Last week Iran threatened to close the Straits of Hormuz to US ships. “We warn the US and its allies against any threatening passage through Hormuz. If it should happen we will have no other choice but to act according to the 1982 [UN maritime law] Convention,” said Brigadier General Hussein Salami, commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), while commenting on November's bill, passed by the US Congress, to renew sanctions against Iran for another 10 years. The bill was a reaction against Iran's continued testing of ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads in violation of UN Security Council resolutions. In threatening to close the straits to international shipping Tehran will have fully understood the repercussions of acting on such a threat, says Mohamed Abbas Nagi, editor-in-chief of Mukhtarat Iraniya (Iranian Selections), a journal published by Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies. “Between 20 and 30 gigantic oil tankers pass through the straits daily, at the rate of a tanker every six minutes during peak times, transporting 40 per cent of oil from the Gulf. Given the international ramifications of any closure it is likely that this latest threat will go the way of Tehran's many previous threats. Iran, after all, has other means to confront the US over the nuclear issue. Iran may have frozen its programme but it did not dismantle it and it could easily put it back into operation,” says Nagi. Yemeni political analyst Abdel-Aziz Al-Majidi believes Tehran's posturing is part of its ongoing campaign to consolidate its regional influence. “Iran is already present in the Red Sea and other international waters. It has a tangible presence in the ports of Midi and Mocha. It has also threatened regional and international security by firing missiles at the [UAE] HSV-2 Swift naval vessel and at an American destroyer, though it did this via the Houthi movement, its Yemeni proxy. If we view the Hormuz statements alongside Iran's other machinations, the message is clear. Iran is staking its claim to be a major player in any regional security arrangements,” Al-Majidi told Al-Ahram Weekly. One of the first official reactions to the Iranian threat came from the UAE. The emir of Fujairah, Crown Prince Sheikh Mohamed bin Hamad bin Mohamed Al-Sharqi, noted that in the past, whenever a misunderstanding occurred at the gateway of the Hormuz Straits, concerns for the safe passage of oil exports meant that international attention would focus on the UAE. But now, he told the Emirate news agency WAM, “the recent completion of the pipeline linking the Habshan oil field in Abu Dhabi to Fujairah, terminating at the newly developed strategic port where the oil is pumped directly to tankers, means there is no need for Emirati oil to pass through the Hormuz Straits.” Yet the emir of Fujairah also conveyed an implicit message about the need to contain the situation. He said that the UAE “is honoured to be part of the solution to any problem in the region and the world. It is a source of pride to the Emirates that we are ready and prepared to help out neighbours and friends in any crisis.” Iranian actions cannot be separated from wider regional and international developments. “Regional security is fragmented and this works in the interests of Tehran,” says Chief of Staff General Mohamed Qashqoush. “We are passing through an Arab crisis at the moment. Difficulties in the relationship between Egypt and Saudi Arabia have left cracks in Arab national security.” Abdel-Khalek Abdallah, advisor to the Emirati crown prince and an academic who specialises in international relations, is also concerned about the current state of Arab security. “The Arab front is structurally weak. Inter-Arab alliances are too flimsy to handle the current situation,” he warns. “Gulf countries have reached the point where they could be faced with requesting an American presence in the region for which they will pay if only because they fear what might fill the vacuum should the Americans leave. It is difficult to conceive of an Arab defence front capable of bolstering Arab national security without the participation of a broad base of Arab forces which would need to include Moroccan and Sudanese troops alongside Egyptian soldiers. But is this achievable? Arab national security is at its weakest point ever.” Gulf affairs expert Moataz Salama agrees with Qashqoush. “The crisis we see is only the tip of the iceberg,” he told the Weekly. According to sources in Cairo, President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi's recent visit to the UAE was supposed to offer an opportunity for an Egyptian-Saudi reconciliation. The UAE's mediation efforts, however, bore no results. Indeed, some political analysts say the situation worsened following Al-Sisi's return to Egypt. King Salman turned up in the UAE just as Al-Sisi was leaving, after which the Saudi monarch travelled to Qatar. Salman's visit to Doha was accompanied by a spate of Qatari-Saudi statements which revealed not only Riyadh's lack of sympathy for Egyptian grievances against Qatar but a meeting of minds between Riyadh and Qatar on a variety of regional issues. According to Abdallah bin Thamer Al-Thani, Qatar's ambassador to Riyadh, “Saudi and Qatari positions and policies are in complete conformity on all Arab issues, from Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya to the fight against terrorism which threatens the region in many different ways”. Salama says that attempts by the UAE's Crown Prince Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, director of the Arab Thought Organisation Prince Khaled Faisal and Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abul-Gheit to intervene to defuse the situation all failed. “There are no mechanisms for the maintenance of Arab-Arab relations,” Salama concluded. Countries are acting independently, as if they are indifferent to the dangers and threats in the region that no country has the strength to handle alone. Azmi Khalifa, a former Egyptian ambassador to Bahrain, argues that joint action is needed to contain the threat posed by Tehran. “We need to remember Iran holds strong cards in four Arab capitals, in Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, and it will try to flex its muscles in regional waters. Iran today is not the Iran that existed before the nuclear deal. Russia is present in the region, in Syria. The US is not present as forcefully as before. All these factors play in Tehran's favour. We should also take into account that the person who issued the Hormuz Straits threat is deputy commander of the Revolutionary Guards and the official responsible for the Iranian navy. All this is happening just as the Arab front is cracking, and in a way that appears impossible to mend. The situation is further complicated by the existence of two decision-making centres in Riyadh: on the one hand there is King Salman, on the other Deputy Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman. The latter belongs to a new generation of leaders unversed in Arab political traditions when it comes to handling disputes, and unaware of the real nature of regional balances.” Khalifa warns that the ruling family in Riyadh continues to blame Egypt for adhering to positions towards Yemen and Syria that Cairo had made clear from the outset. “There was never any ambiguity. We made it clear from the start of Operation Storm of Resolve that we would not get involved on the ground in Yemen and no Egyptian soldier would set foot on Yemeni territory. On Syria we have said repeatedly that our concern is not about Bashar Al-Assad but Egypt's national security, which any partition of Syria will undermine. We know from experience such major crises could be solved without all this din and commotion. Egypt is not to blame. Our position was clear from the outset.” “Has it escaped Riyadh that the region has changed and the strong cards are being dealt differently,” asks Khalifa. “I am certain that if Saudi Arabia were exposed to a real Iranian threat Egypt would be at the forefront of the defence regardless of any disputes with Riyadh. After all, our own national security would be at risk. We would set our differences aside.”
