WASHINGTON: With less than six months left in office, President Joe Biden and his team are going for bolder, higher-risk diplomacy on both Gaza and Sudan, seeking to make progress on intractable hotspots and \u2014 just maybe \u2014 burnish their legacy.
\nBiden, in an unusually personal appeal, joined the leaders of Egypt and Qatar in not only urging Israel and Hamas to reach a ceasefire but setting a date \u2014 Thursday \u2014 for them to meet in the region.
\nThe approach mirrors a public call by Secretary of State Antony Blinken for the warring parties in Sudan to begin negotiations on Wednesday in Switzerland.
\nThe strategy comes after months of painstaking efforts by US envoys yielded few tangible results in two conflicts that threaten to tarnish Biden, who at 81 decided not to seek a new term and to pass the torch to Vice President Kamala Harris.
\nIsrael\u2019s relentless campaign in Gaza, launched in response to a massive attack by Hamas, has stirred outrage in much of the world and within Biden\u2019s Democratic Party.
\nWhile gaining fewer headlines, tens of thousands have also died in Sudan since rival generals went to war last year, with fears the country is on the brink of a famine unseen since Ethiopia in the 1980s.<\/p>\n
Biden ran in 2020 on his foreign policy experience and on promises of a more normal presidency than that of his predecessor, Donald Trump.
\nHe has highlighted as achievements his rallying of allies behind Ukraine following Russia\u2019s invasion and his nuanced approach to China of raising pressure while seeking to avoid conflict.
\n\u201cThey came into office with one of their slogans being putting diplomacy first. But it\u2019s really hard for me to pinpoint an area where they\u2019ve had a major breakthrough \u2014 a \u2018wow\u2019 moment,\u201d said Brian Katulis, senior fellow for US foreign policy at the Middle East Institute.
\n\u201cThey are looking for some sort of legacy\u201d or at least \u201cto put both of these conflicts on a more solid footing for what they hope will be a Harris administration,\u201d Katulis said.
\nTrump, who is seeking a return to the White House, boasted about fostering the Abraham Accords, in which three Arab states normalized with Israel, and predecessor Barack Obama brokered major deals on Iran\u2019s nuclear program, climate change and normalizing relations with Cuba.
\nKatulis said Biden\u2019s diplomatic track record was inevitably beholden to events on the ground but also showed growing US risk aversion.
\nEarly in his administration, Biden pursued diplomacy begun under Trump for a negotiated settlement in Afghanistan \u2014 which swiftly collapsed when the veteran Democrat withdrew the last US troops and the Taliban seized power.<\/p>\n
Leslie Vinjamuri, director of the US and Americas program at Chatham House, said Biden clearly felt a \u201cstrong sense of urgency\u201d not to leave office with multiple wars raging.
\n\u201cThe last thing the president wants is for a devastating war in the Middle East to be his legacy. This also has the potential to undermine Kamala Harris\u2019s campaign,\u201d Vinjamuri said.
\nBiden in recent days has stepped up the tone with Israel, to which he offered sweeping support following the Hamas attack on October 7.
\nBiden made known his frustration to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the timing of the killing in Iran, presumably by Israel, of the Hamas political chief who was negotiating a ceasefire.
\nBlinken on Tuesday publicly called for restraint not only by Iran, which has vowed to retaliate, but by Israel.
\nBlinken has also said he is nearly finished negotiating an incentive package for a historic prize for Israel \u2014 diplomatic recognition by Saudi Arabia, guardian of Islam\u2019s two holiest sites.
\nBut the Saudis want movement toward a Palestinian state, an idea long resisted by Netanyahu and his far-right allies.
\nOn Sudan, the United States is still trying to persuade the army to participate, with Blinken placing a call to General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and US mediators meeting a Sudanese delegation Friday in Saudi Arabia.
\nBiden\u2019s diplomatic approach does not extend to all conflicts.
\nHe secured the release last week of US prisoners in Russia in a swap but has refused to negotiate over Ukraine, a contrast to Trump whose advisers have suggested threatening to withhold military aid to Kyiv to force it into concessions to Moscow.
\nOn Venezuela\u2019s political crisis, the Biden administration has held off on major pressure on leftist leader Nicolas Maduro, preferring that Latin American powers Brazil, Mexico and Colombia take the lead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WASHINGTON: With less than six months left in office, President Joe Biden and his team are going for bolder, higher-risk diplomacy on both Gaza and Sudan, seeking to make progress on intractable hotspots and \u2014 just maybe \u2014 burnish their legacy. Biden, in an unusually personal appeal, joined the leaders of Egypt and Qatar in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":424030,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-424017","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n