Will UAE-Israel Deal Lead to Larger Gulf Anti-Iran Coalition?

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The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Israel have normalized relations. As part of the deal, Israel has suspended the annexation of the West Bank.

The UAE is one of six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The members are the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia.

The GCC issued a statement this week urging the United Nations to extend an international arms embargo on Iran.

In 2019, the Saudi oil field was attacked and half of Saudi Arabia’s oil exports were shutout. The September 14, 2019 attack dropped Saudi oil production from 9.8 to about 4.1 million barrels of oil a day. This was 5.7 million barrels of oil a day or about 5% of global production. About 2 weeks later production were still down by 1.8 million barrels per day.

Saudi Arabia and the rest of the GCC need a US-supplied integrated missile defense system to defend against such drone and missile attacks.

Nextbigfuture predicts that more deals will be made with Israel and at least some of the other GCC countries will follow. There is a high likelihood this will happen within three months. The geopolitical, military and economic interests are aligned for the deals and for the timing.

SOURCES- Bloomberg, Foreign Policy
Written by Brian Wang, Nextbigfuture.com

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