Arab States, Israeli Expansionism, and the Iran Question

Not long ago, the prospect of American bombs falling on Iran would have been met with muted approval—or even discreet encouragement—in several Arab capitals. For decades, Tehran occupied the role of regional antagonist, its revolutionary ideology, proxy networks, and nuclear ambitions framed as the principal destabilising force in the Middle East. Yet today, as Washington once again toys with the idea of military confrontation with Iran, a striking reversal has emerged: Arab leaders are urging restraint.

This is not the product of sudden affection for Iran, nor of ideological realignment. It reflects something far more consequential and a structural recalibration of threat perception in the Arab world. The Middle East’s strategic centre of gravity has shifted, and with it, the hierarchy of dangers confronting Arab regimes. What once appeared as a tolerable gamble now looks like an existential risk.

At the heart of this recalculation lies Israel’s unrestrained regional behaviour and the growing fear that American power is increasingly deployed in service of Israeli maximalism rather than regional stability.

For much of the past four decades, Arab hostility toward Iran was not merely rhetorical; it was foundational. Gulf monarchies, in particular, viewed the Islamic Republic as a revolutionary force intent on exporting instability, subverting monarchies, and weaponising sectarianism. In that context, the idea of a US-led regime change operation in Tehran was not unthinkable. It was, at times, quietly welcomed.

As President Donald Trump reportedly revisits military options against Iran, the political response from Arab capitals in the Gulf has been unambiguous: do not strike. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, and even Egypt have signalled their opposition through diplomatic channels, urging Washington to de-escalate rather than ignite another regional conflagration.

This reversal is not born of sentiment. It is rooted in experience, in what Arab leaders have observed since Israel’s war on Gaza metastasised into a broader regional campaign.

Over the past two years, Arab governments have watched Israel pursue what increasingly resembles an unapologetic project of regional dominance. Framed domestically as existential self-defence, Israeli military operations have expanded geographically, legally, and politically, eroding any remaining distinction between security policy and territorial ambition.

The devastation of Gaza, accompanied by explicit Israeli signals of long-term control was not viewed in isolation. Nor were the deepening incursions into the West Bank, the expansion of military presence in southern Syria, or the repeated violations of Lebanese sovereignty. Taken together, these actions form a pattern that Arab policymakers can no longer ignore. What has alarmed them most is not merely Israel’s willingness to act beyond its borders, but its apparent immunity from meaningful international constraint.

For Arab leaders, this has produced a chilling realisation: Israel’s ambitions are no longer confined to containing Iran or neutralising non-state actors. They are increasingly territorial, hegemonic, and indifferent to the sovereignty of Arab states themselves.

Nothing crystallised this fear more sharply than Israel’s unprecedented strike on Qatar in September 2025. For decades, Qatar had positioned itself as a diplomatically agile state, balancing relations with Washington, Tehran, and regional actors while hosting key US military assets. That it could be directly targeted, despite its status as a US ally sent shockwaves through the Arab world.

That assault followed closely on the heels of a US-Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure earlier that year, an operation widely understood in Arab capitals as designed less to neutralise a threat than to entrench Israel’s status as the region’s sole nuclear power.

For Arab regimes, these events fused into a single strategic warning. If Israel could attack Gaza with impunity, expand in Syria and the West Bank without consequence, and strike Qatar without triggering US restraint, then no Arab state could assume it lay beyond Israel’s expanding perimeter of coercion.

Israel’s defenders often dismiss concerns about regional domination as conspiratorial exaggeration. Yet from the vantage point of Arab capitals, the pattern is difficult to deny. Israeli leaders themselves, particularly Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have increasingly abandoned diplomatic euphemism, speaking openly about reshaping the Middle East through force.

In this context, a US strike on Iran is no longer seen as a discrete policy choice. It is interpreted as an extension of Israel’s regional project and a project aimed at eliminating all meaningful centres of power capable of resisting Israeli military supremacy. This is the fundamental reason Arab leaders now oppose escalation with Iran. They do not fear a strong Iran so much as they fear an uncontested Israel.

Compounding these anxieties are persistent reports that Israel is actively working to destabilise Iran internally. Statements by senior American and Israeli figures suggesting Israeli involvement in Iran’s protest movements, coupled with media claims of arms transfers to opposition elements have not gone unnoticed in Arab capitals.

These reports revive an uncomfortable historical memory: the long record of US-backed regime change operations that promised stability but delivered chaos. From Iraq to Libya to Syria, Arab leaders have seen how state collapse rarely produces democratic renewal. Instead, it generates power vacuums, militia warfare, refugee flows, and economic disintegration that spill across borders. For Gulf states in particular, the prospect of Iran’s collapse is not a strategic victory. It is a nightmare scenario.

Ironically, Iran’s current vulnerability is precisely what makes further escalation appear unnecessary and dangerous. Years of sanctions have hollowed out Iran’s economy. Israeli and American strikes have degraded its military capabilities and constrained its nuclear programme. Its regional network of allies has been battered: Hezbollah has suffered sustained losses, Syria’s Assad fell in late 2024, and Iran’s deterrent reach has visibly eroded.

From the perspective of Arab governments, this balance, an Iran weakened but intact is preferable to the uncertainty of total collapse. A diminished Iran can be deterred, managed, and engaged. A fragmented Iran would export instability on a scale that no regional security architecture could absorb.

Beyond geopolitics lies a harsher calculus: economics and geography. Any military confrontation with Iran risks immediate disruption to global energy markets. An Iranian retaliation, one targeting the Strait of Hormuz would threaten the lifeline through which much of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas flows. For Gulf economies built on energy exports and long-term investment planning, such volatility is unacceptable.

Egypt, meanwhile, fears the secondary effects. Instability radiating from Iran could further destabilise the Red Sea corridor, endangering the Suez Canal, one of Cairo’s most critical economic arteries. In this sense, Iran’s fate is not an abstract concern; it is tied directly to national survival strategies.

These material concerns have pushed Arab states toward pragmatic diplomacy. The Saudi-Iranian rapprochement brokered in 2023 was not an ideological pivot but a strategic hedge that was an attempt to lower tensions in a region where escalation had become dangerously unmanageable.

Israel’s subsequent actions, particularly the attack on Qatar, only reinforced this logic. Rather than pulling Arab states closer to Tel Aviv, Israeli aggression has accelerated regional coordination aimed at preventing further destabilisation. This does not mean Arab regimes trust Iran. It means they trust unrestrained Israeli power even less.

Perhaps the most profound shift is psychological. For years, Arab regional politics were defined by mutual suspicion: Saudi Arabia versus Iran, Qatar versus Saudi Arabia, Egypt versus Doha. Today, that fragmented threat map has been partially reordered.

With notable exceptions, Israel is increasingly viewed, not Iran as the region’s most destabilising actor. Its disregard for borders, its contempt for international law, and its apparent ambition to impose a unipolar regional order have triggered a reassessment that cuts across old rivalries. Arab leaders now quietly ask a question that would have been unthinkable a decade ago: are we next?

President Trump’s recent de-escalatory rhetoric has offered temporary reassurance. Some analysts interpret this as evidence of a broader American strategy: pressure Iran economically, encourage internal dissent, and pursue regime collapse without direct military entanglement.

Yet Arab leaders remain sceptical. They have seen how easily American restraint can be overridden when Israeli priorities are at stake. They know that Washington’s Middle East policy is increasingly reactive, shaped less by grand strategy than by domestic politics and alliance pressures. In this environment, even de-escalation feels fragile.

There is a deep irony embedded in the current moment. Israeli belligerence backed by American power may achieve what decades of Arab diplomacy could not: a measure of regional convergence.

This is not unity born of shared values or collective vision. It is unity forged by shared fear. Arab regimes are not rallying around Iran. They are rallying against a future in which sovereignty is conditional, borders are provisional, and power is monopolised by a single actor immune to restraint.

Whether this convergence solidifies into lasting coordination remains uncertain. But one conclusion is already clear: the Middle East’s strategic landscape has changed, and the old assumptions no longer hold. A war on Iran would not stabilise the region. In the eyes of Arab leaders, it would complete its unravelling.