(Bloomberg) -- The US has signaled to Saudi Arabia it’s ready to help defend the kingdom against an attack by Iran or its proxies, as Gulf states grow increasingly wary of being embroiled in the standoff between the Islamic Republic and Israel, people familiar with the matter said.
The tacit offer, made in the past few weeks, has given Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and other Gulf Arab leaders some comfort as they await Israel’s response to Iran’s Oct. 1 missile attack, said the people, asking not to be identified discussing sensitive issues. Gulf states fear any escalation of the conflict could severely hurt their economic and security interests, the people said.
Tehran has warned that any country it sees as aiding Israel’s response — including by allowing the use of its airspace — could become a target for an Iranian counterstrike. For the US, one benefit of protecting Saudi airspace is helping defend oil facilities should they come under attack, something that could send global energy prices soaring.
A US official said the Biden administration is in close conversation with partners including Saudi Arabia as they prepare for various scenarios, including with integrated defensive systems. The official, who asked not to be identified discussing private conversations, stressed that the US has significant defensive capabilities throughout the region.
A Saudi foreign ministry official didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The US assurances have gone only so far in calming nerves, the people said, given uncertainty over who will win the presidential election in less than two weeks. Saudi Arabia in particular wants greater assurances after its experience in 2019, when a major drone attack — which the Saudis and US said were sponsored by Iran — briefly knocked out the kingdom’s largest oil-processing plant. In the aftermath, the US didn’t retaliate against Iran.
While the US may be prepared to do more this time, it’s hard to know exactly what role Washington would play because the response would depend of the scale of any attack, one person familiar with the US stance said.
“If Israel hits Iran’s oil facilities, I think there’s a decent possibility that Iran will respond, not itself but via its proxies, against oil facilities in Saudi Arabia or the United Arab Emirates,” said Karim Sadjadpour, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Another concern has been Washington’s apparent inability to rein in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s military ambitions, the people said, after more than a year of devastating conflict in Gaza and Lebanon against Iran-backed militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah. As a hedging policy, the Gulf countries have been deepening contacts with Tehran and many high-ranking officials — the Saudi crown prince — held meetings with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on his tour of the region this month.
Iran fired about 200 ballistic missiles at Israel on Oct. 1, a retaliation for the killing of top leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah, both designated as terrorist organizations by Washington. The attack caused minimal damage. Still, millions of Israelis were forced into shelters, one person in the West Bank died and some military bases were hit.
Israel has pledged to retaliate. The US has urged Netanyahu not to target Iran’s nuclear or oil-export facilities, though it’s not clear how successful those overtures have been.
“I believe the region has been through a lot, especially in the last year,” Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said at a press conference in Doha with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday. “It’s enough.”
Blinken met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed in Riyadh the previous day. In Israel on Wednesday, he spoke about the Biden administration’s vision for a Middle East in which Israel establishes diplomatic relations with more Arab countries — including Saudi Arabia — to counter Iran and its proxies.
For several years until 2022, the Houthis, a group based in Yemen and funded by Iran, regularly attacked Saudi Arabia, including its energy sites, with drones.
“There’s an incredible opportunity in this region to move in a totally different direction, one that actually provides, in a durable way, for Israel’s security,” Blinken told reporters in Tel Aviv.
What the US would do specifically to support Saudi Arabia in the event of an Iranian attack is unclear, though it would most probably be conducted through US Central Command, or Centcom, which oversees the American military in the Middle East.
Centcom worked to respond to Iran’s Oct. 1 missile attack as well as a previous one in April, helping Israel detect and intercept missiles and drones.
Washington has multiple military agreements with Gulf states but countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE have pushed for ironclad defense commitments.
Cusp of Deal
Before the Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel that triggered the war in Gaza, Saudi Arabia was on the cusp of negotiating a deal with the US that would have included a bilateral defense treaty as well as the establishment of diplomatic ties with Israel — on condition measures were taken toward establishing a Palestinian state.
That’s now on hold given the anger of many Arabs and Muslims about Israel’s military campaigns in Gaza and Lebanon, where the number of dead and displaced is mounting and the United Nations has spoken about “a dire humanitarian crisis.”
Saudi Arabia has hardened its stance on wanting Israel to make moves toward accepting a Palestinian state. And while the kingdom and Gulf Arab states may be content to see Israel weaken Iran’s regional influence and destroy its proxies, they are alarmed the ongoing wars appear to be emboldening Netanyahu, said Maha Yahya, director of the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut.
The conflicts have given the Israeli leader a “sense of empowerment that he can go after anything or anyone that he wants,” she said.
Saudi Arabia is pursuing two seemingly contradictory goals: preserving or even strengthening the kingdom’s China-brokered deal with Iran in March 2023, while also boosting defense cooperation with the US.
The Saudis have concluded “this is a region where it’s going to be impossible to have zero problems but you can at least try to contain and lessen the impact of some of them,” said Mustafa Fahs, a Beirut-based former advisor to the Iraqi government.
--With assistance from Fiona MacDonald and Jenny Leonard.
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