For years, Western policymakers operated on a convenient assumption: Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates functioned as a unified strategic bloc; a stabilizing force against Iranian expansion.
By early 2026, that assumption lies in ruins. What has emerged instead is an increasingly open rivalry between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi – one that is reshaping regional power dynamics and creating dangerous security vacuums across the Middle East.
This is not a dispute born of personality clashes or diplomatic misunderstandings. At its core, the Saudi-UAE feud reflects fundamentally incompatible visions of regional order. Saudi Arabia prioritizes hierarchy, territorial integrity, and de-escalation – a strategy designed to protect the kingdom’s borders and maintain internal stability.
The UAE, by contrast, seeks leverage through ports, proxies, and freedom of maneuver in fragile states. These divergent approaches cannot coexist indefinitely.
The contradiction between Saudi and Emirati strategies has nowhere been more visible than in Yemen. What began as a joint Arab coalition against Iranian-backed Houthis has devolved into a shadow conflict between supposed allies. Riyadh has grown increasingly alarmed by Abu Dhabi’s support for separatist forces in southern and eastern Yemen – forces that directly threaten Saudi Arabia’s core objective of preventing a fractured state on its vulnerable southern border.
By late 2025, tensions crossed a critical threshold. Saudi pressure against UAE-linked actors in Yemen signaled not merely coordination failure, but strategic collision. The irony is devastating: the Houthis are stronger today not because Tehran significantly increased its investment, but because their enemies dismantled their own coalition. Every Saudi-Emirati disagreement over militias, ports, and spheres of influence has created operational space for Iran at minimal cost.
Tehran understands this dynamic perfectly. Iranian strategists no longer need to escalate dramatically in Yemen – the erosion of Gulf unity has done their work for them.
This pattern extends beyond the Arabian Peninsula. Hezbollah, observing Arab states squabbling and fragmented, operates in a strategic environment where Israel faces diluted regional coordination and distracted partners. When Arab rivals compete rather than cooperate, Iran’s axis of resistance gains time, flexibility, and confidence.
A fractured Gulf, rising regional risks
For Israel, Yemen has transformed from a peripheral concern into a direct security challenge. The Red Sea is a vital strategic artery, and instability along the Bab al-Mandab Strait threatens Israeli trade, energy security, and naval freedom of movement. A Yemen fractured between rival Gulf patrons and Iranian-aligned forces is not a distant humanitarian crisis – it is an active threat. Houthi capabilities against regional shipping, already demonstrated, become far more dangerous when Arab deterrence collapses.
The fragmentation extends to the diplomatic sphere. The Abraham Accords were meant to usher in a new regional alignment, with pragmatic Arab states openly coordinating with Israel against shared threats. Instead, normalization has become yet another arena of Saudi-UAE competition. The Emirates moved decisively, converting diplomatic recognition into prestige and regional influence. Saudi Arabia, unwilling to be perceived as following Abu Dhabi’s lead and constrained by domestic considerations, has pulled back. The result is not gradual progress toward broader peace, but paralysis.
For Israel, this creates a fundamentally altered strategic landscape. There is no longer a coherent “Gulf position” to engage, no unified Arab partner to anchor regional initiatives. Instead, Israeli strategists must navigate rival ambitions, conflicting priorities, and the absence of a shared security framework – precisely when Iran’s regional posture is hardening and its proxies are gaining ground.
Perhaps the most dangerous aspect of the Saudi-UAE competition is its lack of constraints. There is no mechanism to manage escalation, no agreed hierarchy, and no shared redlines. Two wealthy, ambitious states are pulling the region in opposite directions, each convinced that competition can enhance its position, even as their rivalry weakens the collective front against common adversaries.
This is not a temporary diplomatic rift that will heal with shuttle diplomacy or summit meetings: It represents a structural realignment of Gulf politics. The era of relying on a coherent Gulf axis to contain Iran, stabilize strategic waterways, and reinforce regional deterrence has ended. In its place is a fractured landscape where Arab rivalries generate security vacuums – and those vacuums are systematically exploited by Iran and its network of proxies.
Unless regional actors and their Western partners recognize this as a fundamental transformation rather than a passing dispute, strategic planning will remain anchored to a Middle East that no longer exists. Meanwhile, the real Middle East – fragmented, volatile, and increasingly dangerous – continues to evolve in ways that advantage those who thrive on instability.
The writer, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is a policy analyst and writer based in Morocco. Follow him on X: @amineayoubx