The historic peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates has led to enthusiastic comments from many young people in youth organizations in both countries. At the same time, the peace agreement has led to calls for a boycott of the United Arab Emirates among Arab writers, poets and artists.
In a video chat between Tel Aviv and Abu Dhabi, a young man says that according to Google maps, it takes a day and two hours. “Who is going with me, I intend to drive to Tel Aviv” and a young woman says “I want to learn everything about your culture and your religion”.
This is how young undogmatic enthusiasm sounds before Israel’s third peace agreement with an Arab nation ever. A curiosity free from the anti-Israel rhetoric that characterized all public Arab talks about Israel where, for example, Egypt was boycotted after the Camp David agreement with Israel in the 70s.
But among Arab intellectuals still dominates anti-normalization as it is called, where normal relations with the occupying power Israel are considered a betrayal of the Palestinians, a stab in the back at a people living under military violence, and now a number of artists and famous Arab writers like the Lebanese Elias Khoury , to boycott the Arab world’s major cultural sponsor United Arab Emirates.
And the boycott is expected to hurt those who participate, the United Arab Emirates awards gold medals and rewards literary works with staggering prize money and it has long been sought after to participate in art biennials in Abu Dhabi that has its own branch of the Louvre.
Source: ICELAND NEWS