There were no signs that the emergency meeting between Gulf leaders in the Saudi capital Riyadh Sunday was remotely related to a possible breakthrough in the eight month long rift with Qatar over its support for the Muslim Brotherhood. On the contrary, just days earlier, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates had made public their refusal to attend the annual GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) meeting in December that was scheduled to take place in Doha, Qatar, in protest at the host country's policies, and preferring to move it to Riyadh instead. But by 11pm Riyadh local time, a brief joint Saudi-UAE-Kuwaiti-Bahraini-Qatari statement announced their agreement on what they called “a supplemental Riyadh document” whereby Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE will reinstate their ambassadors in Qatar that they withdrew from Doha in April. The statement cited “sensitive circumstances of the region” which require a “strong Gulf entity”. The following morning, the Saudi owned London-based Al-Sharq Al-Awsat daily hit the news stands with a headline on the return of Qatar to “the Gulf bosom”, accompanied by four photos of the Saudi king receiving forehead kisses from the leaders of Kuwait, Qatar, UAE and Bahrain. And to convey to the public the speed by which relations between the two monarchies have normalised, Qatar's Emir Tamim Ben Hamad Al-Thani made his first phone call since the GCC reunion to Saudi King Abdullah Ben Abdel-Aziz, less than 24 hours after the Riyadh announcement. By Monday, Saudi Arabia's Ambassador to Qatar, Abdullah Al-Ayfan, had returned to Doha. Then in a surprise move on Wednesday the Saudi monarch issued a statement urging Egypt to support the GCC settlement with Qatar, indirectly inviting Cairo and Doha to end their dispute. The Egyptian presidency responded a few hours later by welcoming the invitation but made no mention of Qatar. President Abdel-Fatah Al-Sisi had previously praised the Saudi monarch, describing him as "a great and wise Arab." In a May interview the president said assistance from Saudi Arabia and Gulf states since the removal of Morsi exceeded $20 billion. This wouldn't be the first time that the leaders of the Gulf monarchies meet to review Qatar's foreign policy and its unmet promises to reverse it. Following a similar meeting in April in the Saudi capital, Doha unilaterally declared the end of the crisis within the GCC, almost a month after the withdrawal of the three ambassadors. Little was revealed then about the demands made on Doha and the pledges it committed to, in order to settle the dispute, but leaks suggested that a two month ultimatum was made to Qatar before the Saudi-UAE-Bahraini troika would escalate matters further. It was only five months later, in September, that Doha deported Muslim Brotherhood figures who had sought refuge there following the ouster in Egypt of President Mohamed Morsi in July 2013. But little else seemed to change as its flagship news network Al-Jazeera continued to adopt a hostile approach in its coverage of Egypt's new rulers. Cairo also expected nothing short of deporting the exiled Brotherhood figures to Egypt from Doha, in order to restore ties with Qatar. But the subtle shifts in Doha's position towards Egypt would continue. During the UN Universal Periodic Review (UNUPR) earlier this month, Qatar's representative endorsed Egypt. And before that, during the UN General Assembly in New York, Al-Sisi and Qatar's Al-Thani met over a friendly lunch and had a cordial chat. “These gestures are about Egypt, but the messages were meant for Saudi Arabia and the UAE,” said Mohamed Al-Said Idris, an expert on the Arab Gulf region. “But practically speaking, Doha's Egypt policy hasn't changed. It still opposes the current regime.” According to the Saudi funded London-based daily, Al-Hayat, which quoted an unnamed high ranking Gulf official Tuesday, Qatar pledged “in writing” during the Riyadh meeting to stop its “media campaigns against Egypt” and change its policy within a month's time. But the decision to “open a new page” as per the supplemental Riyadh agreement has already been made and the ambassadors have been reinstated without ultimatums —contrary to previous stands by Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Doha might, or might not, keep its promises. This poses questions on the concessions made on both sides to move beyond the crisis, but no information is being disclosed, although leaks are expected in the near future. For now the narrative is opaque. "Nobody made concessions," said Jamal Abdullah a researcher in Al-Jazeera's centre for studes, "but there's an agreement, given the geopolitical developents in the region, for GCC members to end the diplomatic crisis." "Qatar is a pragmatic state and it will adopt a practical approach in managing its international relations," he added. Direct and indirect negotiations between GCC members — with the exception of Oman — and mediation efforts led by Kuwait never stopped during the impasse and became more intense in recent months. On 28 August, Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Saoud Al-Faisal, Intelligence Chief Khaled Ben Bandar and Interior Minister Mohamed Ben Nayef made a rare visit to Qatar's emir who had visited Riyadh in July. Then, in October, Al-Thani, with an official delegation, paid a second visit to the Saudi capital and met its monarch in an early sign of a thawing of tensions between the two countries. Oman, which continues to mediate US-Iranian talks on Tehran's nuclear file, was absent from Sunday's GCC emergency meeting in Riyadh. Observers say the development reflects GCC concerns about regional threats that directly affect its security, including the Islamic State (IS) group — which is rapidly gaining affiliates across the region — Sunni-Shia tensions and a possible US-Iranian agreement. The Egyptian-Qatari rift is no longer sufficient reason for a fractured GCC. “The security apparatuses in the GCC — especially Saudi Arabia with its Shia minority — do not wish to have to deal with sectarian flare-ups, which the Islamic State is trying to instigate,” said Idris. “Nor do they want to see their foe, Iran, in the US-led anti-terrorism coalition.” “This explains why they made concessions and accepted Qatar's minimal compromises,” he added. A day before the Riyadh meeting, the UAE cabinet issued a list of 83 Islamist groups that it classified as terrorist organisations. The list includes the Muslim Brotherhood, the Houthi group in Yemen, the prestigious Front for Islamic Scholars (chaired by Egyptian-Qatari scholar Youssef Al-Qaradawi) and numerous Islamic organisations in Europe and the US, including the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
