President Donald Trump’s visit to the Middle East has widely changed the United States’ political standpoint on the area. Mr. Trump spent four days in the Middle East visiting the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. The latter of them having gifted the President a luxury Boeing 747 jet costing nearly 400 million dollars and claimed he would be a “stupid person” to not accept their gift.
Other key highlights of the trip include a multibillion dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia which stemmed from Iran’s military threat to the region and hundreds of billions of dollars more in investment commitments. Israel has also been seemingly sidelined from Mr. Trump’s trip due to his recent truce with the Iranian backed Houthis in Yemen and his warm relations with Qatar despite their funding of Hamas.
Meanwhile, Qatar’s gift to Mr. Trump has been labeled a “great gesture,” along with claiming “it’s not a gift to me, it’s a gift to the Department of Defense.” One of Donald Trump’s main goals of his trip was to get some sort of ceasefire deal in Gaza. While we all know that didn’t happen, the chance of having a ceasefire may be even lower due to the erosion of America’s relationship with Israel. While Benjamin Netanyahu has mainly kept away from Trump’s trip, the Israeli Prime Minister is certainly getting some fire for allowing the United States to make new alliances without Israel. Surprisingly, Netanyahu’s office has yet to respond to the regional visit.
While President Trump’s visit to the Middle East was mainly focused on securing investments for American businesses and billions more in arms deals, some may say he benefited from the visit too and might’ve sidelined one of our key allies.
