As President Donald Trump arrives in Canada to meet with world leaders at the Group of Seven summit, his key priorities — shaking up global trade and bolstering international security — threaten to be overshadowed by the escalating conflict between Iran and Israel.
Starting Monday morning, Canada will host the leaders of the UK, Germany, Italy, France, Japan and the EU in Kananaskis, Alberta, for the annual convening of the world’s advanced economies, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the first G7 summit. Leaders from other nations, including Mexico, South Africa, Australia, India, Brazil, South Korea and Ukraine were also invited, with bi- and multilateral meetings between world leaders expected throughout the week.
Trump’s participation comes as his second-term agenda has focused primarily on resetting trade relationships with foreign nations, toughening U.S. immigration policies, bolstering American energy and resolving conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East — though those specific peace-making efforts have yet to materialize.
And as the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Hamas wars proceed with no end in sight, attention shifted days before the summit to Iran, following the Israeli Defense Force’s Thursday night attack on Iranian nuclear sites and Tehran’s retaliatory bombing campaign. Since the conflict broke out, at least 14 Israelis were killed and hundreds wounded, according to Israeli emergency services, while 224 Iranians were killed and upwards of 1,200 injured, the health ministry said.
Trump early Sunday publicly reiterated a call for peace: “We will have PEACE, soon, between Israel and Iran! Many calls and meetings now taking place,” he wrote on Truth Social. But by the same evening, his tone seemed to shift.
“Sometimes they have to fight it out, but we’ll see what happens. I think there’s a good chance for a deal,” he told reporters as he departed the White House for Canada.
The violence raises the stakes for a summit already jam-packed with issues to address.
“I think we have an unprecedented, comprehensive configuration of interconnected global crises,” John Kirton, a professor of political science at the University of Toronto and founder of the G7 Research Group, told Scripps News. “Never before have the stakes been so high, the challenges been so great.”
Leading up to the summit kickoff, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney laid out his priorities for the convening, including ‘protecting our communities and the world,’ ‘building energy security and accelerating the digital transition,’ and ‘securing the partnerships of the future.’
The U.S. similarly expects discussions on trade and the global economy, critical minerals, migrant and drug smuggling, wildfire prevention and response, international security, artificial intelligence and energy security, according to a senior U.S. official.
“The President is eager to pursue his goals in all of these areas, including making America's trade relationships fair and reciprocal, unlocking new markets for American energy exports, and positioning the U.S. to be the world leader and international partner of choice on AI technologies,” the official said.
The G7 will be Trump's first global leaders’ summit since he assumed office for the second time.
“There's a lot of misunderstanding globally about what he's trying to achieve, and I think that some countries and leaders and elites have convinced themselves that he wants change and disruption for disruption sake, and that this is about sowing chaos,” said Alex Gray, who served as National Security Council chief of staff during Trump’s first term. “That's not what this is about, right? There is a strategy that he is seeking. You may disagree with it, but there is a purpose here, and I think this is an opportunity more for explanation than anything else.”
Hope for peace in Ukraine-Russia and Israel-Gaza conflicts
Russia’s war in Ukraine is expected to feature heavily in discussions as the G7 meeting paves the way for the NATO leaders’ summit two weeks later.
“I think, firstly, he's going to be pressing for increased defense spending by all of the G7 members, and that will be a preview of what he's going to, I think, say in The Hague two weeks from now. And I think he's going to champion greater commitment from US allies to do more in terms of the defense of the free world,” said Nile Gardiner, director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at The Heritage Foundation.
Trump pushed for a negotiated peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, but thus far, Russia has not agreed to a ceasefire.
The Europeans who have backed Ukraine are trying to move Trump in the ‘right direction,’ while the Ukrainians will view their presence as a positive, according to a former US official.
“There's still concern among Europeans that there's always this escalation potential between Trump and Zelensky. So there is the general idea to portray Ukraine and Zelensky, not as the troublemaker and the relationship, but to portray them as the ones who are in line with Trump's goals, and that Vladimir Putin is the one who's the problem here,” said Liana Fix, a fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Trump’s trade war earns global scrutiny, pushing climate to the backseat
Trade is expected to be a key priority for the president. U.S. officials have been negotiating with trading partners in hopes of reaching bilateral trade deals, as Trump seeks to reach what he views as fair trade agreements.
“My guess would be going into this weekend, the U.S. would like to come out of it with some deals with certain countries. You can see they're creeping up to that with the Japanese, with the Europeans, with others,” said Penny Naas, who focuses on trade and economic work at the German Marshall Fund.
Naas noted it’s not clear, though, whether they will be able to announce deals or if the summit would serve as a “check-in point” for the leaders, where group dynamics could also be on display.
“I'm just looking to see if we're going to start to see the emergence of new groupings, and how some of the other people that are going to be there, not just the G7 but the other countries that have also been invited to participate- are we going to start to see some of these dynamics start to play out around other alliances that may be forming as the US kind of reconfigures and recalibrates the economic order in the world,” Naas said.
Trump himself hinted at the possibility of reaching trade deals upon his departure for Canada, telling reporters he thinks the U.S. will have “a few” new trade deals to announce soon.
Trump’s tariffs have been felt especially hard in Alberta, owing in part to the region’s status as a key exporter of oil and gas products.
“People are very uneasy about what's next and what's around the corner,” Deborah Yedlin, president and CEO of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, told Scripps News. “How do you see through the noise that is probably causing investment decisions to be on hold?”
The picturesque landscape of the Canadian Rocky Mountains also put the spotlight on climate issues, experts said, though few expected any concrete movement towards climate change mitigation efforts given Trump’s very public support for the fossil fuel industry.
“It feels like it’s not high on the priority list,” Yedlin said, though she noted the scenery should make for a serene backdrop.
“It's a safe place to have a conversation,” she said of Kananaskis. “You're in the mountains; your only threats are bears and maybe some moose.”
Will there be a joint leaders’ statement?
One question remaining as leaders arrived in Alberta Sunday evening was what form, if any, a joint communique between the participating nations would take.
Historically, such meetings would conclude with all participating nations releasing a joint statement of priorities naming key action items to work on in the coming years. But Carney has reportedly decided to abandon that practice. During his first term in office, Trump publicly criticized climate measures included in the 2017 summit’s communique and withdrew U.S. support from the communique in 2018, the last time Canada hosted the G7.
"Canada has worked with G7 colleagues to craft short, action-oriented leader statements on key issues of common interest,” a senior U.S. official said.
Disparate views on the solutions to pressing conflicts lower the likelihood of nations making any to specific action items.
“One of the reasons, I think, that they are not going ahead with the communique is specifically to avoid the need to try and grapple with differing positions and expose those to public scrutiny on an issue as central and at this point, fraught as Russia Ukraine” said Douglas Rediker, a senior fellow at Brookings in the global economy and development program.
Concrete deliverables out of the meetings are not expected, which, according to Rediker, is generally the case.
“This is going to be largely focused on everyone getting a sense of how to deal with President Trump,” he said.
However, some experts do expect language on Russia-Ukraine.
“I do think that we're likely to see a statement on, on, on Ukraine, directed at Russia, calling on Russia to end the war and to, you know, to negotiate, you know, a peaceful settlement,” said Gardiner.
The ‘51st State’
Also hanging over the summit are Trump’s ongoing threats to Canadian sovereignty. Since his inauguration, the president has repeatedly referred to Canada as the “51st State” — comments Carney addressed directly during a meeting with Trump in the Oval Office last month.
“As you know from real estate, there are some places that are never for sale,” Carney told Trump. “It’s not for sale. It won’t be for sale, ever.”
Yedlin said that while Canadians across the board were angered by Trump’s remarks, the taunts succeeded in fostering unity within the country.
“President Trump has reawakened a sense of unity in this country that we haven't seen for a long time, that has also refocused our economic potential and how we have to work together,” she said.
And whereas Trump’s meetings with foreign leaders at the White House have resulted in several viral moments, experts hypothesized the G7 summit would proceed without the same dramatics.
“With nine leaders around the table, there will be no ‘Zelensky moment’ or ‘Ramaphosa moment,’ Kirton said, referencing Trump’s contentious Oval Office exchanges with the Ukrainian and South African leaders.
“We welcome people, because if we don't have people at the table, then we don't have the conversations we need to have,” Yedlin echoed. “Even the difficult and challenging guest is welcome.”
