One year after the normalisation of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, the two countries are looking forward to boosting bilateral trade at the Dubai International Expo, which will be held in October.
Reuters reports that, according to published statistics by Israel, trade between this country and the United Arab Emirates has now reached an estimated $712 million. Although this figure may seem small compared with UAE’s $24 billion of exports to Saudi Arabia in 2019 alone, the Israeli government has announced an increase in trade with the UAE to $1 billion by the end of this year.
The Israeli government announced last week on its official Twitter account in Arabic that it intends to increase bilateral trade to $3 billion over three years. The Israel-UAE Trade Council had previously stated that this figure will exceed $3 billion over three years.
The United Arab Emirates was the first Persian Gulf state to announce the normalisation of relations with Israel in August last year. In September 2020, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain signed US-brokered agreements under the “Abraham Accords” to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. Subsequently, Sudan and Morocco joined the process and established full diplomatic relations with Israel.
Reuters says a major part of trade between the two countries includes the import of plastics, electronics, auto parts and jewelry from the UAE, the main centre of procurement and re-export in the Persian Gulf.
Between January 2020 and the end of June this year, Israeli imports from the United Arab Emirates amounted to $457 million and exports to that country amounted to $255 million, according to the Central Statistics Office of Israel.
Dubai, where Jabal Ali, the region’s largest commercial port, is located, announced in January that the city’s bilateral trade with Israel had reached $272 million since September 2020.
The head of the Israeli delegation in Abu Dhabi, Eitan Na’eh, told Reuters that several agreements will be signed between the two countries in the coming months and a number of Israeli ministers are scheduled to visit Dubai Expo 2020. This international exhibition was postponed for one year due to the Covid pandemic. It will now be held in October 2021. “We need to work on relations between financial institutions, banks, mutual funds and big business,” Na’eh added.
In a report on holding an exhibition in the United Arab Emirates with the participation of Israeli companies, Jill Hoffman, a correspondent for the Jerusalem Post, acknowledged that an Israeli company was using electronic tracking bracelets to carry out security measures on Muslims.
SuperCom is an Israeli company that has been a global leading provider of traditional and digital identity solutions, providing advanced safety, identification, and security products and solutions to governments as well as private and public organisations around the world.
The Jerusalem Post reporter begins her note by meeting with
Trabelsi believes that as a result of this deal, SuperCom will be able to draw the attention of other governments who want to hold similar events in their countries. “I believe that this event will be a big success, it will open a new chapter of relations with the UAE not only for our company but also for other Israeli companies. I personally see a big potential here for Israeli cyber security companies. You can feel the lack of cyber security here and I think we can fill this void for them.”
In the negotiations with Abdullah bin Touq al-Marri (UAE Minister of Economy), it was agreed that the UAE government will provide us with information on passengers who are required to use SuperCom bracelets. Muslims participating at the exhibition will be housed in specified hotels. It is clear that they believe that this contract will be a great success and can cause other governments to turn to it.
According to the report, the head of SuperCom said that the electronic bracelets being used at the UAE exhibition control the location of the users by connecting to mobile phones and using Bluetooth and GPS technology. According to the head of SuperCom, these measures will be taken to minimise criminal, espionage, terrorist and sabotage activities.
A noteworthy point in this report is that the Israeli company announced that during the negotiations with the UAE Minister of Economy, it was agreed that the UAE authorities would provide the company with information about travellers who are required to use electronic bracelets. This equipment will also be installed at hotels where the citizens of the mentioned countries will be accommodated.
The head of SuperCom also claimed that there are many security gaps in the UAE and this situation is a good opportunity for Israeli companies to fill this security gap in the country.
