Saudi Arabia Counters Iranian Aggression

Henry Srebrnik, [Charlottetown, PEI] Guardian

Iran has been slowly tightening its grip on a number of Middle Eastern countries, three of which border Saudi Arabia. It appears the Saudis have had enough.

One sign of the kingdom’s more muscular foreign policy? Saudi Arabia’s new monarch, Salman bin Abdulaziz, on the throne just three months, in late April rearranged the kingdom’s line of succession.

He replaced Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz as his successor with Muhammad bin Nayef bin Abdulaziz, the kingdom’s powerful interior minister.

The new crown prince, who is the king’s nephew, is considered a hard-liner and has led a crackdown on Islamic militants within the country. He crushed the al-Qaeda affiliate that carried out a bombing campaign in Riyadh between 2005 and 2007, and in 2009 he survived an assassination attempt.

Only a day before the reshuffle Saudi Arabia announced the arrest of 93 militants for ties to the Islamic State, including two whom it alleges were planning to bomb the American embassy in Riyadh.

The king’s son, Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was named second in line to the throne. As defence minister, he has been a vocal advocate of using force against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. He is also linked to a new Saudi initiative to support Syrian rebels, together with Turkey.

Spearheading a coalition of nine Arab states, the Saudis began carrying out airstrikes in Yemen on March 26. The intervention, named Operation Decisive Storm, began in response to the Houthi offensive in the country, whose president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, had fled to Saudi Arabia.

But Operation Decisive Storm hardly lived up to its name. Despite the thousands of missions flown, the hundreds of military-related targets that were hit, and the thousands killed, the political process in Yemen remains at a stalemate.

On April 21, Saudi Arabia wound up the military operation and announced it was launching Operation Restoring Hope, emphasizing political and peace efforts between the combatants in Yemen. Some military operations continue, however.

Saudi leaders have long been frustrated that the United States has not done more to limit Iran’s influence. They sense that Washington would like to step back from its obligations in the Middle East, allowing a resurgent Iran to seek hegemony in the region.

The Obama administration was cool to the formation of an Arab coalition against the Houthi rebels and also sought to dissuade the Saudis from launching a ground operation.

Of course Tehran is not happy with Saudi Arabia’s new assertiveness. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has criticized Riyadh’s actions in Yemen, declaring that the kingdom’s traditional caution in world affairs has been abandoned by “inexperienced youngsters who want to show savagery instead of patience and self-restraint.”

 The Iranians have even taken to taunting the Saudis of late. General Mohammad Ali Jafari, commander of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards, said that Saudi Arabia, by “shamelessly and disgracefully bombing and killing a nation,” was “following in the Zionist regime’s footsteps in the Islamic world.” He predicted that “the house of Saud will be toppled.”