VERY little of substance has emerged from US President Joe Biden’s recently concluded tour of Israel and Saudi Arabia. There were plenty of optics, photo ops and sound bites, but few genuine strategic and geopolitical achievements. Perhaps this signals America’s diminishing role in the energy-rich and volatile region. Some observers were earlier of the opinion that the US leader’s tour would yield an announcement of the official normalisation of ties between Tel Aviv and Riyadh. While the first acknowledged direct flight of an American president from Israel to Saudi Arabia could be described as historic, there was nothing close to a headline-making agreement indicating that the House of Saud was ready to publicly embrace Israel. Mr Biden began the tour in Israel, telling the Jewish state’s leadership on the tarmac of Ben Gurion Airport that “you need not be a Jew to be a Zionist”. This line was enough to convince those who may think the US is an honest broker in the Arab-Israeli dispute where Washington’s true sympathies lie. Moreover, Mr Biden, in the so-called Jerusalem Declaration, said the US was “willing to use all elements of its national power” to stop an Iranian nuclear weapon. Delivering a threat from Israeli soil will do little to convince Tehran to seal a new nuclear deal. The Palestinians were also given a presidential audience in Bethlehem, though Mr Biden was silent about the illegal settlements that have devoured Arab land.

The next leg of the trip saw the US leader in Jeddah, where Mr Biden exchanged an awkward fist bump with Mohammed bin Salman, crown prince and de facto ruler of the desert kingdom. Apparently, Mr Biden, who had talked tough about Saudi Arabia in the wake of the brutal Jamal Khashoggi murder, was more interested in letting bygones be bygones. The president said he had told the prince there would be consequences “if anything occurs like that again”. The American leader’s attempts to firm up an anti-Iran alliance involving Israel, as well as asking the Opec states to ramp up oil production to help tame prices, were also met with a cold shoulder during a summit of Arab states in Jeddah. Ultimately, Mr Biden’s visit seems to indicate shifting realities in the region. While Arab potentates and strongmen still look up to the US as a patron, they are willing to pursue more independent foreign policies, such as maintaining ties with Russia, that may not align with Washington’s vision.

Published in Dawn, July 19th, 2022