On Friday, President Trump announced a normalization agreement between Sudan and Israel. Amnon Lord surveys the history of the African country’s relationship with the Jewish state—beginning with the former’s independence in 1956, when its government wished to establish diplomatic ties with Israel, but was pressured not to by Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser.

As an ally of Egypt, Sudan partook in the War of Attrition (1967-1970) and the Yom Kippur War, when it sent a brigade to the Egyptian front. One of the commanders of this brigade was an officer by the name of Omar al-Bashir, the recently deposed dictator of Sudan.

Yet, during Golda Meir’s premiership (1969-1974), Jerusalem made some successful overtures to the country:

Israel sent Mossad agents led by David Ben-Uziel to help the Christians in South Sudan, [which gained independence in 2011], defend themselves against genocidal campaigns. The Sudanese president Jaafar Nimeiry, who recognized the autonomy of South Sudan in the early 1970s, permitted Ethiopian Jews [in his country] to immigrate to Israel more than a decade later. He was also the only [leader] in the Arab world who supported former the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat when he made peace with Israel.

Thereafter the country increasingly turned toward Islamism and to Iran. In 2009 and 2012, Israel is thought to have carried out airstrikes against Hamas-related targets in Sudan:

[The] airstrikes, . . . which destroyed a terror base and a weapons convoy earmarked for the Gaza Strip via the Sinai Peninsula, . . . nudged the Sudanese more toward the American-Saudi axis; and made it obvious to its rulers that their alliance with global terror—chiefly with Iran—was ruining them. Sudan was an important base of operations for al-Qaeda, and the Sudanese government even armed al-Qaeda terrorists with diplomatic passports. The [recent] sea-change in this regard is absolute. Sudan, where an American ambassador was murdered in 1973 under orders from Yasir Arafat, and where the notorious terrorists Carlos the Jackal and Osama Bin-Laden found refuge, is now changing its colors.

Considering the current state of Israel-Arab relations, Ghaith al-Omari writes

First and foremost, no ceasefire will be possible without the release of Israeli hostages and commitments to disarm Hamas and remove it from power. The final say on these matters rests with Hamas commanders on the ground in Gaza, who have been largely impervious to foreign pressure so far. At minimum, however, the United States should insist that Qatari and Egyptian mediators push Hamas’s external leadership to accept these conditions publicly, which could increase pressure on the group’s Gaza leadership.

Washington should also demand a clear, public position from key Arab states regarding disarmament. The Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas endorsed this position in a June letter to Saudi Arabia and France, giving Arab states Palestinian cover for endorsing it themselves.

Some Arab states have already indicated a willingness to play a significant role, but they will have little incentive to commit resources and personnel to Gaza unless Israel (1) provides guarantees that it will not occupy the Strip indefinitely, and (2) removes its veto on a PA role in Gaza’s future, even if only symbolic at first. Arab officials are also seeking assurances that any role they play in Gaza will be in the context of a wider effort to reach a two-state solution.

On the other hand, Washington must remain mindful that current conditions between Israel and the Palestinians are not remotely conducive to . . . implementing a two-state solution.