Rabbis Say Bahrain King Wants to Stop Arab Boycott of ‘Israel’
Local Editor
Hosting a Los Angeles event with the son of Bahraini king, two prominent US rabbis let something slip out: the island nation's ruler thinks the longtime boycott of ‘Israel' by Arab countries should end.
However, the rabbis' revelation of the king's opinion shouldn't come as too much of a surprise - Arab nations have slowly inched closer to ‘Israel' in recent years.
Bahrain may prove to be the test case for other Gulf Arab nations about coming out of the closet about their mutual interests. It also allows the kingdom, still silent about the rabbis' comments, to draw attention away from its internal crackdown on dissent, which largely targets its Shiite majority.
Earlier in February, Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa hosted the two rabbis from the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center, its founder Marvin Hier and associate dean Abraham Cooper. Hier, who had just given a prayer at President Donald Trump's inauguration weeks earlier, said King Hamad brought up the Arab boycott of ‘Israel' on his own.
The king "said he doesn't understand what the boycott against ‘Israel' accomplishes. He made it very, very clear. He said it emphatically," Hier told The Associated Press.
Cooper, who spoke separately to the AP, offered a similar recollection.
"During the course of the meeting, the king brought up his personal opposition to the Arab boycott of Israel," Cooper said. "He brought it up. It's not an issue we did."
That conversation only got mentioned publicly in the last week, when the Simon Wiesenthal Center hosted King Hamad's son, Prince Nasser bin Hamad Al Khalifa.
Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team
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