By ALEXANDER WARD and JONATHAN LEMIRE -- politico.com -- JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia — President Joe Biden’s four-day Middle East trip was a stark demonstration of how, on the global stage, the importance of values at times gets downplayed in the cold pursuit of the national interest. Biden’s swing through Israel, the West Bank and Saudi Arabia saw the United States engaged in a great game, seeking a larger foothold in the region as Russia and China muscle their way in. Armed with hugs and fist bumps, Biden both literally and figuratively embraced traditional allies who sought rekindled ties to their most important security partner. That coziness resulted in historic agreements to bring Jerusalem and Riyadh closer together, a crown prince seemingly more open to ending the war in Yemen and a renewed push to solve the intractable conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

But getting there came at a cost. The president’s reputation as a champion of human rights suffered a potentially significant blow once the image of his fist bump with Mohammed bin Salman beamed across screens worldwide. Though Biden raised the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in his meeting with the kingdom’s de facto ruler, who Biden and the U.S. intelligence community believe ordered the killing, his main objective wasn’t to lecture. It was to maximize America’s influence in the Middle East. Biden came to deal with “the needs of the free world, and particularly the United States, and not leave a vacuum here, which was happening as it has in other parts of the world,” he told reporters Friday night in defense of his trip. It will take weeks, months and years to know if it was all worth the media nightmare the president and his team endured.

The diplomatic gamble had an eye toward the long term even as immediate concerns loomed large, namely the need for increased oil production to erase the West’s energy deficit following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Should many of the initiatives pan out — especially the hoped-for normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia — Biden and his coterie may deem the visit in the scorching heat a success. To hear the administration tell it already, Biden didn’t have to minimize anything to boost America’s standing and make strategic gains this week. If anything, U.S. officials say the president bolstered his reputation as a savvy statesman. “You can’t advance your values and advance your concerns about human rights by not traveling, by staying home, by not having conversations,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told POLITICO on the sidelines of the president’s meetings in Jeddah. “The way you prove that human rights are, in fact, an integral part of your foreign policy is to get out on the road and have those conversations.”

by cnn.com -- Kyle Blaine and Eliza Mackintosh -- (CNN)Saudi Arabia on Friday opened its airspace to all civilian carriers, including all flights to and from Israel, in a step toward normalizing relations between the two nations as US President Joe Biden tours the Middle East. In a statement shared hours before he was due to fly directly from Israel to Saudi Arabia, Biden hailed the kingdom's decision, saying that it could "help build momentum toward Israel's further integration into the region." The Biden administration has for months sought to formalize security and economic deals between Saudi Arabia and Israel, in a bid to set the stage for a normalization deal between the two countries.

Riyadh is believed to have a covert relationship with Israel but has yet to officially disclose those diplomatic ties. In 2020, then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly flew to Saudi Arabia for a covert meeting with the kingdom's de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman -- a claim that was denied by Riyadh's top diplomat. A possible normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia has been hailed as the "crown jewel" of agreements between the Jewish state and the Arab world. The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan normalized relations with Israel in 2020 as part of a wave of agreements at the end of former President Donald Trump's term.

by nypost.com — President Biden said Friday that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman denied having any role in the murder …

by naharnet — MPs Ashraf Rifi, Michel Moawad, Fouad al-Makhzoumi and Adib abdel Massih announced Friday the program of their new parliamentary …