https://www.jns.org/?ct=t%28Daily+Syndicate+1-31-21+%28old%29_COPY_01%29
Yaakov Berg, who owns the Psagot Winery with his wife, expresses his hope that “peace with the Emirates will change our relationship with Palestinians.”
The Psagot Winery sits on the peaks of the Binyamin region mountains in Judea and Samaria, north of Jerusalem and just east of Ramallah. Though Psagot and many Israeli-owned businesses operating over the 1967 armistice lines have historically experienced boycotts in Europe and throughout the Arab world, many say that in the context of the Abraham Accords, this may be changing.
When Yaakov Berg and his wife, Naama, established the Psagot Winery in 2002, they made fewer than 3,000 bottles. Today, that number has grown to 750,000 bottles per year—70 percent of which are exported to 30 countries, including North America, as well as throughout Europe, Asia and Australia. Their new goal is to produce 1 million bottles with a vast majority of them for export, including to Arab countries, which was not before possible.
According to Yaakov Berg, he and wine suppliers in the United Arab Emirates are finalizing “several deals in the making” to export the Israeli wine to the Gulf, crediting the progress made in trade relations between Israel and the UAE to the Trump administration and former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who visited the Psagot Winery during his most recent visit to Israel, becoming the first top American diplomat to tour an Israeli-owned company located beyond the pre-’67 borders.
In December, Hamad Baumim, the UAE head of Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said in an interview with Globes that he has “no problem” with Israeli products made in the West Bank, and that when they are imported to the UAE, they will be treated as all other Israeli products and with no special labeling.
