Donald Trump’s massive attack on Iran occurred against the recommendations of his team in Washington and after several weeks of diplomatic pressure on the mercurial president on the part of Israel and Saudi Arabia. It is about an unusual tandem in the Middle East despite being both traditional allies of the United States.
According to four knowledgeable sources cited by The Washington PostJerusalem and Riyadh insisted that now was the time to hit. This pushed Washington towards an operation with explicit ambition to regime change and despite US intelligence assessments that did not see an imminent threat to the continental US.
According to these sources, the Saudi crown prince Mohamed bin Salman would have practiced a two-way approach. Publicly, Riyadh supported an exit diplomatic and assured that it would not allow the use of its airspace or territory for an attack.
Privately, he would have called Trump several times to advocate for the offensive and warn that inaction would make Iran “stronger and more dangerous”“.
Bin Salman – identified by US intelligence as ultimately responsible for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul in 2018 – would have put pressure through lobbies, messages and calls to promote an attack that the kingdom could greatly benefit.
The middle Al Arabiya indicates that MbS reiterated in public that he would not give up his airspace, in part to avoid retaliation. At the same time, regional media have described signs of political coordination between Riyadh and Washington after the attack, with exchanges of calls between Trump and the heir after the Iranian retaliation against Gulf countries, including Saudi Arabia.
These contacts reinforce the reading of Riyadh as a central actor of the day after (in terms of retaliation management, deterrence and narrative), although they do not prove Saudi involvement in the design of the operation. Before the attacks, Reuters reported contacts and visits by Israeli and Saudi officials in Washington to discuss scenarios, at a time when Trump is still I was weighing options.
The heir’s behavior fits with the strategy that Chatham House summarizes as “weaken Iran without setting the Gulf on fire“. It consists of maximizing strategic damage to Tehran while minimizing Saudi exposure. His influence would be greater than that of other regional leaders due to his direct and frequent access to Trump, a personal lever that usually outweighs bureaucratic channels.
If the bet goes well for Saudi Arabia, Riyadh would gain margin to reorganize the regional balance together with Israel and the USavoiding appearing as a co-belligerent. Hence his public insistence on not facilitating the attack. Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu, for his part, has for years maintained a public campaign in favor of American strikes against Iran.
Both leaders would converge on a fundamental objective: to alter the correlation of forces in the Middle East and breaking the taboo of forcibly deposing the ayatollah regimesettled for decades in a country of more than 90 million inhabitants.
Bin Salman and Trump joke at the White House.
Three vectors weigh in the balance of gains and losses. First, the Israeli commitment to a decisive degradation of Iranian power that opens the door—uncertain—to an internal reconfiguration in Tehran.
Second, the calculation of Saudi Arabia and the rest of the petromonarchies: reduce the threat without becoming the main target of retaliation. Third, the fear of third parties—Turkey, Iraq, Oman, Qatar or Egypt—that the day after to the ayatollahs be worse than the day before.
For Israel, the potential gain is clearer: limiting the military capabilities of its main regional enemy and increasing pressure on its power architecture. The cost is also real: after the attack, Israel remains in the crosshairs of retaliation.
Who wins and who loses
Operational coordination with the US raises the escalation threshold: the coup was timed to hit Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as he met with his circle, and his death was confirmed by the attackers. The elimination of the ayatollah is presented in Tel Aviv as an existential issue.
Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, faces obvious physical vulnerability – energy infrastructure and key cities – and reputational risk if the perception that it consolidates caused a war that others will pay with blood.
Chatham House warned before the coup of a double regional fear: not only of Iran, but of “chaos of a collapsed Iran“. This tension—wanting to weaken Tehran and fearing its collapse—makes Saudi doublespeak plausible and makes it politically inflammable.
In the rest of the region the balance is mixed. United Arab Emirates, a hub regional that cannot afford to panic, can win if it comes out of this with a Iran deterred and less capable of hitting Gulf nerve centers.
But in the short term it is one of the big losers: its model depends on connectivity, trust and perceived security. It has suffered material damage and disruption of the aura of normality in Dubai. Among the impacts is a resort in Abu Dhabi which houses diplomatic missions, including the Israeli embassy.
Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait win little and risk a lot. At most, they would get future risk reduction if Iran is weakened. But they host critical assets (bases, logistics, energy) and enter the retaliation equation, even if they have not been co-belligerents. On an economic level, the loss is immediate: cancellations, airspace closures and paralysis of large hubs with global impact on Europe-Asia routes.
Oman He is the mediator whose table is blown up. He would only win if the conflict forces negotiations to resume and returns Muscat to its role as a discreet channel. He loses when the table jumps into the air, because his historical bet is low exposure and maritime stability.
Türkiyefor its part, practices restraint out of self-interest. Their possible gain is to avoid an even more militarized region, with impacts on energy, trade and internal security. If this gets out of control, the cost for Ankara would be enormous (more volatile neighborhood, additional migration pressure and economic uncertainty).
Iraq and Lebanon They are an example of how fragility multiplies damage. They gain little from a fall of the Iranian regime and they can lose almost everything: polarization, dynamization of militias, deterioration of governability and economic blow. A transition in Tehran does not come in a vacuum, but through networks of weapons, capital and loyalties that are redistributed and can become more violent.
And the most complex chapter remains: the day after in Iran. Succession does not equal moderation. Automatic optimism after the death of Khamenei and other leaders should be contained. Before the attack, the CIA considered it likely that if the ayatollah died, he would be replaced by hardline figures linked to the IRGCthe Revolutionary Guard, the backbone of coercive power.
That is to say: even a “decapitation” scenario can lead to continuity or hardening, not liberalization. Chatham House noted this with a parallel that is uncomfortable for anyone with memory: Irak 2003. Overthrowing a regime is usually easier than building something better than the previous dictatorship.
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