Jordan's King Abdullah II arrived in the United Arab Emirates on Wednesday for a short visit during which he met with Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan.
Senior officials from Manama, Abu Dhabi, and Amman told Israel Hayom that the tripartite meeting focused mainly on consolidating a unified Arab front to contend with the Iranian threat to the region, as well as consolidating a future strategy for working with the incoming US administration. US President-elect Joe Biden has made clear he intends to return to the 2015 Iran nuclear accord, a move that has raised concerns among Persian Gulf and moderate Sunni Arab states.
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Jordan and Egypt have recently had their requests to join the Gulf Cooperation Council, of which Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, and Kuwait are members, approved.
A senior Bahraini Foreign Ministry official told Israel Hayom that during the meeting in Abu Dhabi, the possibility was raised that Bahrain would act to renew negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. As part of these efforts, the Bahraini king proposed hosting a meeting of Israeli and Palestinian officials in Manama in an attempt to kick-start the stalled peace process.
According to a senior Bahraini official, Abdullah gave his blessing to the proposed Israeli-Palestinian summit in Manama, and emphasized to the Bahraini king and the UAE crown prince that Amman would do whatever it could to renew peace talks between Jerusalem and Ramallah and restore Abu Dhabi's and Bahraini's ties to Ramallah, which had been negatively impacted by the signing of the Abraham Accords.
On this front, Saudi Arabia's Al Arabiya and Ramallah's Shehab news agency reported that the Palestinian ambassadors to Bahrain and the UAE would be restored after they were called back over the two countries' normalization of ties with Israel, in an apparent gesture toward Biden and his incoming US administration.
In a similar move, Ramallah also recently announced it would resume its security coordination with Israel. The PA halted coordination in May over Israel's now-shelved plan to extend sovereignty to parts of Judea and Samaria and the Jordan Valley.
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