The recent Israel-Iran crisis could catalyze an expanded role for the Gulf states in maintaining regional security.
The June eruption of hostilities between Israel and Iran once again exposed the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries to the acute dangers of regional instability. Yet it also raises a deeper question: can the GCC states—particularly Saudi Arabia and the UAE, often seen as emerging “middle powers”—together with their smaller but diplomatically agile neighbors, move beyond reactive crisis diplomacy to play a more strategic, security-enhancing role in shaping the region’s future?
Saudi Arabia and the UAE have shown growing capacities for diplomatic ambition and influence. At the same time, other GCC states such as Qatar and Oman, though not middle powers by conventional definitions, have exerted outsized influence through conflict mediation and humanitarian diplomacy.
But their ability to meet the moment is constrained by familiar conditions: continued reliance on the American security umbrella (even amid doubts about its reliability), deep mistrust of Iran, and unease with Israeli military assertiveness. Even so, the current moment may offer a rare opportunity—not to transform the regional order overnight, but to take incremental steps that reduce risk, open communication channels, and begin shaping a more resilient security environment. This ambition is increasingly reflected not only in rhetoric but in real economic and diplomatic shifts.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE: Economic Power and Diplomatic Ambition
In recent years, Gulf states—especially Saudi Arabia and the UAE—have moved well beyond their role as traditional energy suppliers to become assertive economic players on the global stage. They have leveraged their sovereign wealth, central location, and business-friendly environments to position themselves as hubs for finance, logistics, and emerging technologies.
Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) have become some of the world’s most active sovereign investors, financing ventures across renewable energy, AI, biotech, and electric vehicles. Riyadh’s drive to host global sporting events, secure major IPOs, and establish itself as a financial gateway between East and West reflects not only a rebranding campaign but also a deeper ambition to shape global economic trends.
This growing economic clout has been accompanied by a more confident and independent diplomatic posture. The Gulf states’ rising diplomatic ambition is in part a response to declining confidence in the reliability of the US security umbrella, as well as regional uncertainty driven by both Iranian adventurism and Israeli military assertiveness. Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in particular, have demonstrated a willingness to engage with new partners and recalibrate existing alliances.
The China-brokered Saudi-Iran rapprochement in 2023 marked a turning point—signaling not just openness to diplomacy with rivals, but a readiness to diversify strategic partnerships beyond the West. The Gulf’s active mediation roles in Sudan, Ukraine grain negotiations, and the Israel-Gaza conflict reflect a new willingness to act as regional diplomatic entrepreneurs, aimed at shaping outcomes rather than just reacting to them.
Gulf states are also positioning themselves as key actors in the evolving architecture of global digital infrastructure. The UAE and Saudi Arabia have invested heavily in the development of sub-sea cable routes, data centers, and cloud computing partnerships with global tech firms. At the same time, they are increasingly involved in conversations about AI governance, cybersecurity norms, and tech investment screening, reflecting how economic statecraft and strategic ambition are now deeply intertwined.
This rising ambition—spurred by frustration with external security guarantees and sharpened by global realignments—has begun to shape how Gulf states engage with crises, including the recent Israel-Iran escalation.
The Gulf States’ Strategic Vulnerability and Global Stakes
Geography and economic structure render the Gulf states exceptionally vulnerable to any escalation between Israel and Iran. The Strait of Hormuz, through which nearly 30 percent of the world’s oil transits, is a choke-point whose security is vital to global economic stability. Any military confrontation in this area threatens not only the flow of energy but also the broader integrity of global markets.
The impact of the June escalation was immediate and multi-layered. Major air carriers, such as Emirates and Qatar Airways, saw flights canceled or rerouted. Even before the US strikes, the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran had already driven up ocean freight rates on the Shanghai-Jebel Ali route, which ends at the Arabian Gulf’s largest port.
Reuters reported that, although no direct attacks occurred in the Strait of Hormuz, tensions escalated after two oil tankers collided and caught fire nearby. The incident coincided with a spike in electronic interference affecting ship navigation systems across the Gulf, disrupting AIS transmissions and complicating maritime operations. Brent crude surged but stabilized following the ceasefire, highlighting how quickly Gulf tensions can trigger price volatility.
Fractured Unity: Divergent Gulf State Responses to the Iran-Israel War
The GCC states responded with a mix of condemnation, calculation, and cautious diplomacy. At the 48th and 49th extraordinary sessions of the GCC Ministerial Council, foreign ministers issued a unified denunciation of the Israeli offensive against Iran, labeling it a flagrant violation of the UN Charter and international law as well as a serious threat to regional stability.
Despite strained ties with Iran, GCC foreign ministers made clear their opposition to Israeli strikes on Iranian territory, viewing them as unprovoked and destabilizing. Their collective stance reflected shared concern about conflict spillover, threats to energy infrastructure, and broader regional escalation. Yet beneath this show of unity, strategic divergence was evident.
Oman, long a trusted interlocutor between Tehran and Washington, had hosted five rounds of US-Iran nuclear talks. The Israeli strikes effectively derailed a planned sixth round, prompting Muscat to issue an unusually pointed rebuke, condemning the attack as a reckless affront to its mediation efforts and a destabilizing blow to regional diplomacy.
Qatar, which absorbed the direct fallout of the Al Udeid air base strike, assumed a dual role—both as a target and as a mediator. Doha quickly offered to broker a ceasefire between Tehran and Tel Aviv, reinforcing its credentials as a diplomatic fixer and positioning itself above the fray.
Saudi Arabia’s response suggested a rhetorical pivot. In a call with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman invoked Islamic solidarity and portrayed Israeli aggression as the more immediate threat to regional stability and, by extension, to the success of Vision 2030. Yet, this posture may have been more tactical than transformative.
Indeed, a plausible subtext is that some Gulf leaders, while publicly condemning the strikes, privately welcomed the degradation of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. For Riyadh and Abu Dhabi, the attack may have served a long-standing strategic interest—curbing Iran’s nuclear ambitions—without requiring open endorsement or involvement.
UAE diplomatic advisor Anwar Gargash’s call for Iran to “restore trust with its Gulf neighbors” subtly conveyed skepticism about the durability of détente. It also suggested that the onus remains on Tehran to stabilize ties. Meanwhile, Bahrain and Kuwait, both hosts to major US military installations, issued more restrained responses, focused on contingency planning and conflict mitigation while avoiding overt alignment with either side.
This divergence in tone and emphasis highlights a broader tension within the GCC, where member states are eager to assert their regional agency but remain reliant on external security guarantees and divided in their views on both Iranian intentions and Israeli methods.
Gulf State Crisis Management to Resilience-Building
The ceasefire following the June escalation has thus far held. Nonetheless, the region remains on edge. A breakdown could spark fresh hostilities, leading to severe economic and humanitarian consequences. Israel and US strikes on Iranian nuclear sites prompted urgent GCC warnings to the IAEA. While many Gulf states once welcomed the JCPOA’s collapse, they now pragmatically back revived negotiations as the least-bad option. However, deep distrust persists, and the risk of renewed conflict remains high.
Gulf states thus find themselves navigating a volatile regional environment where US disengagement has exposed both the limits of relying on external security guarantees and the challenges of managing their own defense. While they remain constrained by capacity, dependence, and the complexity of regional rivalries, this does not render them impotent.
On the contrary, the current crisis could catalyze pragmatic, longer-term thinking. Even modest steps could help lay the groundwork for more durable security arrangements.
A regional early warning and incident response mechanism is one such step. Built around shared protocols for real-time data exchange, this framework could include GCC states, Iran, and potentially Israel, with technical backing from the IAEA, WHO, and relevant UN agencies. Its scope could cover radiological accidents, cyber intrusions, or public health emergencies. While modest in ambition, such mechanisms can have a profoundly stabilizing effect.
A Gulf-wide nuclear safety and transparency initiative offers another opportunity. With the expansion of civilian nuclear energy programs in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and with Iran’s ongoing nuclear activities, the need for regionally tailored safety protocols is growing. Under IAEA guidance, the GCC could lead to the creation of a platform for joint safety drills, peer reviews, and coordinated emergency planning. This would reinforce non-proliferation norms while creating neutral channels of technical dialogue, even among political adversaries.
A regional health and pandemic preparedness consortium is perhaps the most accessible entry point for inclusive cooperation. Bringing together GCC states, Iran, and Israel under a shared concern for public health security, such a platform—facilitated by the WHO or a Gulf-based public health hub—could promote coordination on disease surveillance, vaccine distribution, and crisis response. A cooperative framework in this sphere would not only save lives but also establish habits of cooperation that could be expanded to other domains.
These kinds of functional, non-political initiatives won’t resolve the region’s deepest rivalries. Still, they can mitigate the risks of miscalculation, open channels of communication, and gradually build the scaffolding for more durable security arrangements.
Gulf sovereign wealth funds and development assistance offer powerful tools of inducement. These could be deployed to offer Iran and others targeted economic incentives—such as re-opening trade corridors or supporting energy-tech partnerships—in exchange for restraint or cooperation. Similarly, initiatives like the Global Alliance for the Implementation of the Two-State Solution reflect Gulf aspirations to influence diplomacy through economic statecraft. If linked to material benefits for both Iran and Israel, such proposals could help reframe diplomacy around opportunity rather than confrontation.
While today’s political climate may not yet allow for such mechanisms to be implemented, tabling them now can serve a de-escalatory function. Proposals grounded in shared risk and technical cooperation offer rare, depoliticized opportunities to build habits of communication and trust.
The Gulf States: From Reactors to Stabilizers
The conflict between Israel and Iran has underscored the Gulf states’ acute vulnerability to regional instability. But it has also revealed the diplomatic space they now inhabit. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are beginning to act not just as reactors to instability but as conveners, mediators, and potential stabilizers.
At the same time, other Gulf states, such as Qatar and Oman, though smaller in size and influence, have demonstrated diplomatic agility, particularly in mediation and back-channel diplomacy. Together, these actors form a multifaceted Gulf bloc increasingly willing to engage with complex regional challenges.
Yet, ambition alone is not enough. The test now is whether these Gulf states can translate influence into initiative, whether they can devise and implement practical, potentially security-enhancing measures that reflect their growing agency, even as they remain tethered to US security guarantees and wary of regional spoilers.
Functional cooperation, economic inducements, and sustained diplomacy offer a path forward—not to resolve every conflict, but to build resilience and contribute to a more stable regional order. This juncture could mark a significant shift for Saudi Arabia and the UAE as emerging middle powers, as well as a broader diplomatic opening for the Gulf. However, without sustained coordination, strategic clarity, and the will to take calculated risks, that potential could just as easily fade.
About the Author: John Calabrese
Dr. John Calabrese teaches international relations at American University in Washington, DC. He is the book review editor of The Middle East Journal and previously served as director of MEI’s Middle East-Asia Project (MAP) and as general series editor of MEI Viewpoints. He is the author of China’s Changing Relations with the Middle East and Revolutionary Horizons: Iran’s Regional Foreign Policy. Follow him on X: @Dr_J_Calabrese.
Image: Hris / Shutterstock.com.
