JERUSALEM — The White House said President Joe Biden would not shake hands when meeting with leaders in the Middle East due to COVID-19 risks, a policy he undermined almost immediately while greeting Israeli leaders in Jerusalem.
The shift in policy comes amid questions over whether Biden will be photographed shaking hands with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman when he travels to the kingdom on Friday.
When asked whether the president was seeking to avoid such optics, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre insisted the policy was a matter of health safety.
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“Always on these trips, we take precautions, and so, for us, this is not abnormal,” Jean-Pierre said, adding that the recommendation came on the advice of Biden’s doctor “to keep him safe and to keep all of us safe.”
Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan said foreign leaders have adopted “different iterations, different manifestations” of COVID-19 protocol during the pandemic. The current phase demands reduced physical contact, he added.
Upon arrival, Biden fist-bumped several Israeli officials on the red carpet. But the rule quickly fell by the wayside, with Biden spotted shaking hands with opposition leader and former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The president was again seen shaking hands while meeting Israeli officials during a Defense Ministry briefing on Iron Dome and Iron Beam technology.
In the days leading up to the trip, the president was spotted shaking hands with congressional leaders on the White House South Lawn.
But Biden has bristled at questions over his plans to meet Salman, whom a U.S. intelligence report deemed responsible for the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
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In an op-ed ahead of his visit, Biden said he would not compromise his human rights agenda and argued that his administration had ended the Trump administration’s “blank-check policy” toward the kingdom.
