The main goal of US President Joe Biden's tour of the Middle East was to reaffirm his country's willingness to engage in a region in which it has continually experienced setback after setback. One thing is clear at the end of this visit: it has left everyone disappointed.
The Israelis can only regret his predecessor Donald Trump, who had aligned US diplomacy with the Jewish state's intransigent positions like never before. The Palestinians deplored the absence of strong gestures that could have reflected Washington's desire to once again become the honest broker of an Israeli-Palestinian peace process now in a coma. There was no shortage of possibilities, from the reopening of the US Consulate in East Jerusalem once dedicated to the Palestinians, to a genuine tribute to Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was seemingly killed by Israeli fire in May.
The most delicate stop for Mr. Biden was in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for a meeting with the crown prince and de facto ruler of the kingdom Mohammed Ben Salman. In 2020, the Democratic presidential candidate had promised to avoid the prince because of his presumed involvement in the assassination of dissident Jamal Khashoggi in atrocious circumstances.
But the president of the United States resigned himself to this meeting, hoping that his U-turn would be compensated by an increase in Saudi oil production. A drop in gasoline prices has become an absolute necessity, a few months before the mid-term elections which could turn into a rout for his camp.
Reneging
The fist bump between the president and the rehabilitated former pariah was a source of further disappointment. It was particularly costly for Mr. Biden and only followed by vague Saudi promises. It could hardly have been otherwise. Since Canossa, it has been well known that such reneging usually fails to restore confidence after a crisis.
There is no doubt that the crown prince learned a deep distrust of the Democratic presidency from his diplomatic quarantine. And Mr. Biden has obviously exasperated all those who may have been convinced by his initial willingness to place the defense of American democratic values at the heart of his foreign policy.
In his defense, Mr. Biden inherited a heavy Middle Eastern record when he took office. The last Democratic president, Barack Obama, had opened the way in 2013 to Russia's massive re-engagement in the region by refusing any intervention in Syria at a time when the dictatorship of Bashar Al-Assad was wavering.
His Republican successor Donald Trump further weakened US interests by withdrawing his country from the 2015 international agreement setting a framework for Iran's nuclear program. On the contrary, his policy of maximum pressure to bring the Iranian regime to its knees pushed Iran to revive its efforts to acquire nuclear weapons and to refuse a return to the status quo ante, for the time being.
Mr. Biden found himself accountable for these strategic errors. By adding his own, he has further complicated the American posture in a region where the confrontation between the United States and the revisionist powers of Russia and China is also at play.