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Watch: Trump's Middle East visit starts on May 13; what to expect from his 'historic return'
'Trump is coming to the Gulf first because this region has become a geopolitical and financial centre of gravity,' one analyst said
- PUBLISHED: Sat 10 May 2025, 1:17 PM
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- AFP
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US President Donald Trump heads for Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE on May 13, eyeing big business deals even as accords on the Middle East's hotspots will be harder to seal.
While Israel's war in Gaza and Iran's nuclear programme will loom large over Trump's first major foreign trip of his second term, the White House said he looked forward to a "historic return" to the region.
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Eight years ago Trump also chose Riyadh for his first overseas trip as president, when he memorably posed with the leaders of Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
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"The president looks forward to embarking on his historic return to the Middle East" to promote a vision where "extremism is defeated in place of commerce and cultural exchanges," spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said Friday. Watch the full extract of her comments on the upcoming visit here:
Long list of crises
But Trump will not be able to avoid the long list of regional crises, including the war in Gaza, the Houthi rebels in Yemen and Syria's post-Assad turmoil.
The Gulf states have played a key diplomatic role under Trump 2.0. Qatar has been a major broker between Hamas and Israel while Saudi Arabia has facilitated talks on the war in Ukraine, and the UAE mediated in prisoner swap deals between Moscow and Kiev.
"Trump is coming to the Gulf first because this region has become a geopolitical and financial centre of gravity," Anna Jacobs, non-resident fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, told AFP.
In Riyadh, Trump will meet the leaders of the six Gulf Cooperation Council states: Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait and Oman.
But one place that is not on the itinerary is Israel, the US's closest ally in the region.
Efforts to get Saudi Arabia to recognise Israel, which Trump also sought during his first term, are likely to stay on the backburner as Riyadh says it first needs to see progress towards a Palestinian state.
Iran will meanwhile also be high on the agenda. Washington and Tehran will hold the latest round of indirect talks on Iran's nuclear program in Oman on Sunday.
Iran has also reacted furiously after Trump said he was deciding whether to announce during the trip that he would change how the US refers to the Gulf, from the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Arabia.
US-backed mechanism for Gaza aid
A US-backed mechanism for getting aid into Gaza should take effect soon, Washington's envoy to Israel Mike Huckabee said on Friday, without detailing how this would work with no ceasefire in place.
Trump had teased a major announcement ahead of the trip. It was unclear if that was what Huckabee announced.
Anticipation has been building about a new aid plan for Gaza, laid waste by 19 months of an Israeli air and ground war against Hamas that has destroyed much of the infrastructure and displaced most of its 2.3 million population several times.
Business deals
One thing that the White House says won't be on the agenda is Trump's own businesses.
Last month, the Trump Organisation struck its first luxury real estate deal in Qatar, and released details of a billion-dollar skyscraper in Dubai whose apartments can be bought in cryptocurrency.
Trump's son Eric was promoting a crypto firm in Dubai while Don Jr prepared to talk about "Monetizing MAGA" in Doha.
(With inputs from Reuters)
