Trump II and the coming ‘golden age’ of tyranny in the Middle East

In his rambling victory speech on November 5, Donald Trump, having stoked the fears of Americans throughout his campaign, and sporting extra fake tan for the occasion, spoke of a new ‘golden age’.
In terms of Middle East foreign policy, with whom will Trump look to build this ‘golden age’?
In May 2017 Trump’s first official overseas state visit as president was to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, followed closely by the State of Israel. It is striking, then, that one of his first phone calls as president-elect on November 6 was with Muhammad bin Salman (MBS), the Crown Prince and de-facto ruler of Saudi Arabia. Likewise, Israeli reports claim Netanyahu and Trump have spoken three times since the US election.
A mutual respect for autocratic approaches to life and politics is constant in the Trump-MBS-Netanyahu triad – Netanyahu is said to have told his staff in 2016 “to be like Trump” in having an aggressive policy towards political rivals and the media.
Beverly Gage writing recently in Foreign Affairs described how the Trump political brand differs from previous US administrations that embraced authoritarian leaders as geopolitical allies. More than that, Trump sees them as ‘models for how to live the good life.’ 
Another element of Trump’s approach that is unlikely to have changed is his transactional approach to foreign policy. He famously remarked in his first term – re NATO – “they want protection, they don’t pay for protection – the Mob makes you pay money”.
In this sense, lacking deep national pockets (apart from his own), Netanyahu cannot automatically depend on the continuation of the $22 billion in aid the Biden administration has sent Israel in the past year.
However, when you factor-in the interests of the Saudis and Emiratis who can fund the ‘protection racket’ under certain conditions, an Abraham Accords II looms as a possibility.
Like the first edition of the Abraham Accords, it could involve three elements: a nominal but ultimately superficial solution for the Palestinians to appease the populations of the Gulf states – as per Trump’s 2017 ‘deal of the century’; secondly, it will mean a huge increase in the regional power of the Gulf states, especially the Saudis and Emiratis, in terms of US support and over Palestinian affairs.
This will mean impunity in crushing any Islamist (Muslim Brotherhood) elements and Palestinian political pluralism in general – as per their own kingdoms. In this form a ‘Free Palestine’ will become a complete misnomer.
Finally, Trump’s deal-making in the Middle East will provide enormous opportunities for enrichment via expansion of his already substantial commercial interests in the Gulf.
What stood in the way of this new ‘golden age’ of Middle East tyranny before was Iran and its resistance axis, as well the Muslim Brotherhood-supporting states of Qatar and Turkey. However, the withering assaults of Israel with US (and silent Gulf) backing since October last year, on Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon and into Syria have started to induce cracks in the Axis.
For instance, Syria’s Bashar al-Assad has looked to distance himself from his increasingly desperate Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah allies – despite the fact he owes them his political survival.
It is also noteworthy Qatar – perhaps in view of an incoming Trump administration that already green-lit its regional ostracisation in the Saudi-led blockade of 2017-2021, and fearing for the retention of the huge Al-Udeid US military base on its territory – has finally caved-in to US pressure and expelled Hamas from Doha and withdrawn from its negotiating role.
This opens the door for MBS, the ruler of the UAE, Mohammed Bin Zayed, and Trump, who have quietly observed the carnage of the past year after having sparked it via the 2020 Abraham Accords, to step in as ‘saviours’ and  implement their vision of the Middle East – as I write 300 aid trucks from the UAE sit at Ashdod north of Gaza.
In the absence of any other solutions and in the midst of fear and insecurity, the Netanyahu-Trump-Gulf triad – visualized as the ‘blessing’ as opposed to the ‘curse’ of Iran and its allies in the simplistic maps held up by Netanyahu at the United Nations in September – could become a reality that may bring stability and acceptance, for a time, but will ultimately entrench the power and impunity of Middle East autocrats, including Netanyahu and possibly even, Trump. 
There would be outbreaks of dissent from extremist messianics who reject even the nominal apartheid-like partition of Israel/Palestine, and from progressive democrats who value civil society and political pluralism. Both will be crushed equally in the new golden age of ‘prosperous’ but corrupt Middle East tyranny.
At that point, the Middle East’s most famous critics of ‘benevolent tyranny’ and proponents of Middle East democracy, who both died at the hands of tyrants: journalist Jamal Khashoggi (d. 2018) and his intellectual guide, social activist ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi (d. 1902) will turn in their graves.