Politically, economically, culturally and militarily, the Gulf has never been so much at the centre of the Middle East. Seven years after the beginning of the Arab revolutions, the region is currently embroiled in a new series of crises, from the human tragedy that is the war in Yemen, to the ongoing isolation of Qatar by the quartet of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Egypt. Indeed, Gulf debates, dynamics and bones of contention, within and between its nine states (the six monarchies of the Arabian Peninsula, as well as Yemen, Iran and Iraq) have been exacerbating and swaying regional issues, from the Maghreb to Pakistan. The heightened struggle between Saudi Arabia and Iran for regional influence and its subsequent impact on the politics of a number of Middle Eastern countries remains a pertinent issue, especially with regards to Yemen, Syria and Iraq and Bahrain. Beyond Iran and Saudi Arabia, the role of Gulf regimes, non-state actors, including businessmen, clerics, armed movements, to name but a few, have been important in shaping the outcomes of the Arab revolutions, while smaller states such as the UAE and Qatar have been taking more proactive and provocative roles in armed interventions as far afield as Libya and Yemen. Some have referred to this as the new ‘Gulf moment,’ which, in its least contentious form, describes the increasing importance of the Gulf states in the politics of the wider Middle East.

This, arguably, unprecedented influence of the Gulf states in regional affairs is intimately linked to the social, demographic and intellectual changes that the wider Middle East has been experiencing in recent years. In particular, the increasing social and political instability of the Middle East makes the nine Gulf states more exposed to regional shock waves and less immune to large-scale change than ever before. The recent Qatar Crisis, for example, has brought into sharp relief tensions existing even within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), reflecting competition for ascendency and challenges to conformity. The manipulation of sectarian identities and the spread of ideas, doctrines and political movements whose roots originate in the Arabian Peninsula and Iran have provoked new debates, with a direct impact on the political situation in Iraq and Syria. This is not to imply that the transnational interactions between the Gulf and the wider Middle East, which underpin this ‘moment’, are radically new in form or content. The deep historical interconnectedness of the Gulf and the wider region is manifest in a wide range of forms, from economic links to population movements, cultural exchanges, religious ties, ideological struggles and communal affiliations. Rather, it is to say that the present moment attests to a number of shifts, accelerations and indeed notable departures, especially regarding the dynamics of power, which should not and, indeed, cannot be overlooked.