Donald Trump has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize after his name was put forward by a Republican congresswoman, citing the Abraham Accords the former president helped sign while in office.
New York Rep. Claudia Tenney said that Trump was “instrumental” in brokering the treaty signed in September 2020 between Israel and Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, which aimed to normalize their relations as part of an overall goal to tackle ongoing tensions in the Middle East between Arab countries and Israel. Morocco and Sudan followed suit in signing similar agreements in the following months.
“For decades, bureaucrats, foreign policy ‘professionals’, and international organizations insisted that additional Middle East peace agreements were impossible without a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. President Trump proved that to be false,” Tenney told Fox News in a statement.
Tenney noted that the 1976 Israeli peace agreement with Egypt and the Oslo Accords in 1994 were both recognized with Nobel Peace Prizes, but so far Trump’s role in the signing of the Abraham Accords had not been acknowledged.
While the Abraham Accords have been cited as a way to introduce and strengthen Israeli-Arab ties,the historic agreements have also been criticized for so far failing to produce meaningful solutions for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“The valiant efforts by President Trump in creating the Abraham Accords were unprecedented and continue to go unrecognized by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, underscoring the need for his nomination today,” Tenney added.
Trump has been nominated for the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize three times in the past.
In September 2020, Christian Tybring-Gjedde, a member of the Norwegian parliament, nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize for his “groundbreaking cooperation” in helping signing the Abraham Accords.
One month later, Laura Huhtasaari, a Finnish member of the European Parliament (MEP) and a member of the right-wing Finns Party, also nominated Trump for the 2021 prize “in recognition of his endeavors to end the era of endless wars, construct peace by encouraging conflicting parties for dialogue and negotiations, as well as underpin internal cohesion and stability of his country.”
Trump received a third nomination from a group of Australian lawmakers in September 2020 for his promotion of peace in the Middle-East.
Thousands of people are eligible to nominate candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize, including members of governments, university professors and past laureates. The committee decides from hundreds of nominees and the winner of this year’s prize will be announced in October.