Whose interests are served by paying off the Middle Eastern rogues’ gallery to play nice?
As he seeks reelection, President Joe Biden has taken up a new cause: to make the Middle East safe for autocracy. Three years ago, he promised to turn the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman into “a pariah.” Today, Biden is slobbering all over MbS, offering a security guarantee that would turn US military personnel into bodyguards for the Saudi royal family. The proposal is a scandalous testament to the flood of Saudi money coursing through America’s political and policysystem.
Also benefiting is the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist government. Netanyahu has been charged with corruption. To stay out of prison he formed a radical ethno-nationalist government which enthusiastically treats millions of Palestinians as second class human beings. Netanyahu also has shamelessly meddled in U.S. politics.
Only stupidity or senility can explain current policy. President Donald Trump began the strange practice of making Americans pay Arabs to establish diplomatic relations with Israelis. The biggest losers were the Palestinians, since diplomatic normalization had been one carrot for Israel to agree to creation of a viable Palestinian state. Whatever assurances about occupation policy that Netanyahu made were flagrant falsehoods, instantly violated, leaving residents of the West Bank a subject, exploited population. The Trump administration compounded the US betrayal with its infamous “Deal of the Century,” a Trojan Horse concocted by and for Netanyahu. His sectarian coalition’s predictably harsh mistreatment of Palestinians has since cooled Gulf ardor for recognizing Israel.
More importantly, Americans paid much for little in return for the “Abraham Accords.” To start, whether Arab states formally recognized Israel mattered little to the U.S. Several already had informal dealings with Jerusalem. Israel and its neighbors have benefited economically from increased ties, but that means they had reason to act without being bribed.
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