But beneath that convergence lay a fundamental asymmetry: Saudi Arabia saw itself as the natural centre of gulf power, while the UAE pursued a more agile, networked model built on ports, finance and local influence.<\/p>\n
As pressures eased, those differences surfaced, turning unity into parallel – ultimately diverging – visions of regional order.<\/p>\n
The conflict in Yemen between Houthi and government forces crystallised the split, as a joint intervention gave way to competing endgames, with Riyadh backing a unified state aligned with its interests while Abu Dhabi supported southern forces to secure maritime influence.<\/p>\n
The rift extended into Sudan where Abu Dhabi and Riyadh backed rival factions in the civil war.<\/p>\n
The rivalry has since shifted into the economic and energy arenas, where it has the most consequences. Riyadh’s Vision 2030, a framework to diversify Saudi Arabia away from oil, has sharpened competition over investment, logistics and regional primacy.<\/p>\n
The split is also evident in ties with Israel. The UAE moved early to normalise under what are known as the Abraham Accords, deepening security and economic links. Saudi Arabia held back, constrained by domestic, religious and geopolitical calculations that mean formal normalisation has much higher stakes for Riyadh.<\/p>\n
(Reporting and writing by Samia Nakhoul; Editing by Timothy Heritage)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But beneath that convergence lay a fundamental asymmetry: Saudi Arabia saw itself as the natural centre of gulf…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[26],"tags":[34,37,1738,1739,1873,31317,39,50,101,272],"class_list":["post-89860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-persian-gulf","tag-iran","tag-israel","tag-mena","tag-middle-east-conflicts","tag-opec","tag-opec-plus","tag-persian-gulf","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-strait-of-hormuz","tag-united-arab-emirates"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116489847054112588","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}