Iran’s Attacks on Arab Neighbors Lead to Rethinking of Post-War Alliances in a Stable and Peaceful Middle East

As President Trump envisions a new post-war Middle East, battle-scarred Gulf countries are already shifting attention to a genuine menace on their border, the Islamic Republic of Iran, from an long-perceived enemy, Israel. The countries of the Gulf have absorbed up to 85 percent of the missiles and drones from Iran, far more than Israel. Their economies, based on oil and gas exports and anchored in stability, are taking a hit. Foreign investors, imported scientists, and tourists that the Gulf states have increasingly lured in recent years are spooked. Officials of Saudi Arabia, a leader of the Arab and Muslim world, are sharpening attacks on the Islamic Republic. Commentators in the United Arab Emirates, which suffered more Iranian missile and drone attacks than any country, are berating Arabs for fetishizing the Palestinians over the Iranian menace. The old Palestine First paradigm is being rethought. “If they have to choose between supporting Palestine and their own survival, it’s a no brainer,” the founder of Middle East Media Research, Yigal Carmon, told The New York Sun. Yet he adds, a complete change of Arab approach toward Israel depends on “one question: How much of the Iranian menace will survive this war.”In what now seems like ancient history, in 2010 Israel’s Mossad killed a Hamas operative, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, at a Dubai hotel. A top UAE police officer called for international arrest warrants against the hit perpetrators and their superiors. Now that cop, Dubai’s deputy police commissioner, Dhahi Khalfan Tamim, says, “Oh, people of the Arabian Gulf, put trust in Israel.”The UAE might be the Arab world’s most Israel-friendly country, but even as at times it is only whispered, it is growing elsewhere too. Mr. Trump is banking on such a change of heart to create a new American-led Middle East.The president spoke recently of conversations he has long had with the Saudi crown prince, Mohamed bin Salman, on joining the Abraham Accords. The prince kept raising conditions for normalizing relations with Israel.“It’s now time,” Mr. Trump said. “We’ve now taken” the Iranians “out, and they are out bigly. We got to get into the Abraham Accords. And we hope all of the countries are going to be in the Abraham Accords.” Iran, he added, “has been known as the bully of the Middle East, but they are not the bully any longer. We saved the Middle East, saved not just Israel. We saved the Middle East.”The new idea — the Iranian Shiite regime is menacing more to Arabs than Jewish Israel — is far from universal. In the ancient pan-Arab paradigm, countries with little in common, and at times at war with one another, can unite behind the ever-elusive cause of a Palestinian state. That ideal is still prevalent in some Arab circles. “In the midst of the Gaza genocide and the seizure of the West Bank and the war on Iran and its catastrophic repercussions on the Gulf states, Trump is asking Arab countries to join what is called the Abraham Accords,” a former director of the International Atomic Energy Agency and veteran Egyptian politician, Mohamed ElBarradei, wrote on X. That call has “nothing to do with Arab interests.”Saudi Arabia: Will MbS make the move?The Saudi crown prince has made significant strides toward bringing the country into the 21st century, following decades in which it wallowed in extreme Islamist ideology. Yet the country’s old guard is clinging to its aversion to Western ideas. Images from Gaza have made any past attempt to formalize relations with Israel even harder politically. After the October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas, the crown prince, known as MbS, toughened his condition for formally recognizing Israel to include the actual establishment of a Palestinian state.Now, though, “the war in Iran actually makes it more likely the kingdom will want to have diplomatic relations with Israel, assuming Jerusalem gives something in the Palestinian issue,” a former Wall Street Journal publisher who often travels to Riyadh, Karen Elliott House, told the Sun. “This is clearly a time when Saudi Arabia needs to put Saudi interests first, so something short of a Palestinian state, which the crown prince earlier demanded, likely would suffice.”The Gulf: Are they united? Members of the Gulf Cooperation Council issued a joint statement recently, condemning the Islamic Republic’s “blatant aggressions, which constitute a flagrant violation of our sovereignty and territorial integrity.” The Kingdom of Jordan signed the statement alongside Gulf Cooperation Council members Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain, and Qatar. Yet one council member, Oman, was notably absent from the list. Oman had advocated on behalf of Tehran in negotiations leading up to the February 28 launch of Epic Fury. It has close commercial ties with the Islamic Republic and hosts Iran’s Yemeni ally, the Houthis, at Muscat. Although Iranian missiles and drones have landed in Oman since the start of the war, the Sultanate calls for mediation to end the war. Qatar shares a gas field with Iran. It too was attacked from Iranian soil. Like Oman, Qatar nevertheless advocates a negotiated settlement that would leave the Iranian regime intact. Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in contrast, are leaning on Mr. Trump, urging him to stay the course alongside Israel and keep degrading the Islamic Republic until the regime’s ultimate demise.The Gulf rush: Post-war opportunitiesPresident Volodymir Zelensky of Ukraine visited Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and Jordan over the weekend, signing defense cooperation agreements with its leaders. “Real security is built on partnership,” he said at Doha. Qatar ordered 2,000 Ukrainian drones to defend against Iranian drones. The UAE orders 5,000 units. The Gulf states can help Ukraine’s energy needs. India is also eyeing the Gulf states. In a phone call to MbS, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reported on X that he “reiterated India’s condemnation of the attacks targeting the regional energy infrastructure.” Delhi announced its intention to dispatch war ships to the Strait of Hormuz to escort tankers delivering oil to India. Meanwhile, the chief of staff for the Israel Defense Force, Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir, reportedly is in constant consultations with Gulf counterparts, coordinating regional defense against the Islamic Republic’s aggression. Beyond officers from the UAE and Bahrain, which maintain formal relations with Israel, General Zamir also coordinates moves with the Saudis and even Qataris — despite Doha’s support for Hamas and its endless anti-Israeli propaganda on Al Jazeera. Is the Islamic Republic’s assault on its neighbors, then, ushering in post-war, American-led stable Mideast alliances with Israel at the center?“There is a messianic view that says Iran will collapse immediately and peace will come upon us,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said recently. “It doesn’t work like that. There will be improvement in percentages, not a knockout, not just with Iran, but mainly with the region. The most important thing is that now the whole world understands what we’ve been saying: Iran is a global threat.”

Iran’s Attacks on Arab Neighbors Lead to Rethinking of Post-War Alliances in a Stable and Peaceful Middle East

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