Posts
Why the Iran Deal Scares Saudi Arabia
Posted by F. Gregory Gause
After the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and
Germany concluded a preliminary agreement with Iran on Sunday, it did
not take long for regional critics of the deal to react. The Israeli
Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, blasted
the agreement as “a historic mistake.” Saudi Arabia, the other American
ally in the Middle East worried about an opening to Iran, took a
different approach, issuing a carefully worded statement that cautiously welcomed the deal.
The Saudis have no allies in American politics to rally against the Obama Administration, and no desire to set themselves against the other international powers who signed the agreement, including their security partners France and Great Britain, their fellow oil producer Russia, and their major oil customer China. But they are as unhappy as the Israelis, if for slightly different reasons. The Saudis are not merely concerned about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. They have a more profound fear: that geopolitical trends in the Middle East are aligning against them, threatening both their regional stature and their domestic security. The Saudis see an Iran that is dominant in Iraq and Lebanon, holding onto its ally in Syria, and now forging a new relationship with Washington—a rival, in short, without any obstacles to regional dominance, and one further emboldened to encourage Shiite populations in the Gulf monarchies, including Saudi Arabia, to oppose their Sunni rulers.
No comments:
Post a Comment