By Latheef Farook
Arab leaders fear they could be Israel's next target. The situation is such that a Saudi official told Al Jazeera that “America has abandoned us and focused its defense systems on protecting Israel leaving Gulf states that host its military bases at the mercy of Iranian missiles and drones”.
Iranian officials have accused Israel of carrying out some of the drone strikes on energy and civilian sites in the Arabian Gulf, calling the attacks a calculated bid to spark regional fury and pull Arab states into the war on Tehran . Sources said that some of the attacks, namely on oil refineries, ports and civilian targets, were carried out by Israel to provoke Gulf states into entering war .
In the more than two and half years of Israeli genocide of Gaza and the indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinians the Arab dictators miserably failed to protect the Palestinians. Instead they sided with Israel and abandoned the Palestinian population who were subjected to medieval style barbarity without shelter , food and even water.
On the other hand these Gulf states allowed US military bases which in fact were Israeli military bases in their countries despite extreme US-Israeli hostilities towards Arabs in the region and Muslims worldwide. Arab countries never allowed people’s participation and invested bulk of their countries’ wealth in US and Europe. By and large they virtually dismissed Muslim countries and sufferings of Muslims worldwide.
Meanwhile there were reports that in early 2026, there were significant behind-the-scenes efforts by Saudi Arabia pressing the United States to take military action against Iran, which appeared to contradict the kingdom's public stance of diplomacy.
Washington Post report of 28 February 2026 titled “ Push from Saudis-Israel helped Trump to attack Iran” stated as follows; President Donald Trump launched wide-ranging attack on Iran after weeks -long lobbying effort by an unusual pair of U.S. allies in the Middle East — Israel and Saudi Arabia — according to four people familiar with the matter, as Israeli and U.S. forces teamed to topple Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei after nearly four decades in power.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman made multiple private phone calls to Trump over the past month advocating a U.S. attack, despite his public support for a diplomatic solution , the four people said.
The combined effort helped lead Trump to order a massive aerial campaign against Iran’s leadership and military, which in its initial hour led to the killing of Khamenei and several other senior Iranian officials.
The Saudi push for an attack came as presidential envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner pursued negotiations with Iranian leaders over the country’s nuclear and missile programs. As those talks proceeded, Riyadh issued a statement, following a phone call between the crown prince and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, that Mohammed would not allow Saudi airspace or territory to be used in an attack on Iran.
Mohammed’s position was reinforced by his brother, Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman, who held closed-door meetings with U.S. officials in Washington in January and warned about the downsides of not attacking, the people said.
Iran, dominated by Shiite Muslims, and Saudi Arabia, led by Sunnis, have long had an intense rivalry that has generated proxy wars in the region.
Meanwhile Saudi regime’s hostility towards Islam within the country and abroad has been causing concern among Muslims worldwide for sometimes.
For example besides siding with US-Israeli wars against Arab and Muslim countries Saudi Arabia together with Kuwait and United Arab Emirates spent eleven billion dollars to topple Mohamed Morsy’s Islamic Brotherhood government in Egypt elected for the first time in 61 years in a free and fair presidential elections. The military coup which killed hundreds of innocent Muslims installed in power Abdel Fattah El Sisi who crushed Muslim brotherhood and later facilitated Israeli genocide in Gaza.
In another development Saudi Arabia awarded its highest civilian honor, the King Abdulaziz Medal of Excellence, to Pakistan's Chief of Defence Forces Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir on Monday 22 December 2025 . Asim Munir who toppled popular elected government of Prime Minister Imran Khan was installed in power in a reportedly US engineered coup after toppling Prime Minister Imran Khan who was working towards building up Pakistan on a democratic and Islamic footing .
Meanwhile United Arab Emirates has become partner with US and Israel in destabilizing the entire region to the benefit of Israel.
Columnist David Herst said “If Netanyahu is successful in crushing the Islamic Republic, his violent expansionist vision will turn towards Arab Gulf states next. Israel's war of regional supremacy will not end with Iran.
It is no coincidence that in the immediate run-up to this attack, the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said to Tucker Carlson that it would be fine if Israel took all the land from the Nile to the Euphrates.
It is also no coincidence that shortly before launching this war, Netanyahu rolled out the red carpet for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This is the dream that Zionists of many hues have harbored for decades: that Israel will one day run from the Nile to the Euphrates.
Whatever the motive, the Gulf has become collateral damage in Israel’s war, its monarchies absorbing the costs of a conflict they did not choose and tried hard to prevent.
According to columnist Mohamed Elmasry Arab governments that once tolerated the idea of US-led regime change in Iran are now urging restraint, recognizing that Israeli expansionism has become the region's main threat.
For 27 months, Arab leaders have watched Israel's rampage throughout the region, in pursuit of its "Greater Israel" project, an expansionist biblical vision for territory spanning from the Euphrates River in Iraq to the Nile River in Egypt .
To this end, Israel has significantly expanded its illegal occupation of Arab lands. Not only has Israel carried out genocide in Gaza and indicated its plans to take the territory over, but it has also deepened its hold in the West Bank , Syria and Lebanon .
In short, Israel's aim of absolute regional hegemony has never been clearer, and a US strike on Iran would represent both an extension of Israeli aggression and an expansion of its regional power. This is the structural shift at the heart of Arab opposition to a potential US-Israel attack on Iran.
Gulf countries need stability to preserve regional security and further economic interests. They worry in particular about what an attack on Iran, and a potential Iranian retaliation, could do to oil and natural gas prices. End
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Increasingly, Arab regimes, with perhaps the exception of the UAE , now view Israel as the region's most destabilizing force. Israeli expansionism, its willingness to strike across borders.
without regard for accepted international norms, and its open pursuit of regional hegemony have fundamentally altered how Arab leaders assess risk.
Arab leaders now fear that they may already be on the path of "Greater Israel", or that they could be Israel's next target. The irony is that Israeli belligerence - and American belligerence at the behest of Israel - carries the potential to unite a divided region, if not on the basis of common interests, then at least on the basis of a common threat.
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