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Abu Dhabi’s post-OPEC energy strategy is beginning to take shape: more drilling, faster unconventional oil and gas development, and a push to secure export routes beyond the Strait of Hormuz.
The United Arab Emirates tried unsuccessfully to persuade Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Gulf states to join a coordinated military response against Iran.
Saudi Arabia’s reported proposal for a Middle Eastern non-aggression pact with Iran presents an admission that the old regional security formula is breaking down.
Kuwait’s Interior Ministry said four people affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps were arrested after allegedly attempting to enter Kuwaiti territory by sea near Bubiyan Island.
In Tehran’s calculation, the higher the cost of the war rises, regionally and internationally, the greater its ability to reach a more sustainable ceasefire that better accounts for its demands.
Gulf states face a persistent demographic contradiction: they possess immense wealth, advanced infrastructure, and ambitious foreign policies, but relatively small citizen populations.
The experiments unfolding in the Emirates and Kuwait are not merely regional phenomena. They are signals of a world in which the attributes and burdens of population are no longer taken as given.
The Strait of Hormuz is the narrow maritime passage linking the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea. It is the single most important oil chokepoint in the world.
Ambassador Mootaz Ahmadein Khalil argues that the conflict is not fundamentally about Iran’s nuclear program or missiles, but about regime change, regional order, and the struggle to shape the postwar balance of power across the Gulf and the wider Middle East.
By moving from war around the Strait of Hormuz to a direct naval blockade of Iranian ports, Donald Trump has deepened a crisis that was already distorting oil flows, freight markets, and inflation expectations. The immediate target may be Iran, but the economic damage radiates far beyond it.