With Saudi Arabia, life and death: defending our collective security
Defending Saudi Arabia is defending the security of the entire Gulf region, the entire Arab nation, and the entire Islamic nation. The attacks suffered by the Kingdom, which target its airports and facilities and the lives of civilians, necessitate a response proportional to the severity of the threat. It is unacceptable to leave the Kingdom alone to face an armed group that threatens the security of the region, its waterways, and its economies. Nor can the positions of others remain limited to expressions of sympathy and statements of condemnation. The stability of the Kingdom is a cornerstone for the stability of its neighbors, and protecting its sovereignty is a responsibility that transcends its national borders.
While US President Donald Trump moves to conclude agreements with Russia regarding diesel supplies and fuel price reductions, and Russian offers concerning Iranian uranium and a war settlement are renewed, major capitals must clearly hear our question: Where does Gulf security fit into these calculations? Do these understandings end by granting Tehran money and time to rebuild its strength and once again threaten its neighbors? The diesel agreement has been announced, but the broader understandings represent a possibility that must be confronted before it becomes a reality we are asked to accommodate.
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Washington and Moscow have the right to pursue their interests, but it is the duty of Gulf governments to prevent those interests from being achieved at the expense of our peoples. Fuel costs should not drop for others while we bear the cost of missiles and drones, airport disruptions, and economic drain. Our security must not become a bargaining chip whenever a president seeks an electoral gain or a state strives to ease sanctions against itself.
Iranian military capabilities have suffered serious damage, but damage does not mean the disappearance of the threat. The current responsibility is to prevent the restoration of its aggressive capabilities and to reject settlements that refinance it and leave its armed wings intact, so that the region’s sacrifices do not culminate in the resurgence of the same threat with greater severity.
Every Gulf state must act using all its influence, relationships, and interests, employing its investments, defense partnerships, and political channels with the United States and Russia to extract clear commitments. New contracts, facilities, and cooperation must be linked to respect for its security. The message must be conveyed to the White House, Congress, the Kremlin, and economic decision-making centers: the continuation of your interests with us requires the protection of our interests; endangering our security will come at a cost to our relations.
The demands are specific: preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, verifiable monitoring, halting the arming, financing, and training of its proxies, ending interference under the guise of "exporting the revolution," and linking sanctions relief to actual, phased implementation, with their reinstatement upon violations. Merely transferring uranium is insufficient if funds and networks continue to reproduce militias and enable blackmail.
We have a lesson in Yemen that should govern our stance toward both the Houthis and Iran. In 2018, as Yemeni forces backed by the coalition advanced toward Al-Hudaydah, US and European pressures mounted to halt fighting and open the door to negotiations, leading to the Stockholm Agreement. However, the settlement did not disarm the Houthis, nor did it end their military ties to Tehran. The Houthis retained their tools of aggression, and Iran kept an arm that threatened the region, until the danger extended to Saudi Arabia and international navigation.
Today, we fear repeating the mistake of saving Tehran’s capacity for aggression and maintaining the Houthi armed authority. Weakening the proxy while allowing its rearmament merely delays the threat; weakening Iran while keeping its armed wings intact leaves it with the tools to return. What is required is to break this cycle through guarantees, implementation, and monitoring, so that the interests of Western and Eastern powers are not achieved by keeping us under constant threat, requiring us to protect them and purchase their weapons at the expense of the genuine, lasting security of our peoples.
The message is clear: Do not halt the coalition midway, and do not exert pressure for a settlement that would give the Houthis an opportunity to regroup, rearm, and replenish their capabilities. What is required is to eliminate their capacity to threaten Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region, and to decisively end their military project by reasserting the authority of the Yemeni state, handing over heavy weapons, missiles, and drones to it, and closing off supply and financing channels. Ceasing hostilities while leaving the tools of aggression intact merely postpones confrontation and multiplies its cost.
Anyone who seeks to end the war should press for outcomes that achieve these objectives, rather than pressuring the victim to accept the continuation of the source of aggression. The value of any settlement lies in what it strips from the aggressor’s arsenal, the security it guarantees for civilians, the restoration of decision-making authority to the state, and the termination of a militant group’s ability to ignite the region at will.
Saudi Arabia’s support necessitates defensive, intelligence, and logistical assistance commensurate with each country’s capacity, along with political moves to prevent incomplete settlements, the drying up of financing and smuggling networks, and economic support for Yemen that restores public services, salaries, and reconstruction, protects civilians, and facilitates aid delivery. A state that reclaims its territory and restores public trust closes the doors to the return of militias driven by poverty and chaos.
Every Gulf government must leverage its influence before the doors to incomplete settlements are closed. The threat will not stop at Saudi Arabia’s borders, and every concession extracted by the aggressor opens the door to new blackmail. It is time for our stance to be resolute: aligned with Saudi Arabia in safeguarding its security, and opposed to any effort to rebuild Iran’s menacing influence or to any peace that restores the aggressor’s strength while leaving its neighbors at its mercy.
