Israeli foreign policy is often described as pragmatic or reactive. In reality, it has followed a consistent structural logic. Israel does not search for allies in sentimental terms. It looks for converging interests under specific threat environments. When those environments shift, so do the alignments. What appears as volatility is usually recalibration.

Historically, Israel’s regional partnerships were rarely built on shared ideology. They were functional alignments born of overlapping fears. In the 1960s, Jordan quietly coordinated with Israel because both feared Nasserist pan Arabism. In the 1980s, revolutionary Iran and Israel found limited convergence in their shared fear of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Even as Ayatollah Khomenei shouted “Death to Israel”, Israeli arms sustained his war effort against Iraq. More recently, mainly in the 2010s, Saudi Arabia and Israel discovered common ground in their perception of Iran as an expansionist power seeking regional dominance.

These were alliances of necessity, not of vision.

Such alignments endure only as long as threat perceptions remain symmetrical. Once the threat declines or is managed differently, the glue weakens. Saudi Arabia’s recent recalibration toward Iran reflects this pattern. Riyadh increasingly favors hedging and de escalation while focusing on economic transformation. For Israel, this means that a once powerful implicit convergence may not be structurally durable.

The lesson is straightforward. Functional overlap is not the same as strategic alignment.

If one examines Israel’s deeper security doctrine, a more consistent theme emerges. Since its founding, Israel has been wary of strong centralized Arab states capable of mobilizing unified military and political power against it. The logic of the periphery doctrine reflected this concern. Israel sought ties with non Arab regional actors and minority groups not as a romantic project but as a structural hedge. The Kurdish question in Iraq, Druze communities in the Levant, and other minority constellations were viewed through a strategic lens. Fragmentation reduced the probability of unified existential coalitions.

This does not mean Israel seeks chaos. It means it is structurally more comfortable with decentralized regional environments than with consolidated hostile blocs.

Today, the regional actor whose strategic logic most closely mirrors this approach is the United Arab Emirates.

The UAE’s foreign policy over the past decade has often been described as activist or interventionist. A more precise description would be network oriented. Rather than relying exclusively on traditional state to state diplomacy, Abu Dhabi has invested in relationships with sub state actors, militias, autonomous administrations, and political factions across fragile states.

In Libya, the UAE supported Khalifa Haftar not merely to influence Tripoli but to shape the balance of power within a fragmented system. In Yemen, it backed the Southern Transitional Council, strengthening secessionist currents that challenge centralized authority. In Sudan, it cultivated ties with the Rapid Support Forces as an alternative pole of power within a collapsing state structure. Across the Horn of Africa, it invested in ports, infrastructure, and autonomous political entities, embedding itself within sub national ecosystems rather than waiting for cohesive national governments to emerge.

Somaliland illustrates this approach with particular clarity. The breakaway territory has operated with de facto independence from Somalia for decades, yet without broad international recognition. The UAE became one of its most significant external partners, investing in Berbera port and building long term economic and security ties. Rather than insisting on formal recognition frameworks, Abu Dhabi treated Somaliland as a functional political entity capable of delivering strategic value.

Israel’s recent decision to recognize Somaliland’s statehood fits into this broader structural logic. Recognition was not merely symbolic. It signaled an openness to engage political entities that exist in practice, even when they challenge traditional notions of territorial sovereignty. For Israel, Somaliland represents a stable, pro Western, strategically located partner along the Red Sea corridor. For the UAE, it represents a node in a network stretching from the Gulf to East Africa.

This convergence is not accidental. It reflects a shared worldview.

For Israel, a Middle East dominated by centralized ideological regimes with expeditionary ambitions represents a high risk scenario. A Middle East composed of fragmented, internally constrained systems presents a more complex but often less existentially threatening landscape. Decentralization limits mobilization capacity. It reduces the likelihood of coordinated military coalitions. It creates multiple channels for quiet engagement.

For the UAE, influence is secured not by waiting for strong states to consolidate but by shaping political landscapes from within. Where authority fractures, Abu Dhabi builds relationships with the most viable actors. Stability is defined not as unified sovereignty but as manageable balance among dependent partners.

This distinguishes the Emirati partnership from previous Israeli alignments. Saudi Arabia’s strategic culture remains fundamentally state centric. Riyadh prefers hierarchical order and strong central authorities, ideally under its own influence. Its rapprochement with Iran reflects this logic of balancing states rather than working through fragmentation within them.

The UAE has demonstrated a greater willingness to operate in gray zones of sovereignty. It sees opportunity where others see disorder.

For Israel, this creates an unusual degree of strategic resonance. Both countries are small in demographic terms but ambitious in geopolitical scope. Both operate in environments where larger neighbors have historically sought dominance. Both rely on intelligence, technological leverage, and network building to compensate for limited size. And both appear comfortable managing mosaics rather than confronting monoliths.

None of this implies immunity from friction. Divergences may emerge, particularly if fragmentation produces instability that threatens trade corridors vital to Emirati growth. The UAE is deeply invested in global commerce and reputational stability. Israel’s security calculations sometimes prioritize containment over economic optics and global public opinion.

Yet the underlying strategic grammar remains aligned.

The Abraham Accords formalized an alignment that had already matured at the structural level. Its durability will not depend solely on shared opposition to specific actors. It will depend on whether both states continue to perceive decentralized regional orders as preferable to consolidated ideological blocs.

Israel’s most enduring partnerships have historically been those rooted not in temporary fear but in shared structural assumptions about power. Tactical convergences will continue to rise and fall across the region. Saudi calculations may evolve further. New alignments may emerge.

But the Israel UAE axis reflects something deeper. It reflects a shared understanding that in a region where centralized authority has often produced expansionist ambitions, influence is sometimes best secured not by building monoliths but by managing mosaics.

In Middle Eastern geopolitics, durability rarely comes from sentiment. It comes from symmetry in strategic logic. Today, Israel’s closest strategic twin may well be found in Abu Dhabi.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)