Abraham Accords Conference

From November 24–26, 2025, the Forum for Regional Cooperation, a consortium of regional and international think tanks and scholars headed by Prof. Joshua Krasna, hosted a seminal two-day gathering with the Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy (AGDA) in Abu Dhabi, to examine the evolving influence of the Abraham Accords on regional cooperation, security
architectures, and geoeconomics integration across the Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean.

The conference brought together some 30 researchers and experts from 11 countries; including Israel, the UAE, Morocco, Bahrain, Jordan, Turkey, India, Pakistan, Cyprus, the UK, and the USA, in a transnational network of academic and policy institutions. Partners included AGDA, the University of Connecticut Abrahamic Programs, the Moshe Dayan Center (MDC), TRENDS Research & Advisory, the American Jewish Committee, and the Ohr Torah Stone Interfaith
Center, and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS).

The first two days comprised closed working-group sessions, where participants convened around pre-circulated research papers prepared over the preceding months in remote consultations and meetings. The final day was a public conference with plenary sessions, panels, and Q&As engaging diplomats, scholars, students, practitioners, and observers, thereby
bridging expert analysis with broader stakeholder engagement.

The overarching aim was to assess where the Abraham Accords stand today, and how they can evolve beyond diplomatic normalization to become a foundation for sustainable regional cooperation, economic integration, security coordination, and people-to-people exchange.

The conference working groups and public sessions addressed six core themes:

The interfaith and tolerance agenda, framed around shared Abrahamic heritage and the possibilities for coexistence and cultural rapprochement
2. Analysis of the impact on the Greater MENA / Eastern Mediterranean region of evolving great power relationships.
3. Infrastructure and transportation connectivity linking the Gulf, Israel, and the Eastern Mediterranean.
4. Energy futures — including cross-border cooperation in electric grids, renewables, resource management, and energy security.
5. Regional security challenges and shifting strategic alignments.
6. An interim qualitative evaluation of the Accords, including development of benchmarks, indicators, and future scenarios.

This multidimensional structure underscored the ambition to move beyond rhetoric and produce empirically grounded, policy-relevant research on how the Accords might deliver tangible cooperation in security, trade, energy, infrastructure, and cultural exchange.