The Key to Peace in the Middle East: Rabbi Aryeh Lightstone on the Future of the Abraham Accords | ATL:NOW

“The greatest part of the Abraham Accords is it changed the lexicon in the Middle East from ‘Will countries ever make peace with Israel?’ to ‘When will countries make peace with Israel?'”

Rabbi Aryeh Lightstone is former senior adviser to U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman. Under the Trump administration, Rabbi Lightstone was one of the architects of the Abraham Accords, a landmark peace agreement between Israel and several of its Arab neighbors.

“Under President Trump, Jared Kushner, David Friedman, Mike Pence, and Mike Pompeo … there was going to be a new Middle East. And that new Middle East was going to involve people looking towards the next 50 years, instead of re-litigating the last 50 years,” says Rabbi Lightstone.

How has the Abraham Accords impacted the region in the last three years? Will Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations follow suit?

“There are 1.5 or more billion Muslims who face Saudi Arabia five times a day. Imagine if they look to Saudi and say, ‘You’ve made peace with Israel. You’ve made peace, then, with the whole Western world,'” says Rabbi Lightstone. “Imagine what that means to Muslims around the world. It’s a game changer. We can’t even fathom what a size game changer it is.”