commitments can be fickle, Saudi Arabia appears to be cooperating with China to construct its own ballistic missiles, according to satellite imagery. But relations have chilled under the Biden administration, even as Washington ostensibly remains “ committed” to providing “equipment, training, and follow-on support necessary to protect Saudi Arabia, and the region, from the destabilizing effects of terrorism, countering Iranian influence, and other threats.” But having learned that U.S. troops, two fighter jet squadrons, and air defense batteries to reassure Saudi Arabia. After Iran’s cruise missile attack on Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq oil processing facility in 2019, the Trump administration sent nearly 3,000 U.S.
Saudi Arabia has also learned not to rely on the United States. The UAE’s hedging is by no means exceptional. Shortly after that revelation, in December 2021, Abu Dhabi suspended negotiations with Washington for the $23 billion purchase of 50 F-35 jets. The announcement came just a few months after the Wall Street Journal revealed that China was constructing a military facility at a port north of the Emirati capital. Since then, the UAE has announced the purchase of 12 Chinese L-15 fighter jet trainers, with an option to buy 36 more. While the Biden administration followed up its latest security guarantee by deploying F-22 fighter jets and dispatching a guided missile destroyer to the UAE, Abu Dhabi seems to have its doubts about U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin just re-upped Washington’s perennial “ironclad” commitment to Israel during a visit to the region last November. Washington has also made explicit or implied security commitments to several other long-standing Middle Eastern partners, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, and Israel-the latter three as major non-NATO partners. commitment, pledging that Washington would “stand beside Emirati partners against all threats to their territory.” National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan assured the UAE of “unwavering” U.S. Only this past January, President Joe Biden’s White House issued a similar assurance to the United Arab Emirates after it had come under drone and missile attack by the Iranian-backed Houthi militia in Yemen. It also won’t be lost on Washington’s partners in the region that the United States gave a security guarantee to Ukraine in 1994-in exchange for Ukraine relinquishing the nuclear weapons it inherited from the Soviet Union. Already, therefore, Russia’s war in Ukraine is spilling into the Middle East. For the Biden administration, a deal in Vienna this week would represent a crowning diplomatic achievement-and Washington appears to be in an even greater hurry to end Iran sanctions in the vain hope that Iranian oil will hit the market and help lower prices sent spiking by the conflict. While the battle for Kyiv rages, many Persian Gulf governments are looking at what’s happening some 800 miles further west-in Vienna, where negotiations on a revived Iran nuclear deal are nearing their denouement. Like their counterparts around the world, Middle Eastern leaders are adjusting to the new geopolitical era created by the largest war in Europe since 1945. the Middle East has been the scene of political turmoil and major warfare, including World War I, World War II, the Arab-Israeli Wars, the Iran-Iraq War and the Persian Gulf Wars. The term is sometimes used in a cultural sense to mean the group of lands in that part of the world predominantly Islamic in culture, thus including the remaining states of N Africa as well as Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The area was viewed as midway between Europe and East Asia (traditionally called the Far East ).
Thus defined it includes Cyprus, the Asian part of Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, the countries of the Arabian peninsula (Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait), and Egypt and Libya. "The Middle East" is a term traditionally applied by western Europeans to the countries of SW Asia and NE Africa lying W of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India. The countries in near the sea are commonly known as the Levant.
The Mediterranean Sea defines the western edge of the region. These Middle East countries are part of the Asian continent, with the exception of Egypt, which is part of Africa, and the northwestern part of Turkey (colored orange), which is part of the European landmass. Note: The Middle East is a loosely defined geographic region the countries listed are generally considered part of the Middle East.