Saudi Arabia has renewed relations with Iran in line with the changed geo-political realities discarding policies pursued in the aftermath of the 1979 Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini-led Iranian revolution that was sought to be countered partly by stoking sectarianism
In March 2023, Iran and Saudi Arabia signed a pact to resume diplomatic ties after four-day secret talks in Beijing. The two countries affirmed respect for each other’s sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs. They agreed to re-activate earlier pacts on security cooperation, investment trade, and the economy. The breakthrough raised hopes for better Saudi-Iran relations, a more secure and stable Middle East, and an end to conflicts their rivalry fuelled.
The 2023 Saudi-Iran pact boosted Tehran’s efforts to counter American attempts to isolate it and help revive its 2015 nuclear agreement with global powers. The Saudi-Iran relations were severed when the Saudi embassy in Tehran was stormed over the execution of a Shia Muslim cleric in Saudi Arabia in 2016. The relations worsened after the Saudis blamed Iran for attacks on its oil facilities in 2019.
Follow MyPluralist on WhatsApp, Twitter, and Facebook
The Yemen conflict was another major impediment to better Saudi-Iran relations. Riyadh headed a coalition against Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels, who were blamed for attacking Saudi Arabia. Iran and Saudi Arabia also backed opposite sides in the Syrian civil war. The de-escalation of the hostilities was expected to end the Yemen war. Tehran was likely to push the Houthis to sign a deal with the Saudis and help them out of the quagmire they had sunk into in Yemen. Houthis were among those who welcomed the resumption of the Saudi-Iran relations.
The Shift
The Saudi-Iran pact was an important marker of the eclipsing sectarianism in the Middle East. The factors that fuelled sectarianism have been fading away. Saudi Crown Prince and facto ruler Mohammed bin Salman accordingly sought to shift away from the policies pursued in the aftermath of the 1979 Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini-led Iranian revolution. The policies stoked sectarian hatred. They have been discarded in line with the changed geo-political realities and for the stability needed for Salman’s aggressive liberalisation drive to succeed.
The drive is part of Salman’s vision for diversifying the Saudi economy for a post-petroleum future. Salman has set a target for transforming his country from an oil exporter into an important pillar of global progress. The Saudi-Iran pact was an important step towards realising this goal, which cannot be achieved without regional peace and stability. The 2020 Saudi announcement ending assistance to mosques globally that proliferated as part of attempts to check the Iranian revolutionary influence was an important step towards checking destabilizing sectarianism.
The Saudis have curbed sectarian rhetoric that became common after 1979. The sectarianism has been ebbing since the late 1980s when it became clear that the fears of the Iranian revolution’s export were exaggerated. The Arab Shia leaders emboldened by Khomeini’s success also understood their inability to replicate it.
Baby Steps
As early as 1993, Saudi King Fahd extended an olive branch and announced measures to placate Shias. He met Shia dissidents and promised to improve their lot. King Fahd announced the removal of derogatory references to the Shias in textbooks and allowed Saudi Shias in exile to return home. The fall of Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003 accelerated Saudi attempts to reach out to the Shias. A Shia delegation met Crown Prince Abdullah, who called for a better Shia-Sunni understanding after Saddam’s fall, and presented a petition for equal rights titled ‘Partners in the Nation.’
Prominent Shias were invited to Abdullah’s national dialogue to discuss combating religious extremism. Shias turned out to vote in large numbers when elections were held for the Qatif council in Saudi Arabia’s Shia-majority and oil-rich Eastern Province. Hasan al-Saffar, a Shia dissident who returned to Saudi Arabia after 15 years in exile, was among those who urged Shia participation in the voting. Many Shias were elected to the council, which gave them a platform to voice their concerns.
The Saudi government allowed the publication of 40 works on Shia family law in 2005 after Abdullah became the king. The works included those by al-Saffar, who headed a transnational Shia network in Saudi Arabia and led an uprising in 1979 against the kingdom. As part of the reconciliation, Saudi Shias were allowed to build a bigger place to commemorate Imam Hussain, the third Shia Imam, and to cater to Shia pilgrims in Medina.
The measures helped build the confidence needed to counter the damage of state-sponsored sectarianism to prevent Iran from exporting Khomeini’s revolution. Arab monarchies feared the potential expansion of the revolution as pan-Islamic groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood congratulated Khomeini and saw him as an inspiration. The monarchies responded by promoting conspiracy theories linking Iranian Shias to a Persian conspiracy to revive their ancient empire.
Saddam, who helmed Iraq’s Sunni-dominated government and feared the country’s Shia majority would replicate the Iranian revolution, jumped on the bandwagon. The sectarian ideas gained traction when the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s polarised the region. Over the years, the anti-Iran and anti-Shia rhetoric was weaponised drawing on the 16th-century Safavid Dynasty’s legacy of converting Iran into a Shia state.
Futile Fratricidal Conflict
The Iranian influence was countered by exporting Saudi Arabia’s official Salafism through a proliferation of televangelists and TV channels. The fall of Saddam, who kept blatant sectarianism in check, and the American reliance on the colonial divide-and-rule policy to counter a broad-based challenge to its occupation escalated sectarianism. Over the next decade, the futility of the fratricidal conflict began to dawn as ISIS overran swathes of the region. Iraq’s first non-sectarian election since 2003 in May 2018 contributed to the eclipse of sectarianism. The public denominational discourse post ISIS’s defeat was markedly absent in the election in contrast to previous polls.
Most political blocs canvassed with cross-sectarian slogans. The need to eschew sectarianism and revenge to stabilise Iraq was the crux of electioneering. Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who has reinvented himself and backed inclusion and equitable treatment of all Iraqis, led an alliance with Sunnis and communists in the May 2018 election. The coalition won the highest seats. An Iran-backed block finished second in Parliament. Kurdish politician Barham Salih was elected as president, Sunni lawmaker Muhammad al-Halbusi the speaker, and Shia politician Abdul al-Mahdi the prime minister.
A regional rapprochement process that helped neutralise sectarianism made the broad-based Iraqi government in 2018 possible. Sadr visited Saudi Arabia in 2017 as part of the process. Mohammed bin Salman hosted Sadr whose visit to Riyadh was seen as part of his attempts to boost his credentials as a nationalist Arab willing to rise above sectarian politics. It was among a series of high-profile exchanges between the two countries amid improving ties since 2016.
Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir visited Baghdad in February 2017. Abadi and his interior minister Qassim al-Araji toured Saudi Arabia in June and July of that year. The following year in March, an Iraq-Saudi football match was held in Iraq’s Basra. It was no surprise when it emerged that the Saudi-Iran pact was in the works for two years through intermediaries including Iraq before China entered the picture to supervise the final agreement sidelining the US.
Sameer Arshad Khatlani is a journalist and the author of The Other Side of the Divide
