US President Donald Trump insisted on Monday that six Muslim-majority countries join the Abraham Accords normalization agreements with Israel ahead of any deal between the US and Iran to end the war, negotiations on which he said were “proceeding nicely.”

The remarks were the second time in as many days that Trump tried to link the emerging deal with Iran to the accords, which were first signed in September 2020 by the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, followed by Morocco and Sudan months later.

“Negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran are proceeding nicely! It will only be a Great Deal for all or, no Deal at all,” Trump announced on Truth Social on Monday, reiterating his oft-uttered threat that if no deal is reached, it will mean “Back to the Battlefront and shooting, but bigger and stronger than ever before.”

He said that during discussions with leaders of Muslim and Arab states, he told them that “after all the work done by the United States to try and pull this very complex puzzle together, it should be mandatory that all of these Countries, at a minimum, simultaneously, sign onto the Abraham Accords.”

He specified that the countries he wished to see sign onto the accords included Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, and Jordan. He said he also spoke to the UAE and Bahrain about this possibility.

It was not clear why Egypt and Jordan would be required to sign the Abraham Accords, given that both have had relations with Israel since 1978 and 1994, respectively. Turkey and Israel have had rocky relations almost since the founding of the State of Israel, with long periods of amicable ties, although those have nosedived in the past decade.

Trump’s request for the Muslim and Arab states to join the Abraham Accords was first reported by Axios on Sunday.

The US president did not mention Israel in the lengthy post, and it was not immediately clear whether he was envisioning traditional accession to the Abraham Accords — which were brokered during his first term — or envisioning the creation of a political framework built around broader........

© The Times of Israel