Zarif: Trump desperately needs Arab-Israel normalization as ‘campaign photo’

The Iranian foreign minister says recent efforts by the United States to normalize Israel’s ties with a number of Arab countries in the region clearly show that US President Donald Trump is in desperate need for “a campaign photo” ahead of the November presidential election.

“@realDonaldTrump desperately needed a campaign photo. His son-in-law (Jared Kushner) blackmailed their regional clients into giving him one,” Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a post on his Twitter page on Monday.

The top Iranian diplomat, however, cast doubt on the nature of the so-called “peace agreements” and said these deals are not being signed “between foes but longstanding allies,” thus alluding to the fact that both the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have had covert relations with Israel long before bringing them into the open through the recent deals.

Zarif ridiculed the signing of the agreements as “a diplomatic coup” and said, “Stay tuned for more…,” connoting that more reactionary Arab regimes are in line to normalize their relations with Israel at the behest of the US administration.

Trump announced on September 11 that the tiny Persian Gulf state of Bahrain had struck an agreement to normalize relations with Tel Aviv, hailing the deal as yet another “HISTORIC breakthrough.”

The agreement came roughly a month after Washington brokered another deal enabling a similar rapprochement between the United Arab Emirates and the occupying regime.

Bahrain has agreed to formalize the deal with Israel at a ceremony on September 15 at the White House, where the UAE would also sign off on its own thaw with Tel Aviv.

Zarif’s tweet came after Ali Akbar Velayati, a top advisor to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, also said that the US president seeks to clinch victory in the upcoming presidential election.

He said, “He (Trump) wants to focus on the foreign policy and the recent measures by some countries to normalize relations with the Zionist regime is a positive point for him.”