Bilateral business groups from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and India, Israel and the U.S. have joined forces to support a new economic partnership among the four nations.

In July 2022, their governments formed the I2U2 group to pursue joint investments in space, transportation, energy, food security, health and water. It has similarities to the “Quad” Asia-Pacific linkage among Australia, India, Japan and the U.S. I2U2 builds on the Abraham Accords, which were designed to bring Israel closer to other nations in the region.

The new memorandum of agreement among the U.S.-UAE Business Council, UAE-India Business Council and UAE-Israel Business Council was signed April 19. It flows out of the diplomatic arrangement to target technological and private sector collaboration. I2U2 plans to convene working group meetings across each industry sector, publish a series of studies and white papers about those sectors, and promote the group’s potential.

The U.S. and UAE, the U.S. and Israel, and India and Israel have strong defense trading ties. But efforts by the U.S. to sell Lockheed Martin F-35 fighters and General Atomics MQ-9 UAS to the UAE have stalled since they were announced during the Trump administration.