Despite the fact that several months ago US President Donald J. Trump’s adviser Steven Witkoff stated that Armenia and Azerbaijan could potentially join the Abraham Accords, it remains unclear how Armenia – a country with a 98 percent Christian population – could become part of these agreements.
One of the Trump administration initiatives in the Middle East, the so-called Abraham Accords seek to establish avenues of cooperation between Islamic countries and Israel, with the broader objective of promoting peace and prosperity across the region. These accords were originally formulated during the first administration of President Trump, with the aim of normalizing Israel’s relations with states that had historically maintained hostile or adversarial positions toward it. The initial phase of this process unfolded in 2020, when Israel established normalized relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco, through the mediation of the United States.
The principal architect of this initiative was Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law, who served as the chief negotiator. Following Trump’s electoral defeat in 2020, momentum behind these agreements declined, and Washington’s broader foreign policy approach toward Israel experienced a degree of recalibration. Trump’s return to the political arena in 2024, however, signaled a potential revival of the Abraham Accords, though within an expanded framework – one that envisions either the normalization of relations between Israel and a broader range of Islamic countries or the deepening of already existing ties.
While the Abraham Accords were originally intended to normalize relations between Israel and Arab states, one of their subsequent objectives became the normalization and deepening of Israel’s relations with Muslim-majority countries outside of the Middle East, in Central Asia and the South Caucasus. Good examples of such target countries are Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, which both expressed interest in joining the initiative.
Azerbaijan’s potential participation would be largely symbolic in nature. Relations between Israel and Azerbaijan are already strategic. Azerbaijan purchases billions of dollars’ worth of weapons from Israel in exchange for oil and gas. Diplomatic relations between the two countries were established in 1992 and have remained at a high level ever since. Therefore, Azerbaijan’s interest in joining the Abraham Accords is driven primarily by a desire to gain political credit with the Trump administration and to establish additional channels of engagement with the United States and the Trump team. The relationship between Israel and Azerbaijan is already so close that many allied and partner countries could envy it. Azerbaijan’s possible accession to the Abraham Accords is unlikely to further “warm” this already exceptionally close partnership.
Baku is driven by a desire to develop closer relations with the United States in order to pursue a more independent policy vis-à-vis Moscow. Through this step, Azerbaijan seeks to balance its political relationship with Russia on the one hand, while on the other minimizing potential pressure related to human rights issues coming from the US. At the same time, Azerbaijan aims to reduce the risks of pressure and possible sanctions resulting from Armenian lobbying efforts in Washington DC.
