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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives at the Beijing Capital International Airport, in Beijing, China, April 25, 2024.
Blinken meets with Xi, but no breakthroughs
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken brought up concerns over China's support for Russia with his counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Friday, before meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Blinken’s visit is largely meant to advance the mutual goal of stabilizing the relationship, and Xi said he wants to be "partners, not rivals" with the United States.
As Blinken landed in Shanghai for the first leg of his trip earlier this week, the Biden administration signed bills providing Taiwan with $8 billion in military aid and starting a process that could result in a ban of the popular video app TikTok in the US unless its Chinese owner, ByteDance, sells. The day before, the State Department released its annual human rights review, which criticized Chinese treatment of Muslim minorities.
Once he landed, Blinken pressed Shanghai Communist Party Secretary Chen Jining on treating US companies fairly. Meanwhile, he told students at NYU’s Shanghai campus that the cultural ties being built between both countries are of utmost importance.
Despite the many possible pratfalls during the first leg, China’s response has been fairly milquetoast. Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said, “We hope that the US side will respect the principle of fair competition, abide by WTO rules, and work with China to create favorable [trade] conditions.” Hardly “Wolf Warrior” stuff, and Wang said Friday that ties are “beginning to stabilize.”
President Joe Biden during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss the war between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, Oct. 18, 2023.
Is the US-Israel relationship on the rocks?
The White House seems increasingly fed up with Israel’s approach to its war against Hamas. On Tuesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken – who’s set to visit the region again this week in ongoing efforts to secure another cease-fire – warned that all of Gaza faces “severe” food insecurity.
President Joe Bidenreiterated his opposition to a ground invasion in Rafah during a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, reportedly noting that Israel needs a “coherent and sustainable strategy” in Gaza. But on Tuesday, Netanyahu told Israeli lawmakers he would press on into Rafah despite Biden's pleas for restraint.
Will the US punish Israel? If Israel defies the US and invades Rafah, recent reporting suggests Biden could consider conditioning aid to the Jewish State — a step that prominent Democrats are advocating. In another sign of his escalating spat with Bibi, Biden last week applauded Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer after he called for new elections in Israel.
For now, the White House has summoned an Israeli delegation to gather in Washington by early next week for a discussion on an alternative to invading Rafah. But Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israel is “determined” to eliminate Hamas fighters in Rafah, adding, “There's no way to do that except by going in on the ground.”
An Israeli soldier gestures atop of a tank near the southern Gaza Strip border, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, as seen from Israel, February 7, 2024.
Bibi rejects Hamas’ ‘delusional’ cease-fire offer
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday forcefully rejected a proposal from Hamas for a 135-day cease-fire involving a phased exchange of hostages and Palestinian prisoners – and the eventual withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza.
Describing Hamas’ terms as “delusional,” Netanyahu said Israel would continue to pursue “absolute victory.” The Israeli leader has repeatedly said the war won’t end until Hamas is destroyed, and he is making it clear that he will not accept any proposal that allows for the militant group to retain control of even a sliver of Gaza.
A diplomatic dead-end. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday signaled that Washington will keep pushing for a new truce and hostage deal. But he acknowledged that “there is a lot of work to be done.”
With both Bibi and Hamas unwilling to compromise, the war is poised to continue. Meanwhile, Israel is seemingly shifting its offensive to Rafah, where many displaced Palestinians are gathered.
UN chief António Guterres on Wednesday warned that Israel focusing its ground operations on Rafah could “exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare with untold regional consequences."
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in Tel Aviv, Israel, January 9, 2024.
Blinken’s message falls flat in Israel
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is touring the Middle East this week in a bid to prevent a wider, regional conflict from spilling over from the Israel-Hamas war. But Blinken has his work cut out for him as Washington is increasingly struggling to exert its influence over the Israeli government.
While meeting with Israeli leaders in Tel Aviv on Tuesday, the top US diplomat “stressed the importance of avoiding further civilian harm” in Gaza and emphasized that the establishment of an eventual Palestinian state is crucial to fostering a “lasting, sustainable peace for Israel and the region.”
But while Blinken was making his case, fierce fighting raged on in Gaza, and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told him Israel’s operations in southern Gaza would "intensify and continue until Hamas leadership is detected.”
Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire, with the UN recently warning that a famine could be on the horizon. The death toll in the enclave has surpassed 23,000, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
The big picture: Despite mounting international criticism – including allegations of genocide from countries like South Africa – and rising pressure from the US to take its foot off the gas, Israel has made it clear that it will not give up on its goal of destroying Hamas. The fighting is poised to continue for the foreseeable future.
Like Blinken, Germany’s top diplomat also visited the region this week and reiterated Berlin’s support for a two-state solution to the conflict. But Bibi Netanyahu’s far-right government is openly hostile to Palestinian statehood, with some officials going as far as to support the permanent displacement of Gazans.
In short, Blinken is swimming against the current with his messaging toward Israel.
And though the US is hoping to stop a regional war from developing, Israel and Hezbollah – the powerful Iran-backed militant group in Lebanon – also continued to exchange cross-border fire on Tuesday. The US has also been entangled in an escalating tit-for-tat with Iranian proxies across the Middle East, launching a drone strike that killed the leader of an Iran-backed militia in Baghdad as recently as last week.
But this doesn’t mean all hopes for diplomacy are dead in the water. Israeli officials arrived in Cairo on Monday to revive talks aimed at securing the release of more hostages trapped in Gaza. We’ll be keeping a close eye on these discussions in the coming days.
REUTERS/Alexander Ermochenko
US pushes for longer Israel-Hamas truce
Top US officials are in the Middle East this week to try to prolong the fragile, temporary truce between Israel and Hamas made possible by the exchange of hostages and prisoners.
CIA Director Bill Burns, who was in Qatar on Tuesday as part of this push, is reportedly urging Hamas and Israel to embrace a broader agreement that would allow for the release of men and military personnel. Until now, the deal has only involved the release of women and children.
Sec. of State Antony Blinken is also set to visit Israel and the occupied West Bank this week, where he’ll discuss “continued efforts to secure the release of remaining hostages,” according to the State Department.
While the Biden administration and others pushing for a longer truce may succeed in getting a short-term extension – Israel has said it would add a day for every 10 hostages released, and the truce was extended by two days on Monday – there are serious doubts that a lengthier pause is in the cards anytime soon given the Israeli government’s vocal commitment to continuing the war.
The obstacle: Qatar, which has served as a mediator between the warring parties, says more than 40 of the 240 hostages seized on Oct. 7 are not held captive by Hamas. Dozens are reportedly being held by another militant group in Gaza – the Palestinian Islamic Jihad – that wants greater concessions from the Israeli government.
Israel has indicated that it will resume its Gaza offensive unless hostages continue being released. And even if all the hostages were freed, Netanyahu – whose political days are numbered, with recent polling showing that most Israelis want him to resign –- has made it clear he intends to destroy Hamas.
TL;DR: The conflict is paused, but far from over.
Blinken meets Xi in Beijing
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi, everybody. Ian Bremmer here, and Tony Blinken is not. No, he's coming back from Beijing, the US Secretary of State, the once-postponed and now-on-again weekend trip to Beijing. It's the first time he, as Secretary of State, has been there. Also, this was a last-moment meeting that included President Xi Jinping, and that's very important because on the ground in China, no attention being given publicly to the trip until Xi meets with Blinken, 35 minutes long, and then suddenly it is everywhere, and it's over 1 billion views, and it's all over state media, and it's all over social media. In a sense, the Chinese blessing the visit to their public and showing that they want to have a more constructive or at least stable relationship.
The other takeaway, marginal but still not unimportant, is the willingness to create a fentanyl working group. That's something the Americans have been pressing on for a while, which provides a little bit of cover for Biden that he's actually getting something done with the Chinese. Of course, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and execution on that is something that everyone is going to be skeptical about and watching.
Okay, that's the good news. What's the bad news? There is no trust within this relationship. The US-China relationship continues to be very contentious, very conflictual. It's true that the Chinese gave their standard speaking points on Taiwan, and we can go to war, and we maintain the status quo. The Americans said, "We're not changing the status quo, and we don't want war." And everything will be fine. But the status quo is changing. The status quo is changing in a couple of ways. First of all, the Americans are doing whatever they can to make Taiwan less important. The export controls on Taiwan's semiconductors. Let's keep in mind that until very recently, until about a year ago, TSMC was producing 92% of the most important semiconductors in the world. The highest speed, smallest, fast. This is critical. Suddenly, that's down to 80%. Why? Because the Americans want to get away from vulnerability to Taiwan.
That's going to be down to 50% probably within five years. And as that happens, you've got Foxconn now moving all of their supply chain away from mainland China and towards India and Vietnam and Canada and other countries. Why are they doing that? And the answer is because the Americans see the status quo as risky, and they're trying to de-risk the status quo, which means less exposure to Taiwan, which makes a lot of sense for the Americans. But if you're the Chinese, you see that as actually leading to confrontation. You're saying, "Wait a second, we no longer have the ability to get access to this high-level technology. We have to build it ourselves." So when they do that and Taiwan becomes less important, it of course, becomes an area that's easier to have direct conflict.
Part of the reason the Americans were able to put unprecedented levels of sanctions against the Russians is because the Americans do almost no business with the Russians, Taiwan becomes less important, and the Americans de-risk the broader US-China relationship. It becomes easier to have confrontation with the Chinese, and as the Chinese take similar steps, they do the same thing. The one thing that didn't happen in this meeting was a willingness to re-engage on the military-to-military front. The Americans have been asking for it. Chinese have said no. They continue to say no this weekend. At the same time that the Chinese have taken really aggressive measures in the Taiwan Straits, in the South China Sea that potentially could risk direct accident/conflict with American military warships, jet fighters operating in the area. The fact that the Chinese are willing to tolerate that level of risk is they would argue analogous to the Americans being willing to tolerate greater levels of risk around the broader US-China relationship and around Taiwan.
That's not going to change. It's not going to change because Biden thinks he's got the right policies right now for China, because the politics of the relationship are heavily constrained by hawkish Democrats and Republicans, and because we're heading into the 2024 election. Now, the one thing that's useful is that in this relationship, Biden and Xi know each other well, they've known each other for a long time. Biden actually speaks with a lot of pride about that when you talk to him personally about how much time he spent with Xi. Not that he necessarily likes everything about him or trusts everything he says, but he respects him as a leader as opposed to Biden's view of Putin, which is exactly the opposite. That means that when they meet face-to-face, maybe there'll be a video call soon, but certainly looks likely on the sidelines of the APEX Summit in San Francisco this fall. Biden's going to go for a couple of days. That has the potential to strengthen the stabilization of the relationship, even as the structural forces are heading more towards conflict. I wish I had better news, but I'm glad the meeting happened. I'm glad it went as well as it actually did.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.
Blinken-Xi talks deliver mixed results
While there was no major breakthrough from US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's much-anticipated meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Monday, how it went depends on how you view the immediate future of fraught US-China ties.
If you see the glass half-full, the mutual vibes were a tad less frosty than in February, when they hit rock-bottom after Blinken postponed his trip over balloon-gate. Xi admitting some progress was made is the strongest sign to date that he's willing to call a time-out before things spiral out of control over things like economic decoupling, Taiwan, trade, or Russia's war in Ukraine.
But if you see the glass half-empty, the expectations were so low that just talking again might be as good as it gets. Indeed, the pleasantries won’t move the two sides anywhere near repairing their strained relations, and Blinken’s call to resume military-to-military comms in order avoid further close calls in the South China Sea and near Taiwan fell on deaf Chinese ears (Beijing blames the radio silence on US sanctions against China’s military).
What’s more, the most senior US visit to China since 2018 did not immediately produce a long-sought invitation for Xi to meet Biden at November's APEC summit in San Francisco.
If you just see a glass with some water in it, the meeting was just ... a meeting. And whether the two are on a path toward easing US-China tensions depends on whether the high-level diplomacy momentum continues.US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Is the US trying to patch things up with Saudi?
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled on Tuesday to Saudi Arabia for a three-day trip, marking the second high-level US visit to the kingdom over the past month.
While few have expectations of a large breakthrough in a relationship that's been underpinned by awkward exchanges and tense standoffs for some time, Blinken is likely hoping to bolster waning trust.
Why now? The US’ top diplomat likely hopes that confidence-boosting measures can help give Washington some renewed influence over global oil policy, which the Saudis largely steer. And the timing of this trip couldn’t be more apt, particularly after Riyadh announced Sunday that it will unilaterally slash oil production by 1 million barrels per day starting next month. (You may recall that the kingdom’s decision to cut oil output – in turn raising gas prices – ahead of the 2022 midterm elections deepened the US-Saudi rift.)
Blinken also reportedly aims to push the Saudis to normalize ties with Israel, which has long been on the cards but hasn’t materialized due to a range of sticking points.
To be sure, the US-Saudi relationship is important to both sides. However, deteriorating relations amid a changing geopolitical landscape reinforce that the longstanding model of Saudi oil in exchange for US arms and security guarantees no longer flies.