H. A. Hellyer
H. A. Hellyer é pesquisador associado sênior do Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies e pesquisador sênior do Center for American Progress.
Foreign Affairs
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| Após ataques com mísseis iranianos, Doha, Catar, março de 2026 Mohammed Salem / Reuters |
Na primavera de 2024, o Irã atacou diretamente o território israelense pela primeira vez, lançando mais de 300 drones e mísseis contra seu adversário. As forças americanas, britânicas, francesas e jordanianas os interceptaram rapidamente. A mensagem era clara nas capitais do Golfo: quando o Irã ataca Israel, a resposta liderada pelos EUA será imediata e coletiva. Mas uma questão incômoda e não dita permaneceu no ar: o que aconteceria se o Irã atacasse o Golfo?
Essa questão agora foi respondida. Quando os Estados Unidos e Israel iniciaram sua guerra em 28 de fevereiro — uma guerra contra a qual os governos do Golfo haviam feito lobby —, o Irã retaliou atacando aeroportos, portos, instalações petrolíferas e usinas de dessalinização dos Estados árabes do Golfo. Embora as forças americanas tenham ajudado a interceptar alguns ataques contra os Estados árabes do Golfo, houve danos à reputação da região como um porto seguro para os negócios globais — o que, sem dúvida, era a intenção do regime iraniano. E o Irã efetivamente fechou o Estreito de Ormuz, bloqueando completamente as exportações do Bahrein, Kuwait e Catar, e dificultando as de Omã, Arábia Saudita e Emirados Árabes Unidos.
Por cerca de uma década, os Estados do Golfo mantiveram sua segurança tentando parecer neutros em confrontos envolvendo o Irã, cultivando relações de defesa sólidas com Washington e mantendo uma linha de comunicação aberta com Teerã para evitar uma escalada militar. Mas agora os governos do Golfo estão reconsiderando, senão abandonando, todas as três estratégias.
Eles também rejeitam uma premissa, defendida pelos Estados Unidos e por Israel, de que os Estados do Golfo poderiam ser incorporados a uma arquitetura de segurança regional baseada na hegemonia israelense — uma arquitetura na qual Israel manteria superioridade militar decisiva sobre seus vizinhos, liberdade de ação além das fronteiras e a capacidade de impor termos que os outros teriam que acatar. Tal acordo fazia sentido para os líderes americanos e israelenses. Israel e os países árabes do Golfo estavam unidos em sua oposição ao programa nuclear iraniano e a seus aliados desestabilizadores no Iraque, Líbano e Iêmen. Trabalhando juntos, Israel e os governos do Golfo poderiam deter seu inimigo comum.
Mas a atual guerra no Irã deixou claro que as aspirações de Israel à hegemonia regional colocam o Golfo em risco. Israel está disposto demais a travar guerras preventivamente para conseguir o que quer e se sente confortável demais em ignorar os interesses dos países vizinhos. Muitos líderes do Golfo estão agora determinados a encontrar maneiras alternativas de se proteger. Não será fácil criar uma nova ordem regional, mas os líderes do Golfo já começaram a diversificar seus fornecedores de armas e parcerias de segurança. Para terem maior influência sobre o que lhes acontece, também precisarão coordenar-se melhor entre si, tanto militar quanto diplomaticamente.
MY ENEMY’S ENEMY
Normalization deals became one mechanism through which the United States tried to fold Gulf governments into a regional order built around the idea that Israel should enjoy lasting dominance over its neighbors. For decades, all the Gulf states pledged that they would formally recognize Israel only if Israel withdrew from the occupied Palestinian territories. In fact, all Arab states solidified that commitment by signing the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative and by endorsing that initiative in subsequent years.
But within the last decade, some Gulf countries have normalized relations with Israel (or considered doing so) while sidestepping questions of Palestinian self-determination, thereby depriving Palestinian leaders of important leverage. For countries such as the United Arab Emirates, normalization came with access to advanced U.S. and Israeli military technology, commercial deals with Israel, and the chance to embed more deeply into Washington’s regional security architecture. The first Trump administration, for example, agreed to sell F-35 fighter jets to the UAE to sweeten its normalization deal with Israel. (The sale ended up stalling under the Biden administration, but the normalization agreement went ahead.) The United States was also in talks with Saudi Arabia to sign a defense pact on the condition that Riyadh normalized ties with Israel.
Nevertheless, even those Gulf capitals that were willing to normalize relations with Israel never embraced the idea that they could support Israeli dominance, either directly or indirectly. Israel already had poor relations with many Arab countries and its response to Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack further eroded its standing in the region. Israel killed over 70,000 Palestinians in its campaign in, moved to annex the West Bank, bombed Lebanon and Syria, and launched incursions into both countries. In September 2025, Israel violated Qatari sovereignty by launching lethal strikes on a residence in Doha. Its goal was to kill Hamas members who were there to take part in U.S.-facilitated negotiations.
Os líderes do Golfo estão desesperados para que os negócios voltem ao normal.
For Gulf leaders, the war in Iran is the latest, and perhaps clearest, evidence that their interests do not align with Israel’s. Many of them believe that Israel persuaded the Trump administration to attack Iran on February 28—ultimately forcing Gulf countries to pay the price of a war they never wanted. In the months leading up to the conflict, Gulf governments advised the United States to refrain from attacking Iran and to instead negotiate with Iranian leaders. Gulf countries clearly communicated, both publicly and through backchannels, that they would not let their territories be used as a staging ground against Iran. In fact, they had worked for years to improve relations with Iran to prevent escalation. Riyadh, for example, signed a détente with Tehran in 2023, after nearly a decade of tensions.
But such efforts did not translate into protection from Iranian strikes. Within hours of the first U.S.-Israeli salvos, Iran attacked every Gulf country. What mattered to Tehran was not the intent of Gulf governments—nor whether the initial strikes were launched from Gulf territory—but the position of Gulf countries within a security architecture that, as far as Tehran sees it, enables U.S. and Israeli operations. A neutrality not acknowledged by the relevant actors is, in practice, inoperable, even if sincerely offered. To Iran, Gulf countries cannot be neutral if they host U.S. bases, jointly train with the U.S. military, and buy American weapons.
As the conflict hardened into a war of attrition, Gulf states separated into three broad camps. Oman’s approach most clearly reflects restraint. Despite Iranian strikes on the port of Duqm, Muscat formally congratulated Iran’s new supreme leader, who took over after his predecessor was killed in U.S.-Israeli strikes, and issued a statement condemning attacks from all belligerents. The UAE, on the other hand, facing the highest volume of Iranian strikes of any Gulf state, appears to have concluded that its many efforts to reengage Tehran before the war were ultimately futile. It has banned most Iranian passport holders from entering or transiting its territory, signaled an openness to joining U.S. military efforts to secure the Strait of Hormuz, and has made clear its intention to deepen bilateral ties with the United States and Israel. Bahrain, which also normalized relations with Israel, has broadly aligned with the UAE’s more assertive posture. Kuwait, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia have taken an approach that lies between those of Oman and the UAE.
These divergences are not new. They reflect long-standing differences in threat perception and risk tolerance, as well as intra-Gulf rivalries. Their divergences also stem from the fact that Gulf governments are in some ways internally conflicted over what they want to come next. Leaders are desperate for the Strait of Hormuz to reopen and for business to return as usual. But they also worry that if Iran is left in its current state, it will remain willing and able to strike the Gulf in the future. The Gulf states’ unity has historically peaked during acute crises and rarely extended to long-term strategic alignment. But this latest crisis has exposed more fundamental questions about Gulf security than any in recent history.
The attacks from Iran could be a catalyst for the Gulf states to overcome their discord and create a security architecture of their own. For decades, they defended themselves through a tradeoff with Washington: Gulf countries provided the United States with energy, capital, and basing in exchange for at least the implicit presumption of protection, rooted in a patchwork of legal documents. U.S. officials have designated Bahrain, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia as “major non-NATO allies.” Oman provides the United States with access to different military airfields under a 1980 facilities agreement; Bahrain hosts the United States’ Fifth Fleet under a 1991 agreement. After Israel bombed Qatar in 2025, the Trump administration signed an executive order committing the United States to Qatar’s defense. Although none of these arrangements legally bind the United States to defend its partners with force, they created a reasonable expectation of assistance against external aggression.
Ever since U.S. President Barack Obama announced in 2011 his intention to “pivot to Asia,” Gulf countries have been concerned that U.S. support for their defense will wane. Yet other governments can’t provide for Gulf security as Washington can. The region relies on the United States for arms, planes, naval vessels, maintenance, training, and, crucially, the most advanced military technology.
And thus once the dust settles in the Middle East, Gulf governments will be stuck with few good options. They will not succumb to Iranian demands to expel U.S. bases or give up U.S. security cooperation because they have no other way (in the medium term) to defend themselves, and Iran’s own behavior proves that they need protection. Across the Gulf states, antipathy to Iran is genuine, rooted in what Tehran and its allies have done to Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen, and compounded by the recent direct strikes on Gulf soil. It’s likely that many will adopt a much more aggressive form of containment of Iran. But Gulf countries also don’t want to go along with Israel’s plans for the region. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he believes that the war will change “the balance of power in the Middle East” and has even floated the idea of building pipelines across the Arabian Peninsula to Israeli ports as a way to circumvent the Strait of Hormuz.
Gulf countries see Israel as at least as much of a threat as Iran.
Most Gulf states will not build their security on a foundation of Israeli dominance because they see Israel as at least as much of a threat as Iran. Since 2023, Israel has repeatedly invaded its neighbors and occupied more territory in Lebanon and Syria. The International Criminal Court has warrants out on Israeli leaders for war crimes committed in Gaza, and the world’s leading association of genocide scholars has concluded that Israel committed genocide in the occupied territory. Israel’s aggression has upended the region, and the country is so unpopular it is untenable for most Gulf leaders to cooperate with it. Even before U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran led to devastation in the Gulf, Oman’s foreign minister said that “Israel—not Iran—is the primary source of insecurity in the region.” There is scant appetite for signing up to a regional order dominated by Israel. (Although the UAE is prepared to deepen operational cooperation with Israel in response to specific threats.) Many Gulf citizens regard Israeli aspirations of regional dominance as fundamentally incompatible with their own sovereignty—a dimension consistently underestimated by those who have treated Gulf-Israeli normalization as a substitute for resolving the Palestinian question.
Although Gulf states will likely increase their cooperation with the United States because of their vulnerability to more attacks, they do not see Washington as their sole long-term security guarantor because of its close relationship with Israel, its disregard for Gulf interests, its failure to effectively deter Iran, and its poor track record of protecting Gulf states. As a result, Gulf governments are diversifying their partnerships. In 2024, the UAE formed joint ventures with Turkish drone manufacturers. Last year, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed a mutual defense agreement.
Gulf governments are also starting to seek alternatives to American materiel: Turkish fighter jets, South Korean missile defense systems, Ukrainian drones, Japanese Patriot interceptors, and British low-cost antidrone missiles. In April, the president of the European Council said that Europe was a “reliable partner for the Gulf countries” and “ready to contribute.” The EU is negotiating a free trade deal with the UAE and could sell the Gulf drone technology. Gulf states will probably pursue economic and technology deals with China but avoid explicit defense guarantees so as not to cross U.S. redlines. By having more partners to turn to, Gulf states will have more leverage in dealing with any one country.
CLUBE DO GOLFO
Mas, como afirmou o Oman Daily Observer, “a dependência de garantias externas, por mais poderosas que sejam, não concede aos Estados do Golfo uma soberania genuína sobre sua segurança”. Assim, para conquistar uma autonomia real, os Estados do Golfo precisarão fortalecer os laços de defesa entre si — por exemplo, compartilhando dados de radares de alerta antecipado, coordenando as defesas aéreas e reunindo estoques de tecnologia antidrone comum. No papel, o Conselho de Cooperação do Golfo, um órgão composto pelos seis Estados do Golfo, possui um comando militar unificado, mas as rivalidades entre os membros têm impedido uma integração significativa na área da defesa.
O Golfo também deve aprimorar suas indústrias de defesa nacionais, com foco especial na defesa aérea. A Arábia Saudita e os Emirados Árabes Unidos já fizeram esforços para formar empresas estatais de defesa, como a Saudi Arabian Military Industries (que visa nacionalizar 50% dos gastos militares do reino até 2030) e o Edge Group, um conglomerado emiradense que já começou a produzir grandes quantidades de munições guiadas de precisão. Mas, ao longo da guerra, os países do Golfo enfrentaram uma grave escassez de mísseis interceptores que nenhuma indústria nacional consegue suprir. Os países do Golfo também precisam se unir diplomaticamente para terem peso suficiente — e influência suficiente sobre Washington — para moldar as decisões que determinarão seu destino.
Washington há muito tempo baseia sua estratégia regional na alegação de que a segurança de Israel e do Golfo são complementares e que a normalização apoiada pelos EUA produz estabilidade. Mas o último ano expôs a fragilidade dessa premissa. O abismo entre a visão de Netanyahu de um Oriente Médio remodelado e as aspirações dos Estados árabes é muito grande para ser transposto. O que os Estados do Golfo querem é uma ordem de segurança que leve seus interesses a sério em seus próprios termos — e não como um corolário das ambições israelenses ou iranianas.
Ever since U.S. President Barack Obama announced in 2011 his intention to “pivot to Asia,” Gulf countries have been concerned that U.S. support for their defense will wane. Yet other governments can’t provide for Gulf security as Washington can. The region relies on the United States for arms, planes, naval vessels, maintenance, training, and, crucially, the most advanced military technology.
And thus once the dust settles in the Middle East, Gulf governments will be stuck with few good options. They will not succumb to Iranian demands to expel U.S. bases or give up U.S. security cooperation because they have no other way (in the medium term) to defend themselves, and Iran’s own behavior proves that they need protection. Across the Gulf states, antipathy to Iran is genuine, rooted in what Tehran and its allies have done to Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen, and compounded by the recent direct strikes on Gulf soil. It’s likely that many will adopt a much more aggressive form of containment of Iran. But Gulf countries also don’t want to go along with Israel’s plans for the region. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he believes that the war will change “the balance of power in the Middle East” and has even floated the idea of building pipelines across the Arabian Peninsula to Israeli ports as a way to circumvent the Strait of Hormuz.
Gulf countries see Israel as at least as much of a threat as Iran.
Most Gulf states will not build their security on a foundation of Israeli dominance because they see Israel as at least as much of a threat as Iran. Since 2023, Israel has repeatedly invaded its neighbors and occupied more territory in Lebanon and Syria. The International Criminal Court has warrants out on Israeli leaders for war crimes committed in Gaza, and the world’s leading association of genocide scholars has concluded that Israel committed genocide in the occupied territory. Israel’s aggression has upended the region, and the country is so unpopular it is untenable for most Gulf leaders to cooperate with it. Even before U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran led to devastation in the Gulf, Oman’s foreign minister said that “Israel—not Iran—is the primary source of insecurity in the region.” There is scant appetite for signing up to a regional order dominated by Israel. (Although the UAE is prepared to deepen operational cooperation with Israel in response to specific threats.) Many Gulf citizens regard Israeli aspirations of regional dominance as fundamentally incompatible with their own sovereignty—a dimension consistently underestimated by those who have treated Gulf-Israeli normalization as a substitute for resolving the Palestinian question.
Although Gulf states will likely increase their cooperation with the United States because of their vulnerability to more attacks, they do not see Washington as their sole long-term security guarantor because of its close relationship with Israel, its disregard for Gulf interests, its failure to effectively deter Iran, and its poor track record of protecting Gulf states. As a result, Gulf governments are diversifying their partnerships. In 2024, the UAE formed joint ventures with Turkish drone manufacturers. Last year, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed a mutual defense agreement.
Gulf governments are also starting to seek alternatives to American materiel: Turkish fighter jets, South Korean missile defense systems, Ukrainian drones, Japanese Patriot interceptors, and British low-cost antidrone missiles. In April, the president of the European Council said that Europe was a “reliable partner for the Gulf countries” and “ready to contribute.” The EU is negotiating a free trade deal with the UAE and could sell the Gulf drone technology. Gulf states will probably pursue economic and technology deals with China but avoid explicit defense guarantees so as not to cross U.S. redlines. By having more partners to turn to, Gulf states will have more leverage in dealing with any one country.
CLUBE DO GOLFO
Mas, como afirmou o Oman Daily Observer, “a dependência de garantias externas, por mais poderosas que sejam, não concede aos Estados do Golfo uma soberania genuína sobre sua segurança”. Assim, para conquistar uma autonomia real, os Estados do Golfo precisarão fortalecer os laços de defesa entre si — por exemplo, compartilhando dados de radares de alerta antecipado, coordenando as defesas aéreas e reunindo estoques de tecnologia antidrone comum. No papel, o Conselho de Cooperação do Golfo, um órgão composto pelos seis Estados do Golfo, possui um comando militar unificado, mas as rivalidades entre os membros têm impedido uma integração significativa na área da defesa.
O Golfo também deve aprimorar suas indústrias de defesa nacionais, com foco especial na defesa aérea. A Arábia Saudita e os Emirados Árabes Unidos já fizeram esforços para formar empresas estatais de defesa, como a Saudi Arabian Military Industries (que visa nacionalizar 50% dos gastos militares do reino até 2030) e o Edge Group, um conglomerado emiradense que já começou a produzir grandes quantidades de munições guiadas de precisão. Mas, ao longo da guerra, os países do Golfo enfrentaram uma grave escassez de mísseis interceptores que nenhuma indústria nacional consegue suprir. Os países do Golfo também precisam se unir diplomaticamente para terem peso suficiente — e influência suficiente sobre Washington — para moldar as decisões que determinarão seu destino.
Washington há muito tempo baseia sua estratégia regional na alegação de que a segurança de Israel e do Golfo são complementares e que a normalização apoiada pelos EUA produz estabilidade. Mas o último ano expôs a fragilidade dessa premissa. O abismo entre a visão de Netanyahu de um Oriente Médio remodelado e as aspirações dos Estados árabes é muito grande para ser transposto. O que os Estados do Golfo querem é uma ordem de segurança que leve seus interesses a sério em seus próprios termos — e não como um corolário das ambições israelenses ou iranianas.
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