A couple of weeks ago, Joe Biden went to Israel and Saudi Arabia. This was not a summer vacation. The president had goals. Did he achieve any? Did he set any back?

Foreign Podicy host Clifford D. May poses these and other questions to Michael Singh and Hussain Abdul-Hussain.

Michael is the Managing Director and Lane-Swig Senior Fellow at The Washington Institute. From 2005 to 2008, he was senior director for Middle East affairs at the White House National Security Council.

He’s also served as special assistant to secretaries of state Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell and at the U.S. embassy in Israel.

Hussain is a research fellow at FDD. Formerly a managing editor of Beirut’s Daily Star, he has reported from war zones in Lebanon and Iraq. He headed the Washington Bureau of the Kuwaiti daily Alrai.

He’s been a Visiting Fellow with London’s Chatham House, and he’s published in numerous Arabic and English language publications, including in The New York Times and The Washington Post.