Biden embraces a signature Trump achievement on first trip to the Middle East, aiming to bring Israel and Saudi Arabia closer
CNN
When President Joe Biden arrives here on Wednesday, he will do something he has never done on a foreign trip: Embrace one of his predecessor's legacy achievements.
While much of his foreign travel in his first 18 months in office has focused on reversing the foreign policy of former President Donald Trump and shoring up battered alliances, Biden on his first trip to the Middle East will embrace the Trump-era Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Israel and several Arab countries and pursue an expansion of growing Arab-Israeli security and economic ties.
In the lead-up to the trip, US officials have been working to deepen Israeli-Arab security coordination and broker agreements that will inch Israel and Saudi Arabia -- which do not have diplomatic relations -- closer to normalization.
A CIA assessment circulated among US officials this week concluded that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu likely judges he can get away without defining a post-war plan — even as the Biden administration has launched a full-court press to pressure him to bring an end to the conflict in Gaza.