Middle East brief: hedging bets on US election

• The outcome of the US presidential election and which party will control the US Congress following the vote are highly uncertain. However, The Economist Intelligence Unit expects the Democratic Party candidate, Joe Biden, to win.

• Whichever candidate and political party prevail will have significant and, in some policy areas, very different implications for US engagement with the Middle East.

• Middle Eastern governments will continue to adjust their own domestic and foreign policy to hedge their bets on who will become the next US president.

The US presidential election will be a close-run contest. The incumbent president, Donald Trump, is trailing in the polls, but they have tightened in recent months, and Mr Biden has a good chance of securing enough electoral college votes to win the White House. Whoever secures the victory will face a range of pressing and complex issues in the Middle East. Addressing the Israeli-Palestinian (and wider Israeli-Arab) conflict, dealing with the destabilising influence of Iran, countering the influence of Russia and China in the region, bringing an end to devastating civil wars in Syria and Yemen, the extent and location of US troop deployments, and securing lucrative commercial deals are but a few areas of US foreign policy towards the Middle East that could be dealt with very differently depending on who becomes the next US president.

Resolving the unresolvable

The Arab-Israeli conflict has beset US foreign policy with major challenges for decades, and specifically the struggle between Israel and Palestine. Since the Trump administration came to office in 2016 it has provided strong and unwavering support for Israel, accompanied by little official engagement with the Palestinian authorities. Mr Trump also recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moved the US embassy there in 2017. He produced a new Middle East peace plan that has few silver linings for the Palestinians and has been roundly rejected by the administration of both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. In addition, Trump signed a decree in early 2019 that recognised Israeli sovereignty over the hotly disputed Golan Heights. This support for Israel and narrow policy focus in resolving the conflict with Palestine would most likely be retained and refined in a second term for Mr Trump, which would exacerbate tensions in Palestine, in turn raising risks of intermittent low-level conflict breaking out between Israel and Gaza.

Mr Biden describes himself as a Zionist but does not openly support Israeli moves to annex Jerusalem and large parts of the West Bank. Mr Biden would scrap the Trump Middle East peace plan and put pressure on Israel to return to the negotiating table with the Palestinians to broker a more palatable solution to both sides. Mr Biden would probably reopen a US consulate in East Jerusalem and could resume aid to the Palestinian Authority. However, he would be reluctant to openly and unilaterally pressurise Israel into making major concessions to the Palestinians, and would resist calls from some within his party to impose sanctions on Israel should it resume with recently suspended annexation plans. The overarching thrust of Mr Biden’s strategy for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would be similar to that adopted during the second term of Barack Obama’s presidency—one of restricted engagement through international alliances while pushing for a two-state solution. Mr Biden, as well as Mr Trump, would seek to promote normalisation of relations between Israel and the Arab states.

Dealing with Iran

Mr Trump has taken a tough and confrontational stance towards Iran and this approach would undoubtedly continue and intensify during a second term. He has labelled Iran as “the leading state sponsor of terrorism” and ordered air strikes that killed Iran’s top military commander, Qassem Suleimani, in Iraq in early 2020. The US left the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, new economic sanctions have been implemented and strong support has been provided to Iran’s bitter rival in the region, Saudi Arabia. A second-term Trump presidency would not recommit to the Iran nuclear deal and would keep the squeeze on Iran through its “maximum pressure” campaign that entails harsh and sweeping sanctions, brinkmanship and the threat of military conflict, and continued support for Iran’s regional rivals, especially Israel and Saudi Arabia. With Iran backed into a corner, this approach would mean the ongoing risks of a miscalculation leading to direct military conflict in the Gulf.

Mr Biden considers Iran a destabilising force in the Middle East and is a staunch believer that Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. However, he does not think that the US’s withdrawal from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal brokered by Mr Obama has prevented Iran from pursuing its nuclear ambitions, and a return to the agreement is a stated policy objective. In the short term, Mr Biden is unlikely to pursue decisive action on the nuclear deal, with his attention more focused on resurrecting the US’s relations with its traditional European allies. However, in the medium term he would probably demand subtle changes to the nuclear deal before the US rejoins it—changes that would probably include an expansion of the deal to cover Iran’s ballistic missiles and a resumption of the UN arms embargo on Iran. This would allow a clear break from Trump-era foreign policy back towards the Obama years, but without appearing weak on Iran. Indeed, rolling back sanctions on Iran without any substantial compromise by the Iranians would be unlikely to gain congressional approval.

Nonetheless, with a hardliner likely to win the 2021 Iranian presidential election, and trust in US negotiating positions undermined by the US’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal, Iran will be very cautious in any negotiations, making a revised deal unlikely in the short to medium term. In terms of dealing with Saudi Arabia, Mr Biden has long been a critic of the kingdom and would look to reassess US engagement in areas such as domestic human rights abuses, the Saudi-led war in Yemen and US arms sales.

US troop deployment

Large US troop deployments in the Middle East will remain a major issue whoever wins the election. Both presidential candidates favour a withdrawal of troops but will be confronted by complex geopolitics, regional instability and the need to support key allies, while tackling the influence of other major international players such as Russia.

Mr Trump has repeatedly promised to reduce the US’s involvement in the Middle East. He would attempt to push ahead with a policy of US troop withdrawal from certain parts of the Middle East. For instance, he has promised to withdraw all US troops from Syria and has scaled down the US military presence in northern Syria since late 2019. Mr Trump believes US troops should remain in Iraq and Afghanistan to carry the fight to Islamic State, as well as keep an eye on the meddling of Iran, but envisages a greatly reduced military presence. In September the US announced that it would cut troop levels in Iraq from about 5,200 to 3,000 and push ahead with a much smaller footprint in Afghanistan. However, geopolitical needs will ensure that a sizeable US military presence remains in the Middle East, which often ranges between 45,000 and 65,000 troops spread from Jordan across the Arabian Peninsula to Oman.

Similarly, Mr Biden believes the US should end its involvement in “unwinnable” conflicts in the Middle East and would prefer to wind down the US military presence in the region. He is sceptical of committing US forces to Syria and would prefer troop drawdown in conflict zones of Afghanistan and Iraq. However, Mr Biden has supported troop deployments and withdrawals in the region, as and when required over the past few decades, and this would remain the case despite his inclination towards a reduced military footprint. In an example of Mr Biden’s approach to alliance building in the region, he condemned Mr Trump’s withdrawal of US troops from northern Syria in 2019 as a betrayal of the Kurds and labelled the operation “the most shameful thing any president has done in modern history in terms of foreign policy”.

Hedging their bets

The US election outcome is highly uncertain and there are clear policy differences and some policy continuity in terms of Middle East foreign policy. Governments in the Middle East are aware of the implications of each presidential candidate for their own objectives, and some countries are already adjusting their own foreign policy by hedging their bets on who will win the US presidential contest and putting themselves in the best possible position regardless of the outcome. This dual approach is evident in the normalisation agreement recently reached between Israel and the UAE, which provides both countries with points scored for Republican and Democratic leaders and members of Congress. The accord provides the Trump administration with a perceived foreign policy win in the run-up to the election and appeases congressional Democrats, as well as Mr Biden, who oppose annexation and have frequently called for normalisation of ties between Arab countries and Israel. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Israel and other key states in the Middle East over the course of the next two months will continue to attempt to retain close working ties with the Trump administration, while at the same time placing themselves in a better starting position vis-à-vis a potential new Democratic leader. What is certain is that Middle Eastern governments will adjust their foreign policy to a potential post-Trump era and work to retain close relations with the US.

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