has been urging Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries to increase oil production. This meeting will take that to its highest level - breaking the ice, as one analyst says. and Saudi Arabia have things in common they both want to talk about. and several regional security issues at stake, the U.S. finding that Mohammed bin Salman was involved in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in 2018.īut with gas prices high in the U.S. Biden's administration made public the U.S. When he ran for president, Biden called Saudi Arabia "a pariah" for its human rights record and its escalation of the war in Yemen - while former President Donald Trump was defending the monarchy. Meeting the Saudi leaders means the administration is turning a page
Perhaps the main drama will come Friday or Saturday, when Biden is expected to meet face-to-face with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman - along with his ailing father, King Salman, who is 86. From there, he'll attend a regional Arab summit in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where he'll meet the Saudi leader along with leaders from Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar, Iraq, Jordan and Egypt. Then Biden will go to the Israeli-occupied West Bank to meet the Palestinian leadership. The meetings start in Israel on Wednesday. He'll try to strengthen Saudi backing for the Yemen cease-fire.Īnd in general, Biden is expected to seek to get all the leaders he meets to help keep up the pressure on Russia to end its invasion of Ukraine. The president is expected to announce steps to counter Iran by expanding ties between Israel and Arab countries. Though they say the trip isn't about oil, White House officials note that " energy security" is one of the topics.
The administration has been urging the Gulf countries to keep oil supplies high as gas prices are up in the U.S. seeks "a region with more stability and with fewer wars that could draw the United States in."Īnd the oil is flowing from the Gulf to the world - unlike the energy supplies from Russia and Ukraine. National security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters Monday that the region is more stable now than when Biden took office. Although there's frequent violence between Israelis and Palestinians, it's nothing like last year's Gaza war. The seven-year war in Yemen - with hundreds of thousands dead from violence and deprivation - has seen three months of cease-fire between Iran-backed and Saudi-led forces. The Middle East is relatively calm - but just barely. No major strategic deals appear to be in the works but the White House says the president hopes to build on connections between the countries and support what it says is a more stable region than it was a couple of years ago. It's the first trip of his presidency to the region - prompted in part by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the rising oil prices it's caused. "Middle East” is problematic because it is, undeniably, a Western term reflecting a Western perspective.President Biden will be in the Middle East this week, where he'll meet with 11 regional leaders. His suggestion continues to receive a great deal of support and many academics. Jerwaharlal Nehru (the first Prime Minister in India), for example, argued that the term should be replaced with ‘West Asia’. Many argue, however, that since the term is Eurocentric and only valid from a Western perspective, it should be replaced with a term that is more appropriate. The term 'Middle East' then evolved to become common verbal currency in 1902 when Alfred Thayer Mahan, a USA naval officer and historian, used the term in an article to describe the land between Arabia and India.Īfter the collapse of the Ottoman Empire as a result of WWI and other geopolitical events, the term ‘Middle East’ became established, widely used by people both within and outside the region. The terms made sense when they were first coined, and they helped to designate locations from a Eurocentric perspective. The Middle Eastern region was particularly important to the British during this period in history as it served as a buffer region in the defence of British interests in India. Why was the Middle East Important to the British? Photo shows Sir Frederick Stanley Maude leading British troops (the Indian Army) into Baghdad (1917) The British have had a large hand in shaping this region before, during and after World War I.
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