Trump to meet Middle East leaders, Zelenskiy at G7 summit

Donald Trump will arrive at next week’s G7 summit in Évian-les-Bains with a packed diplomatic ledger: meetings with Middle Eastern leaders, a working session with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and a summit agenda dominated by war, sanctions and alliance management. Senior U.S. administration officials said the president will also meet separately with the leaders of Egypt, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, France and India, underscoring how much of Washington’s attention will be split across several crises at once.

The choreography matters because it turns the G7 into more than a ceremonial gathering. No formal bilateral meeting with Zelenskiy is planned, though the two leaders could still meet on the sidelines. That distinction suggests the White House is keeping its Ukraine engagement real, but tightly managed, while layering in parallel talks with Middle Eastern governments at a moment when the region’s instability, Iran diplomacy and the war in Ukraine are all pressing on the same summit calendar.

France will host the meeting from June 15 to 17 after taking the G7 presidency on January 1. The group has met in its current seven-member format since 2014, when Russia’s violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity pushed the format away from the G8. That history gives extra weight to any session involving Zelenskiy, especially as European allies look for signs that Washington will stay aligned on Moscow even while it tries to manage other flashpoints.

For the White House, success will be measured in concrete diplomatic outcomes, not just photographs. That means clearer coordination with allies on Ukraine, sharper pressure on Moscow and Tehran, and at least some shared line on the next phase of Middle East diplomacy. If the summit produces only separate meetings, generic statements and visible effort without policy movement, it will look more like reactive scramble than strategy.

The setting also reflects the security stakes around the meeting itself. Swiss authorities have been preparing because Évian sits close to the Swiss border, and the summit is being treated as a major event with consequences beyond protocol. France has pushed to project unity while avoiding direct confrontation with Trump, but the real test in Évian will be whether Washington can convert a crowded schedule into a coherent line across Ukraine, the Middle East and the broader alliance system.