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After naming its terms for a normalization deal with Israel, Saudi Arabia restores relations with Iran
(JTA) — Saudi Arabia has taken significant steps this week toward better relations with two countries that see each other as sworn enemies: Israel and Iran.
On Thursday, the kingdom set terms for what it would need from the United States as a price for normalizing relations with Israel: a security agreement of some kind with the United States, a civilian nuclear program and decreased restrictions on U.S. arms sales.
Then, on Friday, Saudi officials signed an agreement with Iran, brokered by China in Beijing, that restores diplomatic ties between the two countries. Saudi Arabia and Iran are regional rivals that have competed for influence across the Middle East, and that have taken opposing sides in Yemen’s long-running civil war. The two states ceased diplomatic relations in 2016. Now, they have pledged to reopen embassies in each other’s countries within two months.
The two developments have created a complex picture for Israel, whose prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has publicly sought a normalization deal with Saudi Arabia. Establishing full relations with Saudi Arabia would add the powerful country to the list of Arab states that have signed normalization deals with Israel in recent years under a framework called the Abraham Accords.
The Biden administration has also said it would like to add more Arab countries to the accords. If Saudi Arabia and Israel did establish full ties, it would be a milestone in Arab-Israeli relations, which have historically been hostile.
Part of Israel’s rationale for normalizing relations with Saudi Arabia is that the relationship would allow the two countries to better confront Iran’s ambitions, including its nuclear program. But Saudi Arabia’s public thaw in relations with Iran complicates that picture. Included in the reestablishment of Saudi-Iranian ties is the revival of a security cooperation pact, according to The New York Times.
Saudi Arabia’s publicizing a list of demands in exchange for normalization with Israel isn’t its first foray into trying to facilitate a diplomatic agreement with the state, whose nearest border is only about 150 miles from Saudi Arabia’s border with Jordan. More than two decades ago, a Saudi-led peace plan promised full relations between Israel and the Arab world in exchange for full Israeli withdrawal from all territories it captured in the 1967 Six Day War, the establishment of a Palestinian state and “a just solution to the Palestinian refugee problem.” Israel has not viewed the proposal as a basis for negotiations, and Saudi Arabia has previously said it wouldn’t establish full ties with Israel before a Palestinian state is established.
Netanyahu does not appear to have commented directly on either the Saudi list of demands or the kingdom’s restored relations with Iran. But in an interview with the Italian newspaper La Repubblica yesterday, published before the Saudi terms were announced, Netanyahu said Arab states “can see we share a strategic interest” and added that “they see our technology and innovation and understand the opportunity it represents for the entire region.”
“Riyadh has released many statements,” he added, referring to a Saudi commitment not to normalize relations with Israel before the establishment of a Palestinian state. “But naturally I believe that the peace agreement between us and the Saudis will lead to an agreement with the Palestinians, provided they agree to recognize the existence of Israel.”
On Friday, the Israeli news website Walla quoted an “Israeli official” who spoke about the Saudi-Iran agreement to the reporters accompanying Netanyahu on a visit to Italy. The anonymous official blamed the agreement on the “weakness” of the United States and the previous Israeli government.
“There was a feeling of American and Israeli weakness, and so Saudi Arabia turned to different horizons,” the official said, according to Walla. “It was clear where they were going.”
Yair Lapid, Netanyahu’s immediate predecessor and the leader of Israel’s parliamentary opposition, criticized Netanyahu over the Saudi-Iran agreement.
“The agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran is a total and dangerous failure of the foreign policy of the Israeli government,” he tweeted. “It’s a collapse of the regional wall of defense that we began to build against Iran.”
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The post After naming its terms for a normalization deal with Israel, Saudi Arabia restores relations with Iran appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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UK Doctor Blames ‘Jewish Lobby’ After Suspended by Medical Regulators for Pro-Hamas, Antisemitic Posts
Dr. Rahmeh Aladwan addresses the Activist Independent Movement’s Nakba77, Birmingham Demonstration for Palestine, outside the local BBC offices and studios in 2025. Photo: Screenshot
A British Palestinian doctor based in London blamed the “Israel and Jewish lobby” after she was suspended this week from practicing medicine in the United Kingdom over social media posts denigrating Jews and celebrating Hamas’s terrorism.
“Let this decision stand as the definitive proof that there is no independent British medical regulation. The ‘israeli’ and jewish [sic] lobby decide who can and cannot practice medicine in Britain,” Dr. Rahmeh Aladwan, a 31-year-old trainee trauma and orthopedic surgeon, posted on X on Wednesday just after her suspension. “This is not an end. It is the beginning of a far greater battle for the integrity of our institutions.”
The Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) suspended Aladwan’s registration for 15 months, with a review every six months.
Aladwan, a doctor in the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), had called online for the ethnic cleaning of Jews and celebrated the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. She also described Israelis as “worse than Nazis” and Hamas operatives as “oppressed resistance fighters, not terrorists.”
The anti-Israel activist also made explicitly antisemitic claims, such as labeling the Royal Free Hospital in London “a Jewish supremacy cesspit” and asserting that “over 90% of the world’s Jews are genocidal.”
Aladwan also blamed the Jewish people for her suspension in a long X post on Friday.
“The UK ‘israel’ [sic] lobby has pressured my government and medical board into referring me to a tribunal hearing to try and suspend me for opposing genocide. This is Britain. We are occupied,” Aladwan wrote. “Hi. My name is Rahmeh. I am a part-Palestinian British NHS doctor. I am facing the suspension of my medical license. This is not the result of any professional failure, but the outcome of a coordinated lobbying campaign against me because of my public stance against the genocide in Gaza being carried out with my tax pounds.”
Aladwan addded, “I march — having attended over 300 protests in the last 23 months — advocate and educate online, and have taken direct action.”
The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) has led the charge in recent months to raise awareness about Aladwan’s vocal support for Hamas.
Aladwan “has been suspended for 15 months while an investigation takes place into her campaign of hatred against British Jews,” the British charity said in a statement. “Dr. Aladwan has been on an unapologetic crusade to harass the Jewish community and, until now, she has shockingly managed to do so without facing any consequences. We are pleased to see that common sense has finally prevailed – at least for the next 15 months – and that an interim suspension has been handed down, following our complaints.”
British law enforcement had arrested Aladwan on Oct. 21, charging her with four counts related to malicious communications and inciting racial hatred.
“It is inconceivable that a Jewish person would feel safe receiving treatment from this doctor,” CAA Said. “We expect the GMC [General Medical Council, the UK’s top medical regulatory body] to pursue its investigation speedily so that this doctor is removed from the medical profession without much further delay. The steps we have taken against Dr. Aladwan are further evidence of our commitment to protect the Jewish community as the UK’s institutions continue to fail it.”
Aladwan’s arrest followed the GMC’s clearing her to continue treating patients, finding that her conduct had not done anything to “undermine public confidence in the medical profession” and that her comments did not “amount to bullying or harassment.” The MPTS panel concluded that “a reasonable and fully informed member of the public would not be alarmed or concerned” by her being allowed to continue treating patients.
However, following widespread backlash, the GMC said it had re-referred Aladwan’s case to the MPTS for “”an interim orders tribunal,” adding that such referrals are made when an interim order “is necessary to protect the public or public confidence in doctors during an investigation.”
The 15-month suspension came after UK Health Secretary Wes Streeting earlier this month called it “chilling” that some members of the Jewish community fear discrimination within the NHS, amid reports of widespread antisemitism in Britain’s health-care system.
Last month, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer unveiled a new plan to address what he described as “just too many examples, clear examples, of antisemitism that have not been dealt with adequately or effectively” in the NHS.
“We’ve already put in place management training in relation to the NHS, but I think we need a wider review, because in some cases, clear cases are simply not being dealt with, and so we need to get to the root of that,” Starmer said while announcing the plan.
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Pro-Israel Lawyers Challenge UK University Academic’s Boycott of Israeli Scholar
The entrance to Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Mount Scopus campus. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
An association of lawyers who support Israel is demanding the University of East Anglia (UEA), located in Norwich, England, investigate and take disciplinary action against a senior academic who refused to consider an application from a researcher because the latter was from an Israeli university, the group announced on Friday.
On Nov. 20, a professor of social science at UEA declined to consider a request by an Arab Israeli post-doctoral researcher at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI) to schedule a research visit to the British university, according to UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI). The UEA professor said the decision was made “primarily as Palestinian colleagues have asked us not to work with Israeli universities at this time,” and noted that the move was “a personal position rather than that of my university.”
UKLFI chief executive Jonathan Turner told The Algemeiner that HUJI shared a copy of both the researcher’s email requesting the visit and the professor’s response with the association of lawyers, following consent from the researcher.
UKLFI wrote a letter to UEA Vice-Chancellor David Maguire about the incident on Wednesday, asking the school to investigate the professor’s conduct, take appropriate disciplinary action, and guarantee that the HUJI researcher’s application is “reconsidered fairly.” The association also called on the university to issue a statement prohibiting discriminatory academic boycotts; examine if similar boycotts are being practiced in the school; and introduce or update training for staff of the UK’s Equality Act 2010, which prohibits discrimination based on protected characteristics that include nationality. The decision targeting the Arab Israeli scholar is likely a breach of the Equality Act, according to UKLFI.
“A refusal to consider an applicant because of her Israeli affiliation directly undermines the principles of fairness, equality, and dignity that the University professes to uphold,” said the group of lawyers.
In its letter to the university, UKLFI also noted that UEA could face legal consequences for the decision and argued that “such boycotts are contrary to fundamental academic values, recognized by international instruments as well as UEA’s own policies.” The UEA has an Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Policy that was issued in August and adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) Working Definition of Antisemitism in January 2020.
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Slovenia to Pull Out of Eurovision Song Contest if Israel Participates; Spain Reaffirms Same Position
Yuval Raphael from Israel with the title “New Day Will Rise” on stage at the second semi-final of the 69th Eurovision Song Contest in the Arena St. Jakobshalle. Photo: Jens Büttner/dpa via Reuters Connect
Slovenia’s national broadcaster RTVSLO will compete in the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest only if Israel is excluded from the competition, it announced on Wednesday, a day before the president of Spain’s RTVE reiterated its boycott of next year’s Eurovision if Israel is involved.
The 2026 draft programming plan for Slovenia’s RTVSLO does not include its participation in the 2026 Eurovision or even the broadcast of the competition, set to take place in Vienna, Austria, in May.
“However, if next week, on Thursday, when the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) General Assembly is scheduled to vote on whether Israel will participate in the Eurovision Song Contest or not, it turns out that Israel will not participate in the Eurovision Song Contest, then we will propose to the council a change to the program-production plan and we will of course participate in this festival,” said Natalija Gorščak, president of the RTVSLO board.
Members of the EBU, which organizes the Eurovision Song Contest, are set to convene at the 95th EBU General Assembly in Geneva on Dec. 4 and 5 to discuss next year’s competition, the implementation of new rules for the contest, and Israel’s participation.
Slovenia’s explicit actions this week to boycott the 2026 Eurovision follows its previous threats to withdraw from the competition if Israel is included. They join other countries – such as the Netherlands, Ireland and Iceland – that have expressed opposition to Israel’s military actions in the Gaza Strip during its war against the Hamas terrorist group, which orchestrated the deadly massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
On Thursday, José Pablo López, president of Spain’s RTVE, appeared before the Senate’s Joint Parliamentary Control Committee and defended the broadcaster’s initial decision in September not to compete in the 2026 Eurovision if Israel is allowed to participate.
“Eurovision is a contest. Human rights are not,” Lopez said, after claiming that a “genocide” has taken place in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas war. He then falsely accused Israel of breaking the rules of the Eurovision competition by attempting to politically exploit the contest and influence voting in the last two years, referring to performances by Eden Golan in 2024 and Yuval Raphael earlier this year. “Any other country that had carried out this use of the contest, I assure you that it would have been sanctioned and temporarily suspended,” he said.
López also challenged Eurovision Director Martin Green, who has previously defended Israel’s participation in the Eurovision.
“Martin Green recently wrote a letter stating that television networks and artists do not represent governments and that this is a cultural competition,” Lopez told the committee, according to a translation of his remarks by Eurovision Spain. “I wonder, is Mr. Green considering the return of Russian and Belarusian broadcasters to the festival? I hope not, because we all know that if those networks return, they would use it in a similar way to Israel, because for them, the contest is much more than just a competition and has a very significant political dimension.”
Lopez also addressed recent changes by the EBU to its rules for the Eurovision, in an effort to prevent rigged voting and governmental interference. Lopez believes the new rules are insufficient. “They do not guarantee that interference from a government like Israel’s, or any other government, cannot happen again,” he said.
“The EBU knows that these measures are a step forward, but they are not enough, and above all, as I have said, they leave Israel’s actions during this period unsanctioned,” he added. “More measures are necessary, and that will be the proposal we will take to the next General Assembly, which will be held on the 4th and 5th.”
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, a longtime critic of Israel, has also called for Israel to be excluded from the 2026 Eurovision.