Eighteen months after taking office, President Joe Biden made his first visit to the Middle East – a region that was once at the center of his country’s foreign policy. The China issue was not far off, however, even with these longtime allies.
“We have to do our best to compete and overtake China,” he had written before his trip.
The footprint of China is becoming more and more visible in the world and the actors of American foreign policy are beginning to think that it is in the Middle East that the rivalry between Beijing and Washington risks exploding.
The world’s second-largest economy is expanding its portfolio – from traditional areas of cooperation like oil and natural gas to the famous New Silk Roads, where it is taking advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic to provide medical care to countries in need. – and makes it clear that this is for a long time.
Since the United States considers the Middle East to be under its protection, its rivalry with China can only increase in the region.
A “romantic orientalism”
“As the Chinese footprint grows, there is a growing romantic orientalism in the region towards China and the idea that it is a potential alternative to the United States in tackling the local issues more deeply”, says Mohammed Turki Al-Sudairi, of the Center for Islamic Research and Studies, Saudi Arabia.
This could bring the Middle East closer to China, some say, as the United States gradually shifts its foreign policy from the region and its energy policy away from oil. Proof that the ties that unite them are growing, in March, Saudi Arabia expressed its willingness to be paid in yuan for its oil sales to China – while the current international system is based solely on the dollar.
Saudi Arabia is the main oil supplier b