The Saudi monarchy seeks to forge a complicated common front against Iran

Not all enemies are equal enemies. Saudi Arabia has met on Thursday, after the end of the mandatory Ramadan fasting, Arab and Muslim leaders seeking a common front against Iran after a chain of assaults on oil tankers and pumping stations whose authors accuse Tehran. A Qatari delegation attended the meeting in the first rapprochement two years after the regional blockade of the country.

"The support of Tehran to the Houthis in Yemen is proof of Iranian interference in the affairs of other nations and this is something that the Islamic countries should reject," the Saudi Foreign Ministry, Ibrahim al Asaf, has proclaimed. first of the summits held today in Jeddah, on the shores of the Red Sea, which brought together foreign ministers from the 57 member countries of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

In its offensive against its regional archenemy, the Saudi monarchy has sponsored two other meetings at the highest level with the Arab countries and the member nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council, an institution badly damaged by the break-up of diplomatic relations with Qatar decreed in June. 2017 by Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt.

For the first time in two years, a plane from Doha was authorized to land in Saudi Arabia. On board was Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Naser al-Zani. A milestone that fired the cabals over a thaw. The close relations of Qatar with the republic of the Ayatollahs, with which it shares a vast gas field, were one of the reasons given then for the unusual blockade.

"This visit should not be seen in the context of a reconciliation, because the reasons that led to the boycott are still unresolved," points out, visiting professor at Kings College in London. "This contact is related to the conflict with Iran and the increasingly close relationship of Doha with Tehran is considered a reason to maintain the blockade rather than to de-escalate it," he adds.

The summits sponsored by King Salman - the last two were set in the holy city of Mecca on special dates for the pilgrimage - took place hours after US National Security Advisor John Bolton pointed to Iran and its mines as guilty of the sabotage of four ships, including two Saudi oilmen, on the coasts of the United Arab Emirates in mid-May.

An escalation of tension that has also fueled the Shiite rebel group of the Huti by claiming a series of drone strikes against Saudi pumping stations that temporarily halted a major oil pipeline. Tehran, meanwhile, has rejected the accusations and criticized the increase in the US military presence in the region.

Saudi diplomacy says in public that it wants to avoid an armed conflict but, in the first of the meetings with Islamic countries attended by an Iranian delegation of modest level, the Saudi minister urged to respond to the attacks with "firmness and determination."

In the resolution of the dispute, up to three Arab countries have offered to mediate: Qatar, which hosts the largest US base in the region; the Sultanate of Oman, with historical ties with Tehran that certified its usefulness during the negotiations of the Iranian nuclear pact that the Trump administration has reneged; and Iraq, a country dominated by a Shiite elite with a notable Sunni population. A degree of closeness and cooperation with the Iranian rival that threatens to make fail the Saudi attempt to seal an Arab and Muslim consensus in front of a country with which it waged a hard and destabilizing battle for regional hegemony.