Accompanying Israel’s normalization agreements with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain has been much hope that these would usher in something more robust than the “cold peace” resulting from Israel’s peace treaties with Egypt (1977) and Jordan (1994), which have brought out-of-the-spotlight security and intelligence cooperation, but not much in the way of economic or cultural exchange. Not only have the events of the past year suggested that such hope was merited, but now there is also reason to believe that the Abraham Accords are helping to expand the relationship between Amman and Jerusalem. Lahav Harkov reports:

Israel and Jordan are set next week to sign a cooperation agreement in the areas of energy and water in the United Arab Emirates, which helped to mediate the agreement. The agreement states that Israel and Jordan will help each other deal with the challenges of climate change.

Israel agreed to examine the possible construction of a designated desalination plant to export more water to Jordan at full price, and Jordan will consider building a solar field in the desert in Jordan to export clean energy to Israel, which lacks open space, and to test solar-energy storage solutions.

The energy agreement is based on the Water and Energy Nexus, a project of EcoPeace Middle East, which brings together Israeli, Palestinian, and Jordanian environmental experts and activists.

“Make no mistake,” said President Biden after the news broke of the murder of six hostages in Gaza, “Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes.” While this sentiment is correct, especially given that an American citizen was among the dead, the White House has thus far shown little inclination to act upon it. The editors of National Review remark:

Hamas’s execution of [Hersh Goldberg-Polin] should not be treated as merely an issue of concern for Israel but as a brazen act against the United States. It would send a terrible signal if the response from the Biden-Harris administration were to move closer to Hamas’s position in cease-fire negotiations. Instead, Biden must follow through on his declaration that Hamas will pay.

Richard Goldberg lays out ten steps the U.S. can take, none of which involve military action. Among them:

The Department of Justice should move forward with indictments of known individuals and groups in the United States providing material support to Hamas and those associated with Hamas, domestically and abroad. The Departments of the Treasury and State should also target Hamas’s support network of terrorist entities in and out of the Gaza Strip. . . . Palestinian organizations that provide material support to Hamas and coordinate attacks with them should be held accountable for their actions. Hamas networks in foreign countries, including South Africa, should be targeted with sanctions as well.

Pressure on Qatar should include threats to remove Qatar’s status as a major non-NATO ally; move Al Udeid air-base assets; impose sanctions on Qatari officials, instrumentalities, and assets; and impose sanctions on Qatar’s Al-Jazeera media network. Qatar should be compelled to close all Hamas offices and operations, freeze and turn over to the United States all Hamas-connected assets, and turn over to the United States or Israel all Hamas officials who remain in the country.