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Iran’s attack on a US military base in Qatar last week, following American airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, was a marked change in course from a warming of ties between Tehran and the Gulf — sparking widespread condemnation from regional leaders, but not much else.
Those improved ties appear to have survived the Qatar strike, while the Gulf now worries about “an unrestrained Israel,” The Washington Post reported: The main source of regional instability, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said, was the “conflict taking place in Gaza.”
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Still, some countries in the Middle East are now more eager to join the Abraham Accords, US President Donald Trump said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday, albeit without naming specific ones.
Meanwhile, the rapid rise in prominence of a US military base in western Saudi Arabia that for years sat idle suggests conflict with Iran had been anticipated, The New York Times reported. Until last year, Logistical Support Area Jenkins was a faint apparition on satellite images, but more recent upgrades — such as to facilities for housing troops and storing ammunition — indicate the mile-wide site could become a key hub for transporting and storing supplies out of the range of Tehran’s short-range ballistic missiles.