Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is seeking to revamp the kingdom’s foreign policy and engage diplomatically with his chief rival, Iran, in an effort to achieve the regional stability needed to achieve his “Vision 2030” plan.
magazine transmits “NewsweekIn her analysis, the Saudi crown prince seeks to end the war in Yemen and achieve his plan internally in the kingdom, with the help of Tehran.
The magazine notes that even with the continuation of the China-brokered agreement between Riyadh and Tehran, serious challenges remain ahead.
The magazine believes that the most difficult task for a man who could rule the kingdom for decades is to extract his country from a fierce civil war across the border in Yemen while finding a solution to the ongoing security threats “that could be devastating to his agenda and legacy.”
According to the magazine, the economic factor is important for both sides, as insecurity has proven costly to Iran and Saudi Arabia’s hopes of increasing their influence on the world stage.
Saab affinity
The American analyst, William Lawrence, says that the Saudi-Iranian rapprochement will not be easy, indicating, in an interview with Al-Hurra, that the two countries have converged on some issues, but not in everything.
However, Lawrence rules out that the differences between the two countries will cause conflicts, “because the current time is witnessing peace deals between everyone, and not all of these deals will necessarily succeed,” according to what he sees.
Lawrence acknowledges that rapprochement with Iran is beneficial to Saudi Arabia, because everything that Riyadh does is related to Vision 2030, and if it can stop the missiles that attack it, then this helps investments, and this is what the Saudi crown prince wants, who seeks to achieve these investments.
Lawrence believes that the solution to stopping the conflict in Yemen is in the hands of the two countries, because “the Houthis only want to control their region, while the government supported by Saudi Arabia and the UAE realizes that it cannot control the north, so the conflict will not be resolved militarily.”
But will peace be achieved? “Yes,” says Lawrence, “because there is no need for this war.”
Saudi Arabia has been targeted in recent years with missiles launched by the Yemeni movement of Ansar Allah allied with Iran, which is referred to as the “Houthis”, and was subjected to a devastating drone strike in particular against the Abqaiq and Khurais oil facilities, in September 2019, and the operation was directly attributed to Iran despite Tehran denied responsibility for the attack.
And while the regional rivalry between Riyadh and Tehran has played out in a number of countries, including Lebanon, Iraq, and Syria, the war in Yemen has proven to be a particularly volatile front.
However, Kenneth Kitzman, an American expert on Middle East affairs, says that he “doubts the ability of rapprochement between the two countries to stop the war in Yemen.”
Kitzman said in an interview with Al-Hurra that Washington still does not believe Iran about its commitments, and despite the Iranians’ promise to Riyadh to stop the war, this has not yet been done.
The expert believes that there is no real change in relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Kitzman says that the normalization of relations between the two countries will not be easy, because “Iran is still seeking influence in the Gulf, Lebanon, Iraq and Syria,” while Saudi Arabia is trying to work with the United States and Israel to contain Iran, “so I do not expect a strong relationship between the two countries.”
As for Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, the expert believes that the Saudi crown prince can work on it and get closer to Iran, “but at the same time confront its influence strategically.”
As for Iran, according to Kitzman, it cannot “help ‘Bin Salman’ in his vision, because it is under pressure from sanctions, and its economy is not growing.”
Riyadh has been accused throughout the conflict of committing war crimes, including targeting civilians, while Tehran has been accused of directly providing the Houthis with advanced military equipment. Both sides deny these allegations.
The next steps are likely to take advantage of the rare diplomatic spirit and goodwill between Iran and Saudi Arabia, which has emerged since the restoration of relations is decisive, in relation to the efforts of the Saudi crown prince to redefine his international image, which has so far been closely linked to the conflict in Yemen, according to the magazine.
Riyadh severed its relations with Tehran in 2016, after Iranian demonstrators attacked both its embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad, in protest against Riyadh’s execution of a prominent Shiite cleric, Nimr al-Nimr.
However, the two countries agreed to resume diplomatic relations and reopen their embassies after a rupture that ended in a sudden agreement reached with Chinese mediation, on the tenth of last March.
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2023-08-25 03:49:41
