The 47th President of the United States of America, Donald Trump, has a planned trip to the Middle East this week. This trip will include visits to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. Trump will focus his attention on the three energy-rich nations home to existing or planned Trump-branded real estate projects — places where he aims to leverage American economic interests. “This is his happy place,” said Jon B. Alterman, a senior vice president at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. “His hosts will be generous and hospitable. They’ll be keen to make deals. They’ll flatter him and not criticize him. And they’ll treat his family members as past and future business partners.” “Trump can easily score a win by reassuring them of America’s strategic commitment to the region, demonstrating consistent messaging and generally rising above the fray,” analysts Elizabeth Dent and Simon Henderson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy wrote Friday.
This is important because it shows how Trump is attempting to create stronger ties with various countries in the Middle East, as well as forge new deals that could prove to benefits both himself and the American people. This also shows how Trump is trying to make up for his last visit to the Middle East in 2017, what became known as the Qatar crisis. According to AP, that is when Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE boycotted Qatar over its support of Islamists in the region and its ties to Iran, with which it shares a massive offshore natural gas field. The dispute grew so serious that Kuwait’s ruling emir at the time, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah, suggested on a visit to the White House there could have been “military action.” Trump initially criticized Qatar as having “historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level” at the start of the boycott. Less than a year later, he praised Qatar and rolled that back. The four nations ended their boycott just before Biden took office.
This relates to what we learned in class because it shows how important individuals are in international relations and diplomacy. Specific individuals like heads of state and monarchs play a huge role in determining the course their state takes and the attitude their country will have in response to various events.