Jared Kushner in the UAE
Jared Kushner in the UAEWAM/TPS

Special Adviser to the US President Jared Kushner has briefed incoming National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on the Trump administration’s Middle East policies, out going US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman informed the Knesset Monday.

According to Axios correspondent Barak Ravid, Friedman informed the MKs of this development during a closed meeting at a farewell ceremony for him in the Knesset today.

According to the report, Friedman told the Israeli lawmakers that Trump Administration officials involved in Middle East policy had met with officials from the incoming Biden Administration in the hopes that the next administration would continue to build off of the successes of the Abraham Accords, the normalization agreements reached between Israel and four Arab states in 2020.

Friedman also stated that he had met with former US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro in recent weeks to brief in on the Trump Administration's Middle East policies. Shapiro, who served as ambassador under the Obama Administration, stated that he was not part of the Biden transition team.

The ambassador told the MKs that Biden was a friend to Israel, but that he would still pressure the Jewish state on settlement construction and resume aid to the Palestinian Authority.

During the farewell ceremony, MKs bid farewell to Ambassador Friedman, ahead of the transition from the Trump administration to the incoming Biden administration, set for next week.

During the event, Friedman touted the Trump administration’s achievements over the past four years in strengthening the relationship between Israel and the US.

“I’m leaving my post in nine days. It has flown by. I can’t believe it has almost been four years since I’ve had this post, it has been more than four years since I was nominated.”

“We’ve had an extraordinary relationship, all of us, from the President of the United States with the Prime Minister to the cabinet secretaries of the United States to their counterparts in ministries here, to all the military and intelligence personnel who don’t appear in public but who’ve I had to privilege of sitting with.”

“I think we succeeded in strengthening the US-Israel relationship… in making it stronger than ever before.”