of Commerce was established, and Dubai was selected as its main international headquarters. The opening of the headquarters was attended by the heads of the Indian and Israeli diplomatic missions in Abu Dhabi and the UAE ambassador to India, in addition to numerous Indian businessmen based in the UAE.
On 14 February 2021, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) organised a virtual symposium titled ‘India, Israel, and the Gulf: New Opportunities’. Israel views Dubai as an important bridge to the large Indian market, as Dubai hosts about 500 Indian investment groups, as well as the headquarters of every Indian company operating in the Middle East, in addition to the 23 Indian banks with branches in the Dubai International Financial Center. On the other hand, New Delhi considers the presence of direct flights between Dubai and Tel Aviv helpful in strengthening the relations of Indian companies with Israel. Israeli representatives in Dubai hastened to establish relations with Indian businessmen in the Emirates, while several Indian companies in Dubai announced the launch of activities in Israel in the fields of healthcare, pharmaceuticals, financial services, and gold and jewellery, among other sectors. The three countries have shown great interest in strengthening cooperation in the field of technology and artificial intelligence, in which Israel and India are pioneers, while the UAE boasts the capital to invest in these projects. According to an opinion poll conducted by the Brookings Institution in 2019, the UAE and Israel are, remarkably, considered the most reliable partners for Indian political elites.
With Washington being party to this regional grouping, the three countries hope to gain access to advanced US technology in security, defence, aerospace, healthcare and emerging technologies, and also hope to access the best weapons technology and to cooperate in containing the Islamist groups that they consider their greatest threat.
Meanwhile, Washington hopes that cooperation with India in the Gulf will replace, if only partially, China, and will lead to the emergence and development of a defence-security architecture that can confront China. The USA is looking for cooperation not only in terms of defence, but also to compete with Chinese trade. To this end, it has been proposed that Indian ports, such as Mumbai, may be linked Greek ports through the Jebel Ali port in Dubai, and a railway line may be constructed from the Emirates through Saudi Arabia and Jordan to the port of Haifa. Washington believes that supporting such projects will help restructure global supply chains and international trade lines away from China and its Belt and Road Initiative. This would be consistent with the vision of the G7 countries, adopted at their last meeting in June 2022, to provide USD600 billion to finance infrastructure projects to rival and limit the expansion of Chinese mega projects.
* This article was first published by the Arab Centre for Research & Policy Studies, Doha
7 August, 2022
Source: www.amec.org.za