Dakhla city is proposed by the US Secretary of State for the upcoming Negev conference

The Negev Conference, which began this week in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, included high-level delegations from Israel and the six Conference Members: the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, the United States.

Alun Oshivez, the director general of the ministry of foreign affairs, as well as officials from the ministries of agriculture, health, defense, intelligence, tourism, energy, education, the economy, the water authority, and foreign affairs make up the Israeli delegation.

أصدر مسؤولون من البحرين ومصر وإسرائيل والمغرب والإمارات والولايات المتحدة إطار التعاون الإقليمي لمنتدى النقب. تحدد هذه الوثيقة الهامة الإستراتيجية التوجيهية لدعم الازدهار والتكامل الإقليمي. https://t.co/GmCznIehPr

— U.S. Embassy Morocco (@USEmbMorocco) January 12, 2023

The potential of holding the Negev Forum Foreign Ministers’ Summit in Morocco in the near future was brought up during the discussion. Eli Cohen, the Israeli foreign minister, would likely attend, and the summit would likely take place in the Sahara region of Morocco and the city of Dakhla.

The working groups of the Forum discussed potential areas of collaboration in security, intelligence, economics, agriculture, water, tourism, and other fields.

اختتم كبار المسؤولين في #NegevForum اجتماعاتهم في أبو ظبي، حيث أطلقوا إطار التعاون الإقليمي لمنتدى النقب ووضعوا مقترحات لتعزيز التكامل والتعاون الإقليمي. https://t.co/0VPB69e943

— U.S. Embassy Morocco (@USEmbMorocco) January 12, 2023

With the participation of the foreign ministers of the six nations, the Negev Forum was held for the first time last March at Kibbutz Sadeh Booker in the Negev region of Israel. Its goal was to activate the “Abraham” Agreements on normalization between Arab states and Israel in an effort by Israel to forge an alliance to counter Iran.

This is the third meeting of the Negev Forum Steering Committee; the first two were held virtually in June 2022 in Bahrain and October 2022.

The Negev region lies in the historical south of Palestine and is surrounded by Jordan’s Arba Valley on the east and Egypt’s Sinai on the south-west. The majority of the area’s residents are Palestinian Bedouin tribes who were occupied by Israel in 1948, also known as the Palestinian Year of the Nakba.