JEDDAH: Like most media frenzy, US President Joe Biden’s “historic first direct flight” from Tel Aviv to Jeddah was first received with much fanfare – but at least among Saudi journalists – it quickly became the cause of much. The matter became about nothing.
It all started with Biden’s statement in an op to the Washington Post on July 9, before he began his Middle East trip, declaring that “On Friday, I will travel from Israel to Jeddah (sic), Saudi Arabia.” I will be the first president to fly.
Many in the US and Israeli news media pushed the phrase as further evidence that a “normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel” was just around the corner, a perennial rumor that has taken over a life of its own.
A follow-up announcement by the White House on July 15 quoted the president as saying: “Today, I will be the first president to fly from Israel to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.”
While the statement was accurate in the sense that no former US president had flown a direct flight from Israel to Jeddah, Biden certainly was not the first to fly direct from Israel to Saudi Arabia.
Many began to question the limited memory of US and Israeli journalists, who overlooked or forgot the fact that as recently as 2008 another president flew directly from Israel to the state, though the capital. Not to Riyadh, but to the coastal city of Jeddah.
In fact, the last president who flew a direct flight from Israel to Saudi Arabia was George W. Bush, who traveled from Tel Aviv in May 2008, the last year of his second term.
According to media accounts of that trip, when Air Force One landed in the Saudi capital, Bush received a red carpet welcome on the tarmac, and was warmly welcomed by Saudi leaders as a military band played the US national anthem.
The Bush White House said the visit was intended to formally celebrate 75 years of US-Saudi ties, but the high oil price ($127 a barrel) was also a factor. Rising energy costs were proving to be a political headache for the president and a major drain on the US economy, which was facing a major recession.
Fourteen years after that visit, another US president claimed that he had made history with a direct flight, but it was in the opposite direction. Donald Trump’s Air Force One flew from Riyadh to Tel Aviv in May 2017 as part of its first foreign trip since taking office.
Another five years later, it was the turn of a Democrat to boast of the “historic first direct flight” between Israel and a Saudi city.
Several Saudi journalists covering Biden’s recent visit said they were unsure why the flight was the subject of so much excitement.
“If it’s a tour involving two countries, first Israel and second Saudi Arabia, then how else was Biden going to fly?” asked a reporter.
“As far as the emphasis by the Western media that this is a step closer to normalization between Saudi Arabia and Israel is concerned, this is not true as this is not the first time such a flight has taken place. But, more importantly, it dwarfs the Arab Peace Initiative,” said a local newspaper editor, citing the Saudi peace proposal to Israel, which was adopted by the Arab League in Beirut in 2002.
However, one thing is certain: every visit by a US president to Saudi Arabia has proved to be historic, one way or another.