Saudi arabia

To the extent Joe Biden had anything to say about Saudi Arabia during the 2020 presidential campaign, it largely centered on shaming the oil-rich monarchy into changing its ways. Coming off the 2018 state-sponsored murder of Washington Post columnist and former royal court insider Jamal Khashoggi in a Turkish consulate, Biden aired numerous complaints about Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman. He pledged to make the kingdom a pariah state during a Democratic presidential debate, accused the Saudi air force of killing children in Yemen — it wasn’t as much an accusation as a fact — and committed himself to reassessing US arms sales to Riyadh. The Saudis didn’t like what they saw during the Biden administration’s opening months.

Poetry is politics in the Yemen. When the last imam of Yemen, who was also the hereditary ruler, was deposed in a coup in 1962, it was a local poet who announced the change of regime on the radio, in verse of course. And the current al-Houthi regime in the north of the country, like all its predecessors, asserts its legitimacy, confounds its enemies and rallies its supporters through poetry. As an aspect of their cause, they have consciously avoided high-Arabic poetry — a literate, urban cultural form — and have made use of the zamil tradition, which immediately speaks not of the palaces of emirs and princes, but takes the listener to sit beside the farmers and Bedouin shepherds in the villages and hills.

Joe Biden can point to a few concrete foreign-policy accomplishments during his presidency thus far. Ukraine would be in far worse shape against Russia were it not for the financial, economic and military assistance the White House has provided. Washington has also done a commendable job getting Japan and South Korea back on speaking terms after years of bickering. Yet both of these items are tactical in nature and aren’t going to bring Biden into the history books. Shepherding a comprehensive normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, however, just might. That was, until an unprecedented Hamas-led attack into Israel threw a wrench into his plans.

Peace isn’t exactly blossoming like rosebuds in the Middle East. The region is still host to a devastating civil war in Yemen, a humanitarian crisis in Syria, sporadic terrorist attacks in Iraq and an endless tit-for-tat between the US and Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Syria. Indeed, just last night, President Biden authorized several airstrikes against three militia locations in retaliation for a drone attack on an American base in Syria that killed one contractor and injured six others. But for an area of the world so often regarded as hopeless, the Middle East is suddenly looking like an epicenter of diplomacy.

Russia’s brutal war in Ukraine has been disastrous for Vladimir Putin, but it has been a boon for the Islamic Republic of Iran. Western nations are increasingly concerned about Tehran’s profitable cooperation with Moscow, as Iran leverages Russian desperation to fuel its own ambitions. So far, Iran has sent hundreds of drones to Russia along with training personnel, and may soon send ballistic missiles. Tehran has continued its malign activities in the Middle East as well, attempting to steal American drones and blind American ships, attacking and endangering American forces and personnel, and supporting destabilizing groups such as the Houthis in Yemen. Iran has also ruthlessly repressed widespread protests at home.

Joe Biden’s chickens are coming home to roost as Chinese President Xi Jinping visits Saudi Arabia. The trip itself has not been especially revolutionary. But it is another indication of America’s declining prowess in the region. Xi was given a welcome befitting an ambitious leader (and notably different from how Biden was greeted in July). Beijing and Riyadh signed numerous economic agreements worth about $29 billion in total, including with Huawei, which will only further the Chinese technology giant’s control over global telecommunications infrastructure. Xi also advanced his desire to make the yuan a competitor to the dollar in the global economy, pushing for the use of the yuan in the oil trade with Saudi Arabia.

Near the top of President Biden’s to-do list for the past few months has been to keep gas prices down. On Wednesday, this was dealt a likely fatal blow by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, which, led by Saudi Arabia, agreed to cut its overall production by two million barrels per day. In actuality, the cut will mean a reduction of more like one million barrels per day if it's taken into account that OPEC has been underproducing compared to its previously stated production goals. Still, this is a significant cut, and the effects on oil markets are already being felt.