JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia, July 16 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden will discuss regional missile and defense capabilities on Saturday when he meets Arab leaders in Saudi Arabia, where he will seek to integrate Israel as part of a new axis, to largely driven by shared concerns about Iran, a senior administration official said.
“We believe that there is great benefit in engaging as many of the capabilities as possible in this region, and certainly Israel has significant air and missile defense capabilities, as they need.” But we are having these bilateral discussions with those nations,” an administration official told reporters.
Biden, on his first visit to the Middle East as president, focused on a planned summit with six Gulf states and Egypt, Jordan and Iraq, while playing down a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. This meeting drew criticism in the United States for human rights violations.
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Biden had vowed to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” on the world stage over the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents, but ultimately decided that US interests demanded a realignment, not a rupture, in relations with the most the world’s largest oil exporter and Arab powerhouse.
The US leader said he raised the issue of Khashoggi’s killing at the start of his meeting with the Saudi crown prince on Friday and that silence on the human rights issue was “inconsistent with who we are and who I am”. Read more
Saudi-owned Al Arabiya TV, citing a Saudi official, said the crown prince told Biden that if the United States only deals with countries that share its values 100 percent, then it will only have NATO countries to deal with they work.
Biden needs the help of OPEC giant Saudi Arabia at a time of high crude prices and other problems related to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and as he promotes efforts to end the war in Yemen, where a temporary truce is in effect. Washington also wants to limit Iran’s influence in the region and China’s global influence.
The administration official said the United States hoped to see an increase in OPEC production in the coming weeks. Biden is expected to pressure other Gulf producers to pump more oil. The OPEC+ alliance, which includes Russia, meets next on August 3.
The US president, who began his trip to the region with a visit to Israel, will hold bilateral talks with the leaders of Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Iraq before taking part in the wider summit, where he will “make clear” his vision and a strategy to engage America in the Middle East, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Friday.
“He intends to ensure that there is no vacuum in the Middle East for China and Russia to fill,” Sullivan said.
Another senior administration official said Biden will announce that the United States has committed $1 billion in new short- and long-term food security assistance to the Middle East and North Africa and that the Gulf states will commit $3 billion over the next two years in projects that align with US global infrastructure partnerships and investments.
The Gulf states, which have refused to side with the West against Russia in the conflict in Ukraine, are in turn seeking a concrete commitment from the United States on strategic ties that have been strained by a perceived US withdrawal from the region.
IRAN IS WORRIED
Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are frustrated by US terms on the arms sale and being excluded from indirect US-Iran talks aimed at reviving a 2015 nuclear pact that they say is flawed because it does not address regional concerns about Tehran’s missile program and behavior.
“The most important demand from the Saudi leadership and other Gulf leaders – and the Arabs in general – is clarity on US policy and its direction towards the region,” said Abdulaziz Sager, chairman of the Riyadh-based Gulf Research Center.
Israel, which shares their concerns about Iran, encouraged Biden’s trip to the kingdom, hoping it would promote a warming between Saudi Arabia and Israel as part of a broader Arab rapprochement after the UAE and Bahrain forged ties with Israel in agreements with the mediation of the US, which received Riyadh’s Blessings.
In a sign of progress in what Biden described as a groundbreaking process, Saudi Arabia said Friday it would open its airspace to all air carriers, paving the way for more flights to and from Israel.
Washington and Riyadh also announced the removal of US and other peacekeeping forces from Tiran, an island between Saudi Arabia and Egypt in a strategic position leading to the Israeli port of Eilat. The troops were deployed as part of the agreements reached in 1978 that led to a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt.
The plan to link air defense systems could prove a tough deal for Arab states that have no ties to Israel and do not want to be part of an alliance seen as countering Iran, which has built a strong network of proxies in the region, including in Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen.
A senior Emirati official, Anwar Gargash, said on Friday that the idea of a so-called Middle East NATO was difficult and that bilateral cooperation was faster and more effective. Read more
The UAE, he said, would not support a confrontational approach: “We are open to cooperation, but not cooperation aimed at any other country in the region, and I specifically mention Iran.”
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Additional reporting by Maha El Dahan in Jeddah and John Irish in Paris Writing by Gaida Gantus and Michael Giorgi Editing by Daniel Wallis and Frances Carey
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