How Iran and the Gulf Arab States Can Start a Dialogue Again
It’s hard to overstate the regional impact of the rivalry between Iran and several Gulf Arab states—most notably Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates—bordering in recent years on enmity.
It’s hard to overstate the regional impact of the rivalry between Iran and several Gulf Arab states—most notably Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates—bordering in recent years on enmity.
While these countries haven’t come close to direct warfare, tensions have impacted many regional conflicts in the Middle East including in Syria, Yemen, and Iraq, and festering instability in countries like Lebanon, Bahrain, and even among the Palestinians.
More even than the struggle against terrorist groups like al-Qaeda or Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), the Arab-Israeli conflict, and Turkish-Kurdish struggles, the confrontation between Iran and Gulf Arab countries has provided an ideological framework that generated proxy conflicts and greatly exacerbated existing ones. As a result, this has caused Iran and Gulf Arab countries to search for every opportunity to bedevil each other, and expand their own influence while limiting the other side.
These contradictions boiled over with the execution of the Saudi Shia dissident and secessionist cleric Nimr al-Nimr in January 2016, and the subsequent mob attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran, which led Riyadh to end its ties with Tehran. But tensions have been a constant feature of the relationship since the 1979 Iranian revolution, and particularly following the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq.
For the Gulf Arab countries, the future is more important than the present, but it is unclear if Iran, the United States, and Israel have the same vision.
Riyadh and Abu Dhabi urged President Trump not to attack Iran, but now that the war is into its second month, leaving the current situation in place would be an unthinkable fiasco for them.
Though they were unsuccessful in preventing the current conflict, and, as expected, have been dragged into the U.S.-Israeli confrontation with Iran, Gulf Arab countries remain crucial to hopes for limiting the war and bringing it to a quick resolution.
After decades of tolerating Hezbollah’s warmaking independence, the current crisis has compelled Lebanese leaders to ban its military activities; this project will do much to determine the reach Iran can maintain in the Arab world.
Gulf Arab countries urged the United States not to strike Iran, but now that is happening, they are in danger of being sucked into a conflict they cannot control but that will likely reshape their present and future realities.
On January 8, AGSI hosted a virtual roundtable with its leadership and scholars as they look ahead and assess trends likely to shape the Gulf region and U.S. foreign policy during the coming year.
