Tom Wegner, CEO and founder of the Global Abrahamic Movement, has announced with “joy and pride” the appointment of Samah Sakran as a Special Envoy of the World Abrahamic Movement to the United Arab Emirates — a move he describes as both an expression of trust in Sakran’s personal and diplomatic gifts and a declaration of a new strategic vision for the movement’s engagement with the Gulf.

Wegner’s announcement carries a significance beyond the individual appointment. In naming an Israeli Arab as the movement’s representative to the UAE, the Global Abrahamic Movement is giving concrete expression to a strategic thesis: that Arab citizens of Israel are uniquely positioned as a living bridge — people who hold Israeli identity and Arab heritage simultaneously — to connect Israel to the Arab world in ways that Jewish Israeli envoys alone cannot.

Wegner expressed particular enthusiasm for the potential to tighten ties between the Arab sector in Israel — especially its younger generation and those who feel connected to the state — and the citizens of the United Arab Emirates. He described the UAE as a country that “leads the Abrahamic axis in the Middle East and is not afraid to publicly identify with Israel,” making the bilateral relationship between Israel’s Arab community and Emirati society one of exceptional mutual value.

Wegner acknowledged openly that the UAE presents both immense opportunity and genuine complexity for the Abrahamic Movement. The Emirates sits at the head of the Abraham Accords table and has distinguished itself as a Gulf state willing to chart a new course in Arab-Israeli relations — but its relationship with civil movements of a “public color,” as Wegner described it, requires careful navigation rather than a blunt approach.

Sakran’s mandate is therefore a dual one: strengthening the substance of the relationship between the Israeli Arab community and Emirati society on one hand, and finding the right diplomatic register through which the Abrahamic Movement can engage the UAE without triggering the caution that public advocacy movements can sometimes provoke in Gulf governance contexts.

Wegner closed his announcement with a message of personal confidence in Sakran’s abilities — and a gesture of warmth toward a colleague he has known since the movement’s founding: “I’m convinced she will prove herself in this new mission and pave the way for others. Rise and shine, Samah.”

The appointment of Samah Sakran as UAE Envoy is the latest in a series of moves by the Global Abrahamic Movement to build out its regional architecture — placing people who embody the movement’s core thesis of shared Abrahamic identity in strategic positions across the Middle East. It comes as the movement prepares for its first global orientation summit on June 29, where founders and senior leaders will address thousands of questions arriving daily from people across the Arab world, Turkey, Iran, Israel, and beyond.