Considering the UAE-Israel peace agreement dated 13 August 2020, the relationship between the UAE and Israel is being expected to warm up soon. At the same time, thoughts around capital infusion from the UAE in Israel’s Silicon Wadi (Israel’s answer to Silicon Valley) have got elevated.
On similar lines, The Guardian in their article has collected a number of statements from various investors – creating ground for this expectation of Israel.
Eldad Tamir, founder and CEO of the Tamir Fishman investment house, one of Israel’s top investment funds.
“The UAE has excess amounts of money, but not enough places to invest it in the Middle East. The high tech sector here is thirsty for money and having new investors from the UAE will help us diversify a bit from our usual Chinese and American investor.”
A UAE-based investor, keeping anonymity told The Guardian,
“The emotional part is definitely a roller-coaster ride and will take a substantial time to overcome,”
It is believed that the deep-seated animosity towards Israel among some investors could cap inflows, according to investment bankers and fund managers in the UAE, the Middle East’s financial hub.
According to Citi Israel head Neil Corney, UAE’s investors usually removes Israel while investing in global or regional shares indexes, but this can be changed as an outcome of the UAE-Israel peace agreement which has been signed this very month. In the words of the Corney,
“If asset managers were following some kind of global index, Israel would get its relevant or relative weight for those investments,”
As covered by the Guardian, regional investment funds, many of which are headquartered in the UAE, however, may not get the green light to invest in Israel if their investors come from Arab countries that don’t recognise the country, according to two fund managers.
UAE being the third Arab nation having official relations with Israel, after Egypt and Jordan, is now witnessing alarming prompts from various UAE’s Gulf allies.
Meanwhile Cairo, Egypt has revealed its support for both Palestine and the UAE-Israel peace agreement considering the provisions of the agreement, that significantly includes: Suspending of Israel’s plans to annex Palestinian territories.
As covered on Al-Monitor, an Egyptian security source said, Egypt supports the right of Palestinian people to their land and promotes the two-state solution based on the 1967 borders, and the UAE-Israel agreement is in the interest of peace in the region. They also highlighted that Egypt’s support for the UAE-Israel deal won’t affect the mediation efforts between Fatah and Hamas. The source also highlights that this deal is realistic considering the coordination of Israel with several other Middle East nations including Oman, Jordan, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia even though these countries don’t recognise Israel.
Editor’s note
Coming back to the question, ‘Is UAE-Israel peace agreement a good sign for the Israeli startup ecosystem?’, I think the answer lies in the new information and conclusions which we’ll find soon.
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