Trump secures big deals in tour

US President Donald Trump on Friday wrapped up his first major overseas trip of his second term to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates with bountiful investment and defense deals claimed to be worth $3 trillion or more apart from heaps of praises, but with little progress to end the conflict in Palestine which reported at least 150 civilian deaths during his tour.

Before heading home from Abu Dhabi, Trump hailed the deepening ties between the United States and the UAE and said the latter will invest $1.4 trillion in the US, especially in the artificial intelligence sector, over the next decade.

"I have absolutely no doubt the relationship will only get bigger and better," Trump said at a meeting with UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Thursday.

The US and the UAE agreed to build a massive data center complex in Abu Dhabi. The presidents also witnessed the unveiling of a new 5GW UAE-US AI Campus in Abu Dhabi. The Emirates will import up to 500,000 of Nvidia's most advanced AI chips annually from 2025 through 2027, according to reports.

If all the proposed chip deals in the Gulf states, and the UAE in particular, come together, the region would become a third power center in global AI competition after the US and China, Reuters reported.

Earlier, the White House stated that investment deals worth $600 billion were inked in his first leg in Saudi Arabia, besides over $140 billion in defense sales, followed by $1.2 trillion deals in Qatar by Wednesday.

Political polarization

Trump's visit came at a time of transformation in the US as its foreign policy posture has shifted due to political polarization at home, strategic fatigue from past military engagements and a growing emphasis on economic influence over military presence, said Amal Mudallali, a visiting research scholar at Princeton University and former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations.

Hasan Alhasan, a senior fellow and analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said the Gulf states now see themselves as bridge-builders in the global economy and are committed to maintaining flexible partnerships.

Yet, those wishing for more US leverage for ending the bloodshed and famine in Gaza had to be disheartened as repeated calls of leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council members for peace in Palestine met with the worsened bombings and killings in Gaza and the West Bank in the same days.

Israeli forces killed 143 people from Tuesday evening to Wednesday in Gaza and left dozens more killed or missing on Thursday, the 77th Nakba Day for the Palestinian catastrophe, according to Al Jazeera and WAFA News Agency.

At the GCC-USA Summit co-chaired by Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud and Trump in Riyadh on Wednesday, the Crown Prince said: "We aim to work collaboratively with President Trump, and in partnership with the GCC countries to de-escalate tensions in the region, end the war in Gaza."

Trump, at the Saudi-US investment forum in Riyadh, did show his sympathy, saying: "The people of Gaza deserve a much better future."

In Doha, Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani told Trump in their talks: "We hope that this time we can do the right thing and bring peace here in the region, Mr President."

Trump, marveling at the marble inside the government center of Qatar, told nearly 10,000 US service people at Al Udeid Air Base, the largest US military base in the Middle East, of "ever more powerful American military", and described the situation in the Gaza Strip as a land of death and destruction, "not livable", reported Qatar News Agency.

Trump then declared: "I have concepts for Gaza that I think are very good, make it a freedom zone, let the United States get involved and make it just a freedom zone," Al Jazeera reported.

"Trump's policies will not resolve the US' current diplomatic challenges in the Middle East," said Liu Zhongmin, a professor of Middle East studies at Shanghai International Studies University. "Nor can they reconcile the fundamental contradiction between Washington's strategic retrenchment and its persistent efforts to maintain hegemonic dominance in the region."

Mike Gu in Hong Kong contributed to this story.

cuihaipei@chinadaily.com.cn