Which side will Arabs take in an Iran-Israel war?

For the past few weeks, the Middle East has been shaking at the fear of an all-out Iranian-Israeli confrontation. Ever since July 31, when Israel allegedly killed Hamas’s political chief, Ismail Haniyeh, on Iranian soil, Tehran has promised to retaliate harshly.

An important calculation that might give Iran pause is its Arab neighbors and what side these countries will take in a war between Iran and Israel.

The outlines of an answer to this question were already evident on April 19 when, for the first time in its history, Iran directly attacked Israel by firing more than three hundred missiles and drones. This came in response to an April 1 Israeli attack on its consular building in Damascus, which was considered inviolable given its diplomatic status but also housed high-ranking officials of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force who were involved in coordinating the Resistance Axis in the region. In those attacks, Iran was joined by allied Houthi rebels in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Iraqi Shia militias, while also receiving some support from the Syrian army. On the other side, Israel’s defense was aided not just by its Western allies—the United States, the United Kingdom, and France—but by its Arab neighbor Jordan, with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) reportedly sharing intelligence about the attacks. In short, Iran needed to rely mostly on its non-state actors, while some major states in the Middle East helped Israel.

But Arab countries’ support for Israel wasn’t straightforward. After months of its brutal assault on the Gaza Strip, which has killed thousands of Palestinians, there is much anger at Israel on the Arab street and in Arab capitals. Arab countries that helped Israel in April were reluctant to declare their support publicly. Saudi Arabia denied some Israeli reports about their collaboration, while Jordan asserted that it was merely protecting its airspace. The UAE was the first country to condemn Israel’s attack on Damascus, something that was also done by Saudi Arabia and all other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)—with the exception of Bahrain, which doesn’t share ties with Tehran. In short, many Arab countries defended Israel against Iran, but not without reservations.

The April confrontation was limited. Iran’s showy attack was ably rebuffed by Israel and its allies and it only caused one serious injury (that of an Arab-Israeli child). Israel’s subsequent response on April 19 was a minor symbolic attack in Isfahan, the home of one of Iran’s key nuclear facilities, which appeared to have only destroyed a replaceable long-range air defense system. The outcome would be very different if a more serious conflict were to break out between Iran and Israel.

To start, Arab states are not interested in war. In recent years, these countries have prioritized winding down conflicts and disputes to focus on reconstruction and economic development, and they have made remarkable progress in this direction.

In 2020, a major rift inside the GCC was mended, with Qatar re-establishing ties with Riyadh and Manama. This, in turn, helped Turkey—an ally of Qatar—patch up relations with Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. During that same year, the Abraham Accords led to Israel’s recognition by four Arab states—UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan—three of which now have significant diplomatic and military ties with Israel. Even the Syrian regime has been welcomed back into the fold of the Arab League, and President Bashar al-Assad now enjoys ties with the UAE. Egypt also recommenced ties with Turkey earlier this year and is now in regular contact with Iran, even though the two countries still lack full ties. More significantly, in 2023, Iran and Saudi Arabia re-established diplomatic relations with the help of China as mediator, ending a major row that started in 2016 and led to the downgrading of ties with several Arab states in the Persian Gulf. Since then, Iran has re-established ties with all GCC countries except Bahrain, which has recently expressed interest in renewed ties.

In short, Arab states have attempted to tone things down among each other and with other countries in the region. In the past few months, they have also pushed the United States and Israel to bring about a ceasefire and avoid a broader confrontation with Iran. This was clearly the message sent on August 4 when Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi visited Tehran, the highest-level visit in twenty years. “We want our region to live in security, peace, and stability, and we want the escalation to end,” Safadi said. He later affirmed, “We will not be a battlefield for Iran or Israel.” Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and other Arab states have issued similar calls for de-escalation.

Additionally, Arab states’ military posture is closely linked to the United States. This matters because any war between Iran and Israel will inevitably involve the United States, which has increased the number of its troops in the region to forty thousand and has given ironclad security commitments to Israel. US bases are present in all six GCC member states, as well as Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Turkey, and Djibouti. US operations in the area are covered by US Central Command, which, since 2021, has included Israel as well as the Arab countries, providing a background for Israeli-Arab collaboration. Diplomatic and trade deals also tie the United States and Israel closely with many of its Arab neighbors, including the I2U2 (the United States, India, UAE, and Israel) and the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, which connects India and Europe via Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Any move by Iran or its allied militias has the potential to backfire. For starters, public opinion in these Sunni-majority countries—including in all Arab countries except Iraq, Bahrain, and perhaps Lebanon—isn’t necessarily favorable toward the Shia-majority Iran. But there are other factors at play.

In economically troubled Lebanon, Hezbollah enjoys some support even among the non-Shia population due to its anti-Israel posture and its being seen as opposing Israel’s attacks on Lebanon’s territory. But if the militia is seen as getting the country into a war it can’t afford, it could also face a backlash. In Iraq, Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani enjoys the support of Tehran-backed political parties and militias, but has also continued at least some of the attempts of his predecessor, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, to assert Iraqi sovereignty from Tehran and expand its ties with fellow Arab countries such as Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. Back in April, Sudani sounded much like GCC leaders when he said the region couldn’t “stand tension” between Iran and Israel. On August 13, he spoke with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and affirmed the “importance of preventing escalation.” Even Iran’s most steadfast Arab ally, Syria, is considering growing its links to the Arab League and UAE—this was why Damascus stopped recognizing the Houthis and kicked out their diplomatic envoys last year. The Houthi rebels are among Iran’s most important allies and could use their strategic position by disrupting trade in the Red Sea and resuming attacks on Saudis. But they also maintain regular dialogue with Riyadh and might not wish to resume the Yemeni-Saudi war that has been mostly dormant since 2022.  

In short, in the event of a broader war, Iran will find itself surrounded by Arab countries that host US bases and have many reasons not to want a conflict. The consequences of such a war will likely be catastrophic for all sides involved. Still, despite its years of patiently building a Resistance Axis of Arab militias, Iran will not enter with a good hand in any conflict that pulls in its Arab neighbors.

Arash Azizi is a writer and scholar. He is the author of The Shadow Commander: Soleimani, the US and Iran’s Global Ambitions and What Iranians Want. Follow him on X: @arash_tehran.

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Image: An Iranian schoolboy with a U.S. badge on his shirt is looking at a portrait of killed Hamas Leader, Ismail Haniyeh, while visiting the Land of Civilizations art and culture show in Tehran, Iran, on August 7, 2024. The Land of Civilizations is depicting parts of the culture and history of Middle East countries, including Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Lebanon, which are collectively known as the ‘Axis of Resistance’. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto)