The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has sent a strong message to Israel regarding Palestine. The country has warned that any move to annex the West Bank would cross Israel's 'red line' and destroy the spirit of the Abraham Accords.

The agreement was the basis for normalizing diplomatic relations between the two countries. Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority has welcomed the UAE's stance. The British media outlet BBC reported this information in a report on Thursday (September 4).

Senior UAE diplomat Lana Nusaybeh said that such a move would destroy the possibility of a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine. The Palestinian Authority's Foreign Ministry welcomed the UAE's stance.

However, the Israeli government has not commented on the matter. The UAE's comments came after Israel's far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced a proposal to annex four-fifths of the West Bank.

The BBC says that since the 1967 Middle East war, Israel has built about 160 settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, where about 700,000 Jews live. An estimated 3.3 million Palestinians live in the same area. These settlements are illegal under international law.

The UAE, Bahrain and Morocco established full diplomatic relations with Israel through the Abraham Accords signed in 2020 under US mediation. At that time, the condition was that Israel would suspend its plan to annex the West Bank. At that time, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that it would “suspend” it, but said that the plan was still “on the table”.

Many ministers in Netanyahu’s current government in Israel have long been in favor of annexing the West Bank. It is believed that the UK, France and some other countries are debating whether Israel should move forward with the annexation plan after it announced its recognition of a Palestinian state.

Netanyahu said that recognizing Palestine as a state after the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 would be “rewarding terrorism.” It is worth noting that the Emirates have already recognized the Palestinian state.

Lana Nusaybeh said, “From the beginning, we saw the Abraham Accords as a way to support the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people and their independent state. The occupation of the West Bank is a red line for the Emirates. It would destroy the spirit of the agreement, stop regional integration and break the international consensus on a two-state solution.”

Meanwhile, at a press conference in Jerusalem, Smotrich said, “Now is the time for occupation. The idea of ​​dividing the country and creating a terrorist state in the middle must be abandoned forever.”

He showed a map, where the Defense Ministry’s settlement administration proposal plans to extend Israeli sovereignty to about 82 percent of the West Bank.

The remaining 18 percent of the area is limited to small areas around six Palestinian cities - Jenin, Tulkarem, Nablus, Ramallah, Jericho and Hebron. It excludes many Palestinian towns, villages and areas, including Bethlehem. Israel captured East Jerusalem in 1980, but the international community does not recognize it.

Smotrich claims that Palestinians will continue to live their lives as before for the time being, which could later be run by an alternative regional civilian administration. The Palestinian Authority has called the plan a "direct threat" to its aspirations for an independent state.

Several international human rights groups have said that Israel has already implemented an apartheid system in the West Bank. The Israeli government denies this.

Earlier last month, the Israeli government approved a major plan to build new settlements in the West Bank, sparking international outrage. If the plan is implemented, the West Bank will be separated from East Jerusalem and divided into two.