Joe Biden took office looking to reshape U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.
Biden had pledged as a candidate to recalibrate the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia, which he described as a “pariah” nation after Trump's more accommodating stand, overlooking the kingdom's human rights record and stepping up military sales to Riyadh.But Biden now seems to be making the calculation that there's more to be gained from courting the country than isolating it.
and has offered no new initiatives to restart long-stalled peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.which reversed more than a half-century of U.S. policy.The Biden administration ”has had this rather confusing policy of continuity on many issues from Trump — the path of least resistance on many different issues, including Jerusalem, the Golan, Western Sahara, and most other affairs," says Natan Sachs, director of the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.
Biden on Saturday used an op-ed in the Washington Post — the same pages where Khashoggi penned much of his criticism of Saudi rule before his death — to declare that the Middle East has become more “stable and secure” in his nearly 18 months in office and he pushed back against the notion that his visit to Saudi Arabia amounted to backsliding.“In Saudi Arabia, we reversed the blank-check policy we inherited,” Biden wrote.
Biden often talks about the importance of relationships in foreign policy. His decision to visit the Mideast for a trip that promises little in the way of tangible accomplishments suggests he's trying to invest in the region for the longer term.In public, he has talked of insights gained from long hours over the years spent with China's Xi Jinping and sizing up Russia's Vladimir Putin.
Biden also will face fresh questions about his commitment to human rights following the fatal shooting of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.The Abu Akleh family, in As a candidate, Biden promised the Saudis would “pay the price” for their human rights record. The sharp rhetoric helped Biden, whose first official foreign trip as president was to the kingdom and who praised the Saudis as a “great ally" even after the Khashoggi killing.
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