Biden’s Status Quo Middle East Policy

In the days since Joe Biden began his presidency, he has been issuing executive orders on a range of domestic policy issues at a dizzying rate. He recast U.S.-Russia relations in one phone call with Vladimir Putin. His administration has been quickly laying down markers on China, Latin America and other global hot spots. But when it comes to the Middle East, it looks as though the status quo is holding.

The American embassy in Jerusalem is not going anywhere. Biden’s White House appears to be committed to the Abraham Accords and to supporting further diplomatic ties between Israel and Arab Gulf states. Even the new president’s outreach to the Palestinians appears to be mainly symbolic (albeit with a little cash thrown in), but there is no evidence that Biden has much interest in restarting peace talks anytime soon.

Even the supposed big shift in U.S. policy in the Middle East — Biden’s promise to reengage with Iran by rejoining the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Agreement (JCPOA) — looks like it’s going to be on the backburner for the foreseeable future. When new Secretary of State Antony Blinken was asked about Iran during his confirmation hearing, the lack of urgency in both the tone and content of his response was palpable. Despite Iran’s insistence that all economic sanctions must be lifted before they will be willing to comply with the agreement, Blinken made it very clear that Tehran must reinstate the restrictions on their nuclear program before any sanction relief would be offered or Iranian oil sales could begin again. And he didn’t seem to be in any hurry to make that happen.

“We are a long ways from that point. Iran is out of compliance on a number of fronts, and it will take some time, should it make a decision to do so, to come back into compliance, and time for us to assess whether it’s meeting its obligations,” Blinken told reporters after the hearing. “So we’re not there yet, to say the least.”

With Iranian elections looming in June and the hardline candidates there heavily favored for victory, it’s reasonable to assume that if a new deal does not come together in the next few months, it’s not going to happen for a very long time. Blinken appeared very comfortable with that prospect. He is already talking about negotiating a “longer and stronger” agreement to address other “deeply problematic” issues, presumably with constraints on ballistic missiles and Iran’s support of terrorist activity, which Tehran refused to address as part of the original JCPOA.

Staffing adjustments at the State Department also suggest a broader de-emphasis on the Middle East, as top-level diplomatic positions are being shifted from that region to the Pacific Rim. Even the issues on which Biden has indicated his interest in a new direction — most notably the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia — will be receiving much less attention from a new administration preoccupied with COVID-19 and the economy on the domestic front and China, Russia and climate change on the world stage. Even if Biden’s heart is still committed to working with Iran, any new agreement will require a great deal of direct presidential involvement, and he might simply not have the bandwidth to take on such a complicated issue right now.

Staffing adjustments at the State Department also suggest a broader de-emphasis on the Middle East.

One clear change of direction from the Trump era will be Biden’s opposition to further Israeli settlement expansion. But his public pressure on Israeli government leaders will only be successful if he allows them to claim victory before their own voters on some other matter. In the face of domestic political pressure in Israel, either Benjamin Netanyahu or his successor will need something tangible from an American president in exchange for curbing additional construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Blinken’s tough talk on Iran suggests that Biden may understand the need to offer an Iranian carrot along with the Palestinian stick.

Biden’s appointment of longtime accommodationist Robert Malley as his special envoy to Iran suggests that this administration will not give up on the prospect of a new JCPOA. But letting Malley spend his next few years whispering sweet nothings to the mullahs and handwringing with the Europeans while Biden concentrates on other geopolitical priorities seems like a good recipe for stasis. In an ideal world, an American president would engage more forcefully in the face of such a critical geopolitical threat. But this version of the status quo is probably good enough for now.

Dan Schnur teaches political communications at UC Berkeley, USC and Pepperdine. He hosts the weekly webinar “Politics in the Time of Coronavirus” for the Los Angeles World Affairs Council & Town Hall.