Iran Is Trying to Play the Saudis Against the US. It Won’t Work.
Five rounds of talks have yielded a truce in Yemen and perhaps renewed diplomatic relations between Riyadh and Tehran.
Mending fences?
Photographer: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
With US President Joe Biden having departed the Middle East, the region’s two prime antagonists are thinking about just getting along. Iran and Saudi Arabia, having completed five rounds of talks in Iraq over the past year, both said last week they were moving toward higher-level negotiations on reconciliation. Paradoxically, this budding rapprochement between friend and foe offers important opportunities for Washington.
After severing diplomatic ties following a January 2016 mob attack on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran, the Riyadh government hoped sanctions on Iran by President Donald Trump’s administration might produce a change in Iranian conduct. Instead, Iran became more aggressive than ever, culminating with a devastating missile strike on Saudi Aramco facilities in September 2019.