Analysis: Tougher on Israel, steady on NATO - how a Harris foreign policy could look

PHOTO CAPTION: U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris delivers a speech during a Get Out The Vote rally ahead of the Democratic presidential primaries at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, South Carolina, U.S., February 2, 2024. REUTERS/Leah Millis

By Matt Spetalnick and Simon Lewis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to stick largely to Joe Biden's foreign policy playbook on key issues such as Ukraine, China and Iran but could strike a tougher tone with Israel over the Gaza war if she replaces the president at the top of the Democratic ticket and wins the U.S. November election.

As the apparent frontrunner for the nomination after Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed her on Sunday, Harris would bring on-the-job experience, personal ties forged with world leaders, and a sense of global affairs gained during a Senate term and as Biden's second-in-command.

But running against Republican candidate Donald Trump, she would also have a major vulnerability - a troubled situation at the U.S.-Mexico border that has bedeviled Biden and become a top campaign issue. Harris was tasked at the start of his term with addressing the root causes of high irregular migration, and Republicans have sought to make her the face of the problem.

On a range of global priorities, said analysts, a Harris presidency would resemble a second Biden administration.

"She may be a more energetic player but one thing you shouldn't expect – any immediate big shifts in the substance of Biden's foreign policy," said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator for Democratic and Republican administrations.

Harris has signaled, for instance, that she would not deviate from Biden's staunch support for NATO and would continue backing Ukraine in its fight against Russia. That stands in sharp contrast to a pledge by former president Trump to fundamentally alter the U.S. relationship with the alliance and the doubts he has raised about future weapons supplies to Kyiv.

STAYING THE COURSE ON CHINA?

A lawyer by training and a former California attorney general, Harris struggled in the first half of Biden's term to find her footing, not helped by being saddled early on with a major part of the intractable immigration portfolio amid record crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border.

That followed a failed 2020 presidential campaign that was widely considered lackluster.

If she becomes the nominee, Democrats will be hoping Harris will be more effective at communicating her foreign policy goals.

In the second half of Biden's presidency, Harris - the country's first Black and Asian American vice president - has elevated her profile on issues ranging from China and Russia to Gaza and become a known quantity to many world leaders.

At this year's Munich Security Conference she delivered a tough speech slamming Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and pledging an "ironclad" U.S. commitment to NATO's Article 5 requirement for mutual self-defense.

The Kremlin said on Monday that Harris had made no noteworthy contribution to relations with Moscow except for statements "unfriendly towards our country." She has accused Russia of waging a "barbaric and inhumane" war in Ukraine.

On China, Harris has long positioned herself within Washington's bipartisan mainstream on the need for the U.S. to counter China's influence, especially in Asia. She would likely maintain Biden's stance of confronting Beijing when necessary while also seeking areas of cooperation, analysts say.

Harris has made several trips aimed at bolstering relations in the economically dynamic region, including one to Jakarta in September to fill in for Biden at a summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). During the visit, Harris accused China of trying to coerce smaller neighbors with its territorial claims in the disputed South China Sea.

Biden also dispatched Harris on travels to shore up alliances with Japan and South Korea, which have had reason to worry about Trump's commitment to their security.

"She demonstrated to the region that she was enthusiastic to promote the Biden focus on the Indo-Pacific," said Murray Hiebert, a senior associate of the Southeast Asia Program at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies.

While she could not match the "diplomatic chops" Biden had developed over decades, "she did fine," he added.

However, like her boss, Harris has been prone to the occasional verbal gaffe. On a tour of the Demilitarized Zone between South and North Korea in September 2022 to reassert Washington's support for Seoul, she mistakenly touted a U.S. "alliance with the Republic of North Korea."

If Harris becomes her party's standard-bearer and can overcome Trump's lead in pre-election opinion polls to win the White House, the Israel-Palestinian conflict would rank high on her agenda, especially if the Gaza war is still raging.

Although as vice president she has mostly echoed Biden in firmly backing Israel's right to defend itself after Hamas militants carried out a deadly cross-border raid on Oct. 7, she has at times stepped out slightly ahead of the president in criticizing Israel's military approach.

In March, she bluntly stated that Israel was not doing enough to ease a "humanitarian catastrophe" during its ground offensive in the Palestinian enclave. Later, she did not rule out "consequences" for Israel if it launched a full-scale invasion of refugee-packed Rafah in southern Gaza.

Such language has raised the possibility that Harris, as president, might take at least a stronger rhetorical line with Israel than Biden, analysts say.

While her 81-year-old boss has a long history with Israeli leaders and has even called himself a "Zionist," Harris, 59, lacks his visceral personal connection to the country.

She maintains closer ties to Democratic progressives, some of whom have pressed Biden to attach conditions to U.S. weapons shipments to Israel out of concern for high Palestinian civilian casualties in Gaza.

But analysts do not expect there would be a big shift in U.S. policy toward Israel, Washington's closest ally in the Middle East.

Halie Soifer, who served as national security adviser to Harris during the then-senator's first two years in Congress, said Harris' support of Israel has been just as strong as Biden's. "There really has been no daylight to be found" between the two, she said.

Harris is expected to have a previously scheduled meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his visit to Washington this week, her first encounter with a foreign leader since Biden ended his re-election bid.

IRAN NUCLEAR THREAT

Harris could also be expected to hold firm against Israel's regional arch-foe, Iran, whose recent nuclear advances have drawn increased U.S. condemnation.

Jonathan Panikoff, formerly the U.S. government's deputy national intelligence officer for the Middle East, said the growing threat of "weaponization" of Iran's nuclear program could be an early major challenge for a Harris administration, especially if Tehran decides to test the new U.S. leader.

After a series of failed attempts, Biden has shown little interest in returning to negotiations with Tehran over resuming the 2015 international nuclear agreement, which Trump abandoned during his presidency.

Harris would be unlikely to make any major overtures without serious signs that Iran is ready to make concessions.

Even so, Panikoff, now at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington, said: "There's every reason to believe the next president will have to deal with Iran. It's bound to be one of the biggest problems."

(Reporting By Matt Spetalnick and Simon Lewis; Additional reporting by Jonathan Landay; Writing by Matt SpetalnickEditing by Don Durfee and Rosalba O'Brien)