When Kazakhstan announced on November 6, during President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev’s visit to Washington, that it would join the Abraham Accords, the decision raised a more interesting question than the move itself: why did Astana take this step before Azerbaijan—despite Azerbaijan’s far deeper and longer-standing strategic ties with Israel?
For years, Azerbaijan had been widely viewed as the natural candidate to lead Central Asia and the Turkic world into the Accords framework. Its close cooperation with Israel in energy, defense, and intelligence, combined with shared concerns about Iran, made Baku the obvious frontrunner. Yet when the moment arrived, it was Kazakhstan—not Azerbaijan—that moved first.
The explanation lies less in bilateral relations with Israel than in how the Abraham Accords are currently being deployed.
Reactivating and expanding the Abraham Accords has become a priority of the Trump administration. While the Accords formalize normalization between Israel and Muslim states that were never at war with it—and therefore differ fundamentally from classic peace treaties—their current strategic significance extends well beyond Israel. They function as a framework for advancing American influence in regions contested by Iran, China, and Russia. From this perspective, Kazakhstan’s decision was driven not by the state of its relations with Israel, which have long been stable, but by Astana’s broader geopolitical weight and signaling value.
Read the full article on the Jerusalem Institute of Strategy and Security.
Alex Grinberg is a Senior Fellow at the Turan Research Center.