SVG
Commentary
Wall Street Journal

What the West Gains from Befriending Baku

michael_doran
michael_doran
Senior Fellow and Director, Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East
A view of Baku, Azerbaijan, on September 17, 2024. (Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Caption
A view of Baku, Azerbaijan, on September 17, 2024. (Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Michael Rubin unjustly slights Azerbaijan in “Israel Shouldn’t Fall for the Azeri Trojan Horse” (Letters, March 24). Take his treatment of the country’s 2021 gas-swap deal with Iran. Baku is the covert partner of Tehran, Mr. Rubin says. But Azerbaijan coordinated that deal with the Biden administration to help ease Europe’s energy crisis. The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control gave the deal a thumb’s up. There’s no hidden agenda.

Mr. Rubin also argues that Azerbaijan endangers Israel. Do Israeli views count? Last month I met in Jerusalem with senior officials from both sides of the country’s cavernous political divide. They couldn’t agree on whether the sun was shining but unanimously described Azerbaijan as one of Israel’s top allies. Baku, they confided, delivered crucial assistance during Israel’s war against Hamas. The Azerbaijani Jewish community is safer and better integrated into the society than Jews in most European countries.

Read the full article in The Wall Street Journal.