Gulf states opposed war with Iran. Most now pushing to keep fighting

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 While Gulf countries cautioned US President Donald Trump not to launch a war against Iran in the runup to the conflict, most of them are now urging Washington to continue striking the regime, stated four senior officials representing different Gulf capitals.

There is still some frustration with the way the US and Israel are prosecuting the war, but there is a desire among Gulf countries — particularly the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar — to ensure that Iran comes out of this war with its military power sufficiently degraded to cease posing a threat to them.

While Trump has repeatedly expressed surprise over Iran’s decision to retaliate against its neighbors, including by targeting civilian sites, one of the officials said that Gulf countries largely anticipated the response and that this was one of the reasons they opposed the US-Israeli launch of the war.

“There was also serious doubt that military strikes would have the desired effect of ending Iran’s destabilizing activities in the region,” the senior Gulf diplomat said, explaining that the consensus in the region had been that continued pursuit of a diplomatic off-ramp was a surer way to maintain security in the Gulf.

But the US and Israel spurned that view, launching operations Epic Fury and Roaring Lion, respectively, on the grounds that only preemptive military action could address Iran’s nuclear aspirations and its rapidly expanding ballistic missile capabilities.

Iran responded by not only targeting those attacking it, but also by launching repeated strikes against all six Gulf Cooperation Council countries — Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The attacks have killed several people and disrupted oil and gas production as well as tourism, both of which are important economic lifelines for the region.

Iran is thought to have calculated that the strikes would lead to the Gulf pressuring Trump for a ceasefire. Instead, the move seems to have had the opposite effect, with Gulf countries experiencing firsthand the danger inherent in allowing Iran to remain an armed regional menace.

“Ending the war with Iran still in possession of the tools it is currently using to target the GCC would be a strategic disaster,” a second Gulf official said.

All four officials agreed that the US and Israeli strikes were unlikely to bring down Iran’s regime. However, they differed on how much the Islamic Republic’s military needed to be degraded to void Tehran’s ability to pose a threat.

“We want this war to end with Iran stripped of the capabilities to harm its neighbors,” the third Gulf official said.

The second Gulf official was more specific, insisting that the war continue until Iran’s missile and drone manufacturing sites are destroyed.

All four officials agreed that the primary target of Gulf anger is Iran, for using the American and Israeli strikes as an excuse to attack them, rather than the US and Israel for launching the war.

While both the UAE and Bahrain have indicated that the war will help tighten ties with Israel, the Gulf officials largely rejected speculation that it would also lead to new Arab normalization deals under the Abraham Accords.