The ongoing conflict between Iran and Israel has divided the Arab World, apart from posing a serious threat to the delicate balancing act of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Saudi Arabia and Jordan have already denied their involvement in the conflict between the two arch rivals in West Asia. In the third week of April 2024, Amman claimed that it shot down the Iranian drones and missiles in an attempt to save its citizens and would have done the same for the Israeli missiles too. Meanwhile, Riyadh has rejected media reports that Saudi Arabia helped Israel destroy an Iranian Consulate in the Syrian capital of Damascus on April 1, 2024.

Noted Saudi author and commentator on the Politics and Economics Ali Shihabi has mentioned in an article (published in the Arab News on April 16, 2024) that the direct conflict between the Islamic Republic and the Jewish Nation has prompted Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations to pay a lot of attention to their respective position in regional geopolitics. He stated that the Arab nations would have to clear their stand on this crisis and to determine how they would behave, if tension escalates in the coming days.

A section of political analysts is of the opinion that Israel destroyed the Iranian Consulate in Syria in order to divert the global attention from the Gaza Strip where the Israeli Forces committed genocide. However, Shihabi believes that although the Iranian regime receives support from Russia and China, it lacks cooperation from the GCC nations mainly because of its close ties with proxies hostile to the Kingdom. Israel, too, would not receive support from the Arab World due to its horrific atrocities in Gaza and its opposition to a Two-State Solution in Palestine. A material progress towards a peaceful settlement of the Palestine issue is crucial for a breakthrough in relations between Riyadh and Tel Aviv.

The GCC countries have made a mistake by not listening to Iran’s words. Instead, they have always tried to judge the Iranian Regime with the light of 1979 Islamic Revolution. The GCC countries thought that Iran wanted to export its ideology and expand its influence throughout the region. Tehran’s actions in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen are to some extent responsible for this. Furthermore, Ayatollah Khomeini and Ayatollah Khamenei often directly criticised the Governments of the GCC as being illegitimate, making it difficult for Iran to normalise ties with the Arab World.

Shihabi added that “Iran’s pretensions of supporting the Palestinian Cause are recognised in the Gulf for what they are: a naked attempt to grab Sunni market share in public support, while enabling Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad to act as continuous spoilers (with the tacit cooperation of Israel’s Right Wing) of any attempt by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to move forward on a Two-State Settlement”. Hence Saudi and the other GCC countries consider Iran as a dangerous adversary that dreams of bringing down the existing order in the Gulf and establishing its hegemony over the region.

As expected, the US has found a Russia link to Iran’s unprecedented drone and missile attack against Israel from its soil on April 13, 2024 that came as a response to the Israeli raid on the Iranian Consulate in Damascus on April 1. The Washington Post has made this stunning claim in a report, mentioning that a Russian arms manufacturer might have assisted Tehran against any future attacks. The Russian arms maker has already been sanctioned by Washington DC. The report further claimed that the Russian arms factory would provide Iran with “advanced jets and air defence technology“, if Israel retaliates. However, it still remains unclear whether the deal has been completed between Tehran and Moscow.

Meanwhile, China has strongly condemned the Israeli attack on the Iranian Consulate in Syria, stressing that it was a clear “violation of International Law”. On April 16 (2024), Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi dialled his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian to express Beijing’s opposition to the attack, stating that it was a “serious and unacceptable violation of International Law”. The Asian Giant’s reaction came amid the rising spiral of violence in West Asia and the prevailing situation between Iran and Israel. With this, China has hinted that it would back Iran in case tension escalates in West Asia.

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das