War Ruptures the Gulf's Understanding with Iran
- Mehran Haghirian
- Mar 27
- 6 min read
Mehran Haghirian
Bourse & Bazaar Foundation
March 28, 2026
The war unfolding now in the Persian Gulf has produced something more dire than just another episode of escalation between Iran and its Arab neighbors. It has created a rupture. For years, the region has lived through tensions, proxy confrontations, maritime incidents, sanctions, and diplomatic breakdowns without crossing into this kind of direct and sustained assault across the Gulf itself. That threshold has now been crossed. Aside from the collapse of the security architecture of the region, this is a rupture in how Iran is understood across the Gulf, and it will shape perceptions for years to come.
The Islamic Republic made the decision to turn the Gulf into a theater of war. This was not an improvised move. For more than three decades, it was understood that if Tehran faced what it perceived to be an existential threat, it might seek to set the Gulf on fire. The scenario was long contemplated, widely predicted, and yet rarely treated as probable. It is now the reality from which the region must begin to think about its future. Across much of the Gulf, Iran is now the “betrayer,” an “enemy,” and a “terrorist” state.
The region has experienced three Gulf wars in recent decades, but none came close to igniting all eight littoral shores simultaneously. Within hours of the escalation, the Islamic Republic attacked five of the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC): Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). By the second day, Oman had also been targeted. Cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and drones struck across the region. Debris from intercepted missiles has fallen into residential neighborhoods. Civilian casualties have been recorded across Iran, Israel, Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, the UAE, and Oman.
Bitter Memories
Politically, the shock has been profound. Resentment toward Tehran is now visible in Gulf capitals and among the public. Memories of earlier attacks remain vivid. In 2016, scenes of Iranians storming the Saudi diplomatic facilities in Tehran and Mashhad. In 2019, tankers off the UAE coast were struck by limpet mines widely attributed to Iran. Later that year, drones and missiles attackedSaudi Aramco facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais. In January 2022, Houthi drones struck Abu Dhabi and Dubai, killing three people. None of those incidents, however, come close to the level of threat, shock, and anger generated by the present war. Leaders, citizens, and residents across the GCC are unlikely to forget the scenes of missiles over their cities, and the attacker.
Some GCC states, particularly Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain, opposed the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers largely because they feared an empowered Iran with closer ties to Washington. Those same countries were the primary supporters of Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement in 2018. The region’s calculus began to shift in 2021, after Gulf states were confronted more directly with the risks posed by the Islamic Republic and shifted strategy to contain it with diplomacy.
Despite tensions, the region moved toward dialogue. Gulf leaders pragmatically concluded that Iran could not simply be isolated and therefore had to be engaged. Oman has never severed ties with Iran. Qatar enhanced relations with Tehran as the 2017 blockade was imposed on it by some of the GCC states. Backchannel talks between Saudi Arabia and Iran continued for years before culminating in the 2023 rapprochement. The UAE and Kuwait also moved to reinstate diplomatic ties in 2022. Bahrain was about to finalize a détente with the Islamic Republic prior to the June 2025 war. What has now collapsed is not diplomacy itself, but the assumption that Gulf states might choose to engage Iran, even while it projects a threat.
Gulf reactions to the war would have been far more reactionary and extreme had there not been substantive and successful diplomacy in the preceding years. Gulf capitals remain cautious about allowing the war to expand further.
Gulf reactions to the war would have been far more reactionary and extreme had there not been substantive and successful diplomacy in the preceding years. Gulf capitals remain cautious about allowing the war to expand further. The region’s leaders understand that escalation will complicate efforts to restore stability in the region while maintaining a viable relationship with Iran. Even so, there are reports that the leaders of the UAE and Saudi Arabia are “pressing Trump in regular phone conversations to finish the job and destroy Iran’s military capabilities before moving on.” The UAE’s ambassador to Washington wrote in the Wall Street Journal that the international community “can’t let Iran hold the U.S., the UAE and the global economy hostage. A simple cease-fire is not enough.” On March 23, Bahrain drafted a UN resolution that would authorize the use of force to open the Strait of Hormuz.
Before the war, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan had emphasized the goal of closing the chapter of tensions with Iran. That chapter has now been reopened. Publicly, Gulf states remain cautious about aligning with Israel, despite the expansion of ties under the Abraham Accords and the dynamics that led to the current war. At the same time, overwhelming dependence on the U.S. has pushed several GCC states toward a degree of practical coordination that may deepen after the war.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE have downgraded diplomatic relations with Iran by expelling the military attaché and reducing embassy staff, though none have severed ties entirely. Qatar has arrested ten suspects linked to an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps cell operating in Doha, while the UAE has also detained individuals with links to the IRGC and Hezbollah. The UAE closed the Iranian hospital, university, school, and social club, and is considering freezing billions of dollars of Iranian assets, one of the few remaining channels through which Iran has access to foreign currency.
Durable Ties
However, the rupture is not yet permanent. Transnational ties, trade routes, migration patterns, family relations, and business networks that have connected Iran and the Arab states for decades, if not centuries, remain intact. They have been disrupted, in some cases severely, but they continue to exist beneath the level of interstate conflict. The Gulf remains a shared Arab-Iranian space.
An awareness of this shared space is reflected in the recognition among Gulf leaderships that a prolonged state of conflict is incompatible with their economic agendas and national visions. The shift toward diplomacy over the past five years was tied to a broader understanding that stability is a prerequisite for growth, investment, and long-term transformation. That calculation has not disappeared because of the war.
The war has also unfolded alongside a profound transformation inside Iran itself. The succession following the death of Ali Khamenei and the rise of his son, Mojtaba, have reopened longstanding questions about the legitimacy and future of the Islamic Republic. Whether the system consolidates or collapses, this moment will shape how Iran approaches the region, and how regional countries approach Iran, in the years ahead.
The trust deficit is no longer confined to governments. It now sits with the public. Across the Gulf, people watched missiles cross their skies, saw debris fall into their neighborhoods, and witnessed civilians killed in cities they consider among the safest in the world. That memory will not fade quickly, and it will shape how Iran is seen across the region for years to come.
There is a real risk that the actions of the Islamic Republic become indistinguishable, in the public imagination, from Iran itself. There is a recognition in the Gulf—sometimes explicit, sometimes implied—that what is unfolding is the result of decisions taken by a state that has long been disconnected from its own population. That distinction leaves open a narrow but important space for something other than complete breakdown. If the distinction collapses, the rupture created by this war will harden into something far more durable, making any future attempt at rebuilding relations significantly more difficult.
The Gulf’s relations with Iran have been ruptured and cannot be restored quickly. But the question is whether the underlying connections that have historically linked Iran and its Arab neighbors can endure long enough to serve as the basis for a new regional order. What survives after the war may ultimately matter more than what has been broken.
Photo: Wikicommons
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