Somalia to attend Negev meeting amid Israeli presence

Flags are set up during the Negev Summit in the southern Negev desert on March 28, 2022. Photo: Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images

MOGADISHU - Somalia has agreed to attend the Negev meeting, a forum which brings together economic heavyweight countries such as the United States, Israel, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco, two Israeli officials tell Axios

Also joining the conference is Comoros, a tiny African country in the Indian Ocean. Surprisingly, both Comoros and Somalia, which are predominantly Muslim nations, do not have formal diplomatic ties with Israel, a close ally of Washington.

However, top officials from both countries have been holding talks with Israel and have even secretly visited the Jewish nation in a bid to normalize diplomatic relations. The decision by the two countries to attend the meeting could be a stepping stone towards normalization of ties between Israel and the Arab League of Nations.

Negev, a forum meant to handle economic ties between nations, was established in March 2022 in a meeting attended by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken among other several top officials from founding members including Morocco..

The idea was that the forum would be a platform for multilateral cooperation in the region in the fields of health, economy, climate change, water and security, the mission of the group reads.

A second ministerial meeting of the Negev Forum was originally scheduled for March, but it's been postponed several times, with Arab members expressing concerns about publicly engaging with the right-wing Israeli government and the "negative conditions" around the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

With the meeting now expected to take place in summer, Israel had previously insisted that Comoros and Somalia should attend the summit as observers ahead of regularization of their membership. Both countries accepted the offer, officials said..

Briefing reporters on Sunday, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said that "two or three countries that Israel doesn’t have diplomatic relations with were supposed to attend the meeting."

He added that Israel still believes "they will attend the meeting in the future and it will be a step toward normalization with them."

Somalia is in the process of nation-building with the government trying to strike multi-national deals for the sake of stabilization of the economy. Back at home, Somalia is also struggling to contain Al-Shabaab militants who are working hard to topple the government of the day.

GAROWE ONLINE