Even before setting foot in the Middle East for his first visit to the region as president, Joe Biden felt compelled to defend a portion of the trip. “I know that there are many who disagree with my decision to travel to Saudi Arabia,” Biden acknowledged in an op-ed for The Washington Post. He went on to restate his commitment to human rights – an issue on which Saudi rulers have long stood accused of abusing.

The president will fly to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia directly from Israel on July 15, 2022. The trip comes a year after the Biden administration released a scathing intelligence report on the murder of Jamal Khashoggi which concluded that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved the operation “to capture or kill” the Saudi journalist.

In his Washington Post article, Biden touted the sanctions and visa bans introduced by the U.S. in response to the killing.

But the tone was certainly softer than the criticism of Saudi Arabia that Biden leveled while on the 2020 presidential campaign trail. Back then, he said his administration would turn this repressive kingdom – a longtime U.S. partner of convenience – into a global “pariah.”

The visit represents a reversal of rhetoric and policy for Biden, especially as the agenda includes a meeting with the crown prince accused over Khashoggi’s killing.

The Khashoggi affair highlights a persistent oddity in American foreign policy, one I observed in many years while working at the State Department and Department of Defense: selective morality in dealing with repressive regimes. Like his predecessors, Biden is grappling with the geopolitical reality that Saudi Arabia is needed to achieve certain U.S. objectives in the Middle East. Recent global developments – the war in Ukraine, fluctuating oil prices and ongoing inflation – underscore that reality. As Biden noted in his op-ed, to counter “Russia’s aggression” and put America in a position to “outcompete China,” the U.S. has to “engage directly with countries that can impact those outcomes.”

Read more: https://theconversation.com/biden-once-wanted-to-make-saudi-arabia-a-pariah-so-why-is-he-playing-nice-with-the-kingdoms-repressive-rulers-now-186784