The Abraham Accords’ Unfulfilled Promise of Regional Peace
A Le Monde commentary argues that normalization agreements have failed to resolve the Palestinian issue and have instead coincided with deeper militarization and instability.
An IRNA report summarizing a Le Monde commentary argues that the Abraham Accords delivered diplomatic normalization but not regional peace. The analysis attributes the accords’ shortcomings to the unresolved Palestinian issue, transactional U.S. diplomacy, the wars in Gaza and Sudan, and broader regional militarization. These conclusions are the cited commentator’s interpretation, not independently verified findings in the supplied evidence.
## Analysis
### Verified from the supplied evidence
The supplied material is an IRNA report summarizing a commentary by Jean-Pierre Filiu, a contemporary Middle East historian at Sciences Po, published in Le Monde. The commentary assesses the Abraham Accords, launched in September 2020 with the normalization of relations between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. Sudan and Morocco subsequently joined the process under arrangements that, according to the report, included separate U.S. political or diplomatic incentives.
The report says Saudi Arabia did not join the agreements and instead linked normalization to Israeli withdrawal from occupied territories and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. It also states that Oman adopted a more critical position and that Saudi Arabia pursued other security partnerships.
The material further describes the commentary’s discussion of the war in Sudan, the war in Gaza since October 2023, and expanded military cooperation involving the United States, Israel and the UAE. It presents Filiu’s conclusion that the Abraham Accords did not create a foundation for regional peace and, over the six years reviewed, were associated with increased conflict and instability.
### Interpretation
The central argument is that the accords prioritized bilateral normalization and transactional diplomacy over resolving the Palestinian question or addressing broader regional disputes. From this perspective, the agreements produced formal relations between governments but did not establish mechanisms capable of constraining military escalation or aligning the signatories around a common regional peace agenda.
The Sudan example is used to illustrate the limits of the accords’ peace branding: a state associated with the process later experienced a devastating internal war, while the report alleges that the UAE supported one of the conflict’s main armed parties. The Gaza conflict is presented as a further test that the signatories failed to prevent or substantially moderate.
This is an argument about the accords’ political and strategic consequences, not proof that the agreements directly caused every conflict or policy shift described. The supplied evidence supports attributing the assessment to Filiu and Le Monde rather than presenting it as an independently established consensus.
### Overall assessment
The evidence supports a cautious conclusion that the Abraham Accords achieved diplomatic normalization among several governments but, according to the cited Le Monde analysis, did not deliver the broader regional peace promised by their sponsors. Their record remains contested: the material emphasizes unresolved Palestinian statehood, military escalation and regional fragmentation, while providing no independent assessment of economic, diplomatic or security benefits that supporters might cite.