Israel’s weakening of Iran is driving a Saudi realignment - The Jewish Chronicle

A profound realignment is under way in the Middle East, the consequence of multiple geopolitical earthquakes that have swept the region since the end of the Cold War. The weakening of the Arab state system that resulted from the US-led invasion of Iraq resulted in four separate, disruptive phenomena.

The first was the Arab Spring, which tried, unsuccessfully, to transition authoritarian dictatorships to democratic governance; the second was a Sunni Islamist uprising led by the Islamic State in the Levant and the Muslim Brotherhood in North Africa, which either led the charge in the Arab Spring or sought to exploit it to their own advantage; the third was a resurgence of independence claims by minorities who, as Arab authoritarianism lost its grip, challenged borders and governance to regain a measure of national freedom; and the fourth was Iran’s hegemonic rise through its ring-of-fire made of Shi’a proxies, once the Obama administration handed Iraq to Tehran and helped Iran’s push to redraw the regional map in its favour.

Though none of these four disruptions demolished the pre-existing order, they fundamentally altered it. The resulting tremors reshaped the landscape. The Islamic State was largely defeated in Iraq, but its offshoots gained power in Syria at the expense of Iran’s proxy, the minority Alawite-dominated regime of Bashar al-Assad that had terrorised its population for over 50 years.

While the Muslim Brotherhood was muzzled in Egypt, it gained powerful sponsors in Turkey and Qatar, spreading its tentacles to the West, entrenching itself in parts of Yemen, governing Tunisia, and keeping a foothold in every Arab country, including those where it is officially banned.

Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, remain split, with regional powers using the warring factions as proxies for their ambitions. The Kurds consolidated their autonomy in Northern Iraq but lost their influence in Northern Syria. The Druze of Syria sought and gained an Israeli protective umbrella against the Islamist proclivities of the new Damascus regime of Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose recent offensive against the Kurds seeks to re-establish the primacy of the Arab state and weaken Kurdish national ambitions on behalf of al-Sharaa’s Turkish overlords.

Iran’s gambit, meanwhile, went sideways, as Tehran suddenly saw its patiently built empire of loyal proxies succumb to Israel’s relentless, multi-front offensive. Its restless population, reeling from economic mismanagement and political oppression sensed weakness and took to the streets, in an unprecedented popular uprising that met a ferocious repression – a horrific carnage but also a sure sign of a weakened regime.

This context explains much of the current regional jockeying. Prior to October 7, 2023, when Hamas massacred 1,200 Israelis and took another 251 hostage, Israel and moderate Arab countries were on course toward a normalisation, largely spurred by anti-Iranian concerns. By crushing the Iranian axis, Israel neutralised the adversary its moderate Arab partners and would-be partners feared the most. Israel’s victory, however, triggered a chain of events that made normalisation, especially with Saudi Arabia, less, not more likely. To some of its erstwhile shy, tentative friends, Israel now looks like an unstoppable juggernaut, more dangerous than an Islamic Republic of Iran cut down to size.

First, Israel’s pounding of Iranian assets in Lebanon and Syria precipitated the collapse of the Assad regime and Syria’s takeover by Ahmed al-Sharaa, a Turkish Sunni proxy with past links to Al Qaeda. The Arab League was already on course to reintegrate Assad in its ranks, and it saw a possible breakdown of Syria along sectarian faultlines as a threat to regional stability. The Saudis moved in to prop up al-Sharaa – a Turkish proxy – thus containing Israel’s attempts to expand its influence and use Syria’s weakness to both improve its control over strategic sites in South Syria and extend a lifeline to Syria’s beleaguered Druze minority.

Second, Israel’s military prowess – and its newly found willingness to cross any red line – unsettled the Saudis, especially after Israel’s bombing raid on Doha, Qatar, sought to eliminate the Hamas leadership.

Third, despite the havoc Israel wreaked in Gaza, Hamas is still standing thanks to the influence that Turkey, Qatar and Egypt leveraged to protect it and shepherd it to a US-imposed truce.

Fourth, the fracturing of Yemen and Somalia is challenging Saudi Arabia’s influence and fifth, the sudden possibility of a collapse of Iran’s regime has created both opportunities and challenges to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey vis-à-vis Israel.

The vacuum Iran’s diminished role has created has given Sunni powers the ability to fill it with their own resources and influence, in a way that enhances their status and challenges Israel as a rising power. But the collapse of Iran’s regime could create instability and chaos along its borders, whereas a successful transition to a pro-Western, potentially democratic form of governance where Islam recedes in the background could create a formidable rival that, with its oil resources and educated, young population becomes again a competitor to the Sunni powers that is suddenly more attractive to both Israel and the West.

Hence the realignment in Riyadh alongside Ankara and Doha to plead with Washington against a coup de grâce against the Ayatollahs, which finds another natural outcome in the sudden Saudi support for Muslim Brotherhood affiliates in Yemen and an almost hysterical opposition to Israel’s recognition of Somaliland as a state.

Missing in this Sunni realignment are the United Arab Emirates. The UAE has not shied away from criticising Israel during the Gaza war but it has also made a strategic decision about its relationship with Jerusalem – not an expedient, temporary, tactical alignment dictated by fear of a common enemy, but one where the UAE seeks to position itself as the indispensable commercial and economic partner on the critical East-West route linking Asia to Europe.

The UAE has also chosen to make a principled stance against radical Islam – outlawing the Muslim Brotherhood and promoting a moderate, tolerant brand instead. In its commercial pursuits, it has used military power and financial resources to build strategic alliances that break ranks with both Riyadh and pan-Arab sentiment, and with good reason and results.

This alliance, between Abu Dhabi and Jerusalem, is the extraordinary outcome of the past two decades of Middle East turmoil – two countries that despite their small size and neighbourhood challenges have invested in prosperity, bet on innovation, opened themselves to globalisation, diversified their economies, and used the dividends of their investments to build resilient societies, strong alliances, and cutting-edge militaries.

The region is very different from what it was on the eve of 9/11 almost 25 years ago. And the earthquakes that jolted it are still causing aftershocks. But the emerging alignments are offering some new clarity, especially for Western observers, who might wish to think twice before insisting that our traditional regional allies – Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Egypt – remain the pillars of stability they once were.

Emanuele Ottolenghi is a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Research on Terror Financing (CENTEF)

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