Relations between the United Arab Emirates and Israel have started to improve during Donald Trump’s presidency and have not lost their momentum since then. In a historic first, Israel and the United Arab Emirates collaborated to create a new optionally manned surface vessel displayed at the NAVDEX 2023 exhibition in Abu Dhabi from 20 February to 24 2023.
The new craft, which can operate autonomously, results from a year-long collaboration agreement between EDGE subsidiary Abu Dhabi Ship Building (ADSB) and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI). ADSB designed the vessel, integrated its sensors and control systems, and developed its operational concept, while IAI developed and supplied the vessel’s autonomous control system, which included a variety of dedicated sensors.The Edge names the system as 170 M-Detector, but IAI does not mention the name in the press release.
The vessel’s military applications could intelligence-gathering activities, tracking, observation, border and coastal surveillance, mine detection, anti-submarine warfare, and the deployment of vertical take-off and landing unmanned aerial vehicles. The vessel can also be used for civilian purposes such as oceanography, pollution detection and monitoring, oil and gas drilling, liquid material transportation, search and rescue, firefighting, and early maritime threat detection.
Joint ventures between Israeli and Emirati companies would have been politically impossible in the past, but the Abraham Accord Peace Agreement of 15 September 2020, in which the UAE became the third Arab country to normalise relations with Israel after Egypt and Jordan, now makes such collaborative projects possible.
