After Wednesday’s phone call involving President Biden, Vice President Harris, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – the US and Israel have moved closer on achieving consensus regarding Israel’s planned retaliation against Iran. 

There have been reports that Netanyahu is now seeking the approval of his security cabinet, however regional media says that no big resolutions have been reached. The expected big counterstrikes have yet to come, despite Iran firing some 200 ballistic missiles at Israel on October 1st.

But The Wall Street Journal has described Iran’s “secret warning” conveyed to other Middle East regional countries this week as it braces for Israel’s potential retaliation.

Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) flags in Kuwait, via AFP

“Tehran is threatening in secret diplomatic backchannels to target the oil-rich Arab Gulf states and other American allies in the Middle East if their territories or airspace are used for an attack on Iran, said Arab officials,” writes WSJ.

Israel could potentially use Jordanian, UAE, or possibly Saudi airspace in such an attack, despite these countries on an official level rejecting such a possibility. We detailed this week that the gulf states are pushing hard for Israel to avoid hitting Iranian oil facilities, on fears that Tehran would in turn authorize its proxies to attack Saudi Aramco sites, like happened in 2019.

According to more from the WSJ:

The Arab officials said the countries that Iran has threatened include Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, all of which host U.S. troops. These states have told the Biden administration that they don’t want their military infrastructure or airspace to be used by the U.S. or Israel for any offensive operations against Iran, the officials said.

As for America’s gulf allies’ pleading for Israel and the US to not use their airspace for counter-Iran operations, the WSJ has noted further, “The Arab countries’ requests remain informal, a U.S. defense official said.”

A key complication, and one which puts the Saudis in a precarious and delicate position vis-a-vis their allies, is that the United States has bases and a troop presence in the kingdom, including significant US Air Force assets.

Washington has already pledged to help the Israelis repel any future Iranian ballistic missile counterattacks, as it did in the last two rounds of drones and ballistic missiles fired on Israel.

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A broader Iran-Israel war would certainly see the US pressure the Saudis and GCC to allow American fighter jets based out of the Gulf to engage Iran.

Meanwhile Saudis appear to be taking steps to appease Iran: “As part of their attempts to avoid being caught in the crossfire, Gulf states including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar are also refusing to let Israel fly over their airspace for any attack on Iran and have conveyed this to Washington, the three sources close to government circles said,” Reuters detailed this week.