Former Qatar PM: Netanyahu using Iran war to reshape Middle East

The United States-Israel warfare connected Iran is not the effect of a abrupt escalation but the culmination of a semipermanent Israeli docket to violently reshape the Middle East, erstwhile Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani tells Al Jazeera.

In a wide-ranging, candid interrogation connected Al Jazeera’s Al Muqabala programme, the seasoned diplomat offered a stark appraisal of the region’s rapidly shifting geopolitical landscape. He warned that the situation successful the Strait of Hormuz is the astir perilous effect of the caller war, cautioned against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ambitions for a “Greater Israel” and called for the urgent constitution of a unified Gulf defence pact.

“We are witnessing a large restructuring of the region,” Sheikh Hamad said, noting that the existent geopolitical tremors volition dictate the signifier of the Middle East for decades to come.

Netanyahu’s ‘illusion’ and the US misstep

Sheikh Hamad had warned of an impending struggle past twelvemonth and urged Gulf states to propulsion for a diplomatic solution to resoluteness the situation with Iran and forestall subject strikes.

He identified a propulsion for a struggle with Iran and blamed it connected a “hardline faction” wrong Israel led by Netanyahu, who helium said had been trying to resistance the US into a warfare implicit Tehran’s atomic programme since President Bill Clinton’s medication successful the 1990s.

While erstwhile US governments – including during President Donald Trump’s archetypal word – hesitated to motorboat a full-scale warfare connected Iran, Netanyahu yet succeeded by selling Washington an “illusion”, Sheikh Hamad argued. “He convinced the US medication that the warfare would beryllium abbreviated and swift and that the Iranian authorities would autumn wrong weeks,” helium said, drafting parallels to failed US efforts to alteration Venezuela’s government.

The erstwhile Qatari premier criticised Washington’s reliance connected subject might, saying, “America’s existent powerfulness has ever been successful its quality to debar utilizing force, not successful deploying it.” He noted that the existent warfare yet has forced each parties backmost to the negotiating table, suggesting that an further 2 weeks of talks successful Geneva aboriginal this twelvemonth – an Oman-led diplomatic propulsion to debar war – could person averted the catastrophe altogether.

Netanyahu has emerged arsenic the superior beneficiary of the war, Sheikh Hamad observed, saying the Israeli person is utilizing the chaos to marketplace his imaginativeness of forced determination alliances and a “Greater Israel”, a program among Israel’s close helping to grow the country’s borders deeper into neighbouring Arab states.

A instrumentality vessel sits astatine anchor successful the Strait of Hormuz disconnected Bandar Abbas, Iran, connected May 2, 2026 [Amirhosein Khorgooi/ISNA via AP]

The Strait of Hormuz: A caller planetary flashpoint

Assessing Tehran’s strategy, Sheikh Hamad said Iran successfully absorbed the archetypal subject strikes of the warfare and subsequently dragged its feet connected a colony aft realising it could leverage a caller strategical advantage: the Strait of Hormuz.

Calling the weaponisation of the waterway the “most unsafe outcome” of the war, helium warned that Iran is present treating the captious planetary chokepoint arsenic its ain sovereign territory. This, helium argued, poses a much contiguous and terrible menace to planetary economies than the Iranian atomic programme.

The Gulf states, alternatively than Washington, person borne the brunt of this crisis, Sheikh Hamad said, and the erstwhile premier curate harshly condemned Iran’s attacks connected Gulf energy, concern and civilian infrastructure nether what helium said was the guise of targeting US interests, noting that these Gulf nations had explicitly opposed the war.

As a result, Tehran has exhausted overmuch of its governmental superior successful the Gulf, generating wide nationalist choler implicit the economical and information disruptions its actions person caused. However, Sheikh Hamad stressed that geography dictates coexistence and called for a frank, corporate Gulf dialog with Tehran alternatively than fragmented unilateral communications to found a realistic model for the future.

A telephone for a ‘Gulf NATO’

In 1 of his astir blunt assessments, Sheikh Hamad declared that the top menace to the Gulf is neither Iran, Israel nor overseas subject bases but interior Gulf disunity.

To antagonistic this, helium projected the instauration of a “Gulf NATO”, a associated governmental and defence task starting with a halfway radical of strategically aligned Gulf nations with Saudi Arabia serving arsenic its earthy backbone. He argued that the European Union began with a tiny fig of states earlier expanding, suggesting a akin exemplary governed by strict institutionalised laws respected by each members.

Addressing the US subject presence, Sheikh Hamad acknowledged that US bases person provided important deterrence for decades. However, helium warned that Washington’s strategical pivot towards Asia and the containment of China means the Gulf tin nary longer trust indefinitely connected the US information umbrella, and helium urged Gulf states to make long-term, interest-based strategical partnerships with determination powers specified arsenic Turkiye, Pakistan and Egypt.

Gaza, normalisation and a late-1990s secret

Turning to the contented of Palestine, Sheikh Hamad condemned the sidesplitting of civilians connected each sides but accused Israel of committing a “moral and governmental disaster” successful Gaza, wherever much than 72,500 Palestinians person been killed since Israel’s genocidal warfare began successful October ⁠2023. He warned of an Israeli crippled to depopulate the strip, citing quality that wealth is being offered to promote Palestinians to permission the enclave, which helium said, successful effect, is turning Gaza into a existent property project.

While acknowledging the unprecedented planetary sympathy the Palestinian origin has garnered since October 7, 2023, peculiarly successful the West, helium cautioned Palestinian factions, including Hamas, to cautiously measurement the devastating quality cost.

He firmly rejected immoderate treatment of disarming Hamas without a guaranteed governmental skyline for an autarkic Palestinian authorities and praised Saudi Arabia’s steadfast refusal to normalise relations with Israel without a roadmap for this – a stance, helium said, that profoundly disrupted Netanyahu’s determination calculations.

Reflecting connected caller determination shifts, Sheikh Hamad expressed alleviation astatine the autumn of Bashar al-Assad’s authorities successful Syria, revealing that helium had personally advised the erstwhile president aboriginal successful the gyration to perceive to his people. He praised the pragmatism of the caller Syrian enactment successful avoiding Israeli provocations and urged it to absorption connected economical and organization rebuilding aft astir 14 years of warfare and mismanagement by al-Assad’s government.

The interrogation besides unveiled a portion of hidden diplomatic history. Sheikh Hamad disclosed that successful the precocious 1990s, the Qatari enactment dispatched him to Tehran to present a connection from the Clinton administration. The US demanded that Iran manus implicit its nascent atomic programme to Russia oregon taxable to planetary arrangements.

While Qatar acted strictly arsenic a messenger, Tehran astatine the clip viewed Doha arsenic aligned with the American stance, helium noted.