It is 80 years old now but still one of the more arresting images of the photographic age. On board the USS Quincy, an ailing Franklin Roosevelt meets King Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia (or Ibn Saud, as the Anglo-American world knew him). And so begins, or at least deepens, the US role in the Middle East. Consider it FDR’s parting gift.

“You shouldn’t have,” some would say, including men as dissimilar as Barack Obama and Donald Trump. Both of those presidents were first elected as sceptics of American involvement in the region. The botched occupation of Iraq was just one reason to turn elsewhere. At home, green tech and a shale bonanza were lessening the need for Gulf oil. Besides, there was China to worry about.

Well, here is a progress report on that deprioritisation of the Middle East. In June, the US attacked Iranian nuclear facilities in Operation Midnight Hammer. Trump has just agreed the first phase of a delicate Israeli-Palestinian peace, which entails an International Stabilisation Force in Gaza. At the bare minimum, the US will have to act as a convener and arm-twister of the regional actors, for an indefinite period. There are still some 40,000 US service members in the region.