One of the first foreign crises of the presidency was the Israeli-Hamas war in May of last year. He has a lifelong connection to the country, and his charge to all of us is to make sure we’re doing all we can to strengthen Israel’s security, prosperity, and integration into the larger region, both now and over the longer term. This will be President Biden’s first visit to the country as President, and it comes nearly 50 years after his first visit to Israel as a young senator.Īs the President often says about Israel, he learned as a young boy from his father that if Israel did not exist, then we would need to invent it. The President will visit the Middle East region from July 13th to July 16th with stops in Israel, the West Bank, and Saudi Arabia, and engagements with nearly a dozen counterparts from across the region and beyond. So while there’s a great deal of work to do, this historic visit to the Middle East comes against that larger backdrop, both globally and in the Middle East region itself. In the Middle East region, the topic of this call, I’d point to the vote last week at the IAEA Board of Governors in Vienna, where 30 countries condemned Iran’s lack of compliance with safeguard obligations, a resounding vote clearly isolating Iran, whereas a year and a half ago, it was the United States that was isolated internationally on this important issue. And as I think we’ve seen since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the United States and President Biden personally has begun to revitalize our unique strength in building alliances and coalitions through diplomacy and highest-level engagement. This comparative advantage of ours - bringing countries together, building and strengthening coalitions and alliances –atrophied under the last administration. So this visit to the Middle East region, where the President will engage with nearly a dozen of his counterparts in three stops - Israel, the West Bank, and Saudi Arabia - is part of this clear sequence of global engagements at an important moment and demonstrates, we believe, the return of American leadership to bring countries together to address common threats and challenges, something the United States can uniquely do, and with new frameworks that aim to harness unique American capabilities to enable partners to work more closely together, which is essential to a more secure, prosperous, and stable Middle East region over the long term. We’ve long recognized the importance of the President visiting this vital region in a manner similar to the Summit of ASEAN leaders here at the White House, the President’s visit to South Korea and Japan and convening the Quad Summit, the Summit of the Americas last week, and the G7 and NATO summits next week. I point out at the top that this trip has been in the works for some time. There’s a lot of information, and so I wanted to get it all out there. My opening here is about 15 minutes or so, maybe a little longer. And thank you for joining this call to a preview the President’s trip to the Middle East later next month. tomorrow, June 14th.Īnd,, I’ll hand it over to you to get started. The contents of the call will be embargoed until 8:00 a.m. For your awareness, not for reporting, on the line is. This call will be on background attributable to a senior administration official. Get Involved Show submenu for “Get Involved””.The White House Show submenu for “The White House””.Office of the United States Trade Representative.Office of Science and Technology Policy.Executive Offices Show submenu for “Executive Offices””.Administration Show submenu for “Administration””.
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