This is an additional step in bringing the Jewish state closer to the Gulf countries.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett met on Tuesday, February 15, with representatives of the small Jewish community in Bahrain before meetings with the leaders of this Gulf monarchy, on the occasion of the first visit of a head of government. Israeli in this country.

Naftali Bennett was welcomed on Monday evening by the head of Bahraini diplomacy, Abdellatif al-Zayani, at Manama airport, decorated for the occasion with flags of the two countries, and must meet on Tuesday with the crown prince and Prime Minister Salman ben Hamad Al-Khalifa, then King Hamad ben Issa Al-Khalifa.

>> To (re) see: Express Orient: the historic visit of the Israeli president to the United Arab Emirates

"I come from Israel full of goodwill, carrying a warm friendship between the two peoples, and I am sure that you can be a remarkable bridge between Bahrain and Israel," Bennett told representatives of the Bahrain's Jewish community.

The Israeli Prime Minister spoke in particular in front of Eitan Naeh, Israeli ambassador, and Ibrahim Nonoo, head of the local Jewish community which has about fifty souls.

Close partners of Washington, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates were the first Gulf Arab monarchies to normalize their relations with Israel in September 2020 through so-called Abraham Accords, strengthening the integration of the Jewish state in a region where the Iran is seen as a threat.

Standardization strategy 

"I look forward to this wonderful day (today, editor's note) to strengthen the Abraham agreements," added Naftali Bennett according to a press release from his services.

Bahrain's Jews enjoy a relatively privileged political and economic position, but worshipers have had to perform their religious rituals at home since the destruction of the synagogue in Manama at the start of the Arab-Israeli conflict in 1947.

In August 2021, for the first time in 74 years, a public Sabbath prayer, the weekly day of rest for Jews, was held in this reconstructed synagogue.

"The (standardization) agreements have changed everything," Ibrahim Nonoo told AFP at the time.

The recent normalization of relations between Israel and Arab countries has been decried by the Palestinian political class for whom such a rapprochement with Israel cannot take place without an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.

Extended since in Sudan and Morocco, this normalization had been signed under the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, who had not made an official visit to the Emirates or Bahrain.

In power since June, Naftali Bennett visited the Emirates in December. 

“It is important, especially in these tumultuous times, that from this region we send a message of goodwill, of cooperation, of unity in the face of common challenges,” the prime minister said on Monday, without naming Iran. , Israel's number one enemy.

Iran in the sights 

Tehran also remains the bane of Bahrain, which accuses it of being behind protests against the government.

In 2011, the small kingdom of today 1.5 million inhabitants, was the scene of a popular uprising mainly led by the Shiite community.

The demonstrators demanded, in the wake of the Arab Spring, democratic reforms.

But the authorities, aided by neighboring Saudi Arabia, responded with bloody repression and dozens of political opponents were imprisoned.

According to human rights organisations, online surveillance also tightened in the following years.

The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, Canada, recently reported that the controversial Pegasus spyware from the Israeli company NSO infected the laptops of a handful of Bahraini activists between June 2020 and February 2021.

If Bennett did not mention Iran on Monday, his Defense Minister, Benny Gantz, signed a "defense agreement" with Bahrain in early February, in order to deal with "maritime and air threats" in a context of tensions between certain Gulf monarchies on the one hand and Iran and its regional allies on the other. 

In the wake of this agreement, the Jewish state must deploy a naval officer in this country which hosts the American 5th fleet, in charge of naval operations in the Middle East of the United States.

Washington also integrated Israel into its regional command (Centcom) last year.

With AFP

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