Iran’s Isolation Continues: A Stranger Among (Feuding) Friends

US President Trump with representatives from Israel, the UAE and Bahrain for the signing of an agreement to normalise relations, 15 September 2020.

Firoozeh Kashani-Sabet, on the announcement of yet another historic agreement between an Arabian government in the Persian Gulf – Bahrain – and the State of Israel.

 

The announcement of yet another historic agreement between an Arabian government in the Persian Gulf – Bahrain – and the State of Israel marks a tragic day for Iran. As a country with a deeply rooted Jewish population, Iran should have forged the path of conciliation and friendship with Israel well before its neighbours. As home to a long-standing Jewish community, Iran’s antiquity is entwined with the history of Judaism. In fact, Iran had tried to pursue a path of collaboration with Israel. It did so during the Pahlavi regime, and, for that, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi bore the animosity of Gamal Abdul Nasser and an invigorated Arab press in the 1960s. Having just concluded a short-lived union with Syria and North Yemen called the United Arab Republic, Nasser and the Egyptian press lambasted the Shah for his overtures to the Jewish state.

 

Read More: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/mec/2020/09/30/irans-isolation-continues-a-stranger-among-feuding-friends/