Commenting on the dramatic escalation of violence between Israel and Palestine in the recent days, Croatian President Zoran Milanovic said on Thursday that the United States should define its foreign policy more clearly, noting that the new administration's energy policy was making that part of the world less interesting to the US than before.

“I look at the American position. Israel is defending itself, but is also attacking. (…) The Americans will have to better define their foreign policy and make it clearer,” Milanovic said.

Unlike his predecessor, Republican Donald Trump, the new Democrat President Joe Biden has distanced himself from the Middle East, but is now aware that he cannot distance himself completely, he said.

“That part of the world is not as interesting as it used to be because of the US new energy policy, notably because of this administration which is much more focused on renewable sources and less on oil, on hydrocarbons which America now produces in sufficient quantities on its own. So the question is: what is their strategic objective in the Middle East other than acting as police?” Milanovic said. “These are extremely important issues that put us in a moral dilemma.”

Milanovic said that his sons were asking him why the US was treating Russian President Vladimir Putin as an enemy, while at the same time supporting “highly parademocratic regimes, regimes that have formal but not democratic legitimacy or regimes that are declared allies even though they dissolve their political foes and journalists in acid,” alluding to Turkish media reports of the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.

“It is hard to convince your allies, and we are an ally, that you’re doing the right thing. I don’t see Croatian interest in that. If you want me to be your ally, you have to give me, as your partner, at least some thin narrative. OK, we will be allies, but we don’t have to fight other people’s wars or engage in other people’s arguments,” Milanović said.