Ever since Adel Abdul Mahdi became the prime minister of Iraq, Palestinian officials have been encouraged to go to Baghdad. They were told that the new Iraqi prime minister who, according to PLO officials in Ramallah, spent time in the 1980s in Lebanon and was very close to the PLO at the time, and his team have a genuine love for Palestine and are willing to translate this into strategic support.

Nabil Shaath, senior international affairs adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, paid a five-day visit to Iraq on June 23-27, where he met senior Iraqi officials and gave a series of lectures. After his return to Ramallah, Shaath told Al-Monitor that the trip was successful, saying that Iraq is coming back strong, is united and diverse and its prime minister has a genuine love for Palestine.

While much of Shaath’s trip was focused on countering the US-led Bahraini economic workshop — which Iraq, like Palestine, boycotted — the visit prepared for a much wider governmental visit that would deal with substantive economic issues.

A key component of the visit was the fact that Iraq was offering Palestine oil at much reduced prices, Al-Monitor learned from sources close to the Palestinian prime minister. But since there are no refineries in Palestine, the offer had to wait until an appropriate solution came. This came during the official visit by Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh to Jordan. During the July 7 visit, three agreements were signed, including an energy pact that provided for the Palestinians to refine any future oil obtained from Iraq at the Jordanian Petroleum Refinery in Zarqa, Al-Monitor learned from the source in the Palestinian Prime Ministry.