The Impact of Iran and Saudi Arabia's Diplomatic Reconciliation on the Geopolitics of the Middle East

• In Event: Foreign and Domestic Politics in the Middle East and Africa

Abstract

On April 19, 2023, Iran officially invited Saudi Arabia's King Salman to visit Tehran. It is one of many steps recently embarked on by the two countries with the diplomatic mediation of China as they slowly improve their relations. The two countries have been bitter enemies for decades, but their relationship has begun to warm since they signed an agreement to resume diplomatic ties in Beijing last month. It was a diplomatic step forward in a standstill that has shaped events and attitudes across the Middle East for more than 40 years.
The two countries completely cut off diplomatic ties after Sunni Muslim-ruled Saudi Arabia executed a prominent Shiite Muslim cleric in 2016. Iran's ruling clerics, and most of its population, are Shiite, and the two nations' hostility has detonated into "proxy wars" in several countries across the Middle East region, including Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, where groups backed by either side have taken a heavy clang in human lives and caused a dreadful humanitarian crisis.
There are many speculations about how much improvement Saudi Arabia and Iran will make on a deal brokered by China in a region where American influence and commitment to Israel is prevailing since World War II. Given both nations' heavy influence across the Middle East and broader Muslim world, the rapprochement could have a significant effect on a range of regional conflicts generally, and the Arab/ Palestinian Israeli conflict particularly

Author

• Ahmed Zohny, Coppin State University