by WorldTribune Staff, January 25, 2021

The first term of President Donald Trump is history but the legacy of his outside-the-box Mideast diplomacy continues.

Israel and Morocco on Jan. 21 signed an agreement to start direct flights between the two countries.

The agreement follows similar agreements with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates announced Sunday that it has approved plans to open it’s first-ever embassy in Israel, implementing a key part of last year’s Abraham Accords.

Morocco closed its liaison office in Tel Aviv in 2000, but the two countries agreed to normalize ties in an agreement brokered by the Trump White House in early December.

Morocco’s Tourism Minister, Nadia Fettah Alaoui, announced late last year that Morocco and Israel will launch direct flights between the countries in “two to three months”.

In a tweet Sunday afternoon, the UAE government announced that the cabinet had voted to approve the opening of an embassy in Tel Aviv.

“The council of ministers approved…the establishment of a UAE embassy in Tel Aviv in the State of Israel,” the government tweeted.

In August, the UAE and Israel agreed to normalize relations as part of the Abraham Accords agreement brokered by the Trump administration.

The normalization deal included the opening of travel between the two countries, as well as the establishment of embassies.

In Teheran, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Jan. 20 celebrate the end of Donald Trump’s nightmarish (for Iran) administration.

“Trump, Pompeo & Co. are relegated to the dustbin of history in disgrace. But the memories of Gen Soleimani & the 1000s murdered, maimed & starved of food & meds by Trump’s state—& economic—terrorism & crimes against humanity, will shine on,” he wrote on Twitter.

Related: U.S. arrests influential ‘expert’ as secret ‘unregistered agent’ of Iran, January 19, 2021

“Perhaps new folks in DC have learned,” he added.

Tensions between the U.S. and Iran were at an all-time high as Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and reimposed sanctions which put a damper on state-sponsored terrorism in the region.

Tensions had been high, as the U.S. nuclear-capable B-52 bombers were deployed to the Middle East in recent weeks.

Following a recent rocket attack on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, President Trump warned that he would hold “Iran responsible” for any fatal attack on Americans in Iraq.

  President Trump’s Mideast peace offensive advances as Iran’s FM celebrates his exit, WorldTribune.com