Emir of Kuwait in Jeddah for mediation
Donald Trump throws his weight behind moves to isolate Doha over its support for terrorist groups and close links to Iran
ABU DHABI // The Kuwaiti emir arrived in Jeddah last night for talks with King Salman aimed at mediating an end to the gravest crisis to face the GCC.
Sheikh Sabah’s visit came a day after the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt severed diplomatic and travel links to Qatar over Doha’s support for Islamist and militant groups and its close links with Iran.
The four countries removed diplomats from Doha, Qatari citizens were ordered to leave and travel and transport to Qatar was blocked.
As support for the action grew, Donald Trump took to Twitter to back Riyadh and Abu Dhabi’s anger at Qatar’s support for extremist groups. “Perhaps this will be the beginning of the end to the horror of terrorism!” the US president said.
Adel Al Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, said the price Qatar would pay should convince it to change its policies. “We believe that common sense and logic will convince Qatar to take the right steps,” he said. “The decisions that were made were very strong and will have a fairly large cost on Qatar and we do not believe that Qataris want to sustain those costs.”
Oman’s foreign minister was in Doha at the request of frantic Qatari officials who have asked that Muscat help to mediate.
There has been a flurry of contact between the two countries to solve the row. “Qatar is looking at Oman to mediate the current standoff so that the crisis will not accelerate,” an Oman foreign ministry official said.
“Oman is obliging and has started the diplomatic process to mend the rift,” the official said.
He said Oman would stress the need for unity in the GCC as the current situation “threatens to break up the alliance”.
Muscat has been a crucial player in negotiations on regional disputes, but its close relations with Iran may mean that Kuwaiti officials have a better chance of restoring relations with Qatar.
“With Oman now mediating ... it might find it difficult to persuade the Saudis to move on since Oman and Qatar have something in common through ties with Tehran. But Sultan Qaboos is a seasoned negotiator and if anyone can do it then he can,” Ahmed Al Falahy, a former Omani diplomat, said.
The Qatari emir, Sheikh Tamim, had been scheduled to give a speech on the crisis on Monday night, but was persuaded by Sheikh Sabah to postpone it to give time to resolve the crisis, Qatar’s foreign minister said.
A crucial factor in the success of any attempts at mediation will be the role of the United States. Yesterday the US president made clear which side he was on and even claimed credit for the isolation of Qatar.
“During my recent trip to the Middle East I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology. Leaders pointed to Qatar – look!” Mr Trump said on Twitter. “So good to see the Saudi Arabia visit with the king and 50 countries already paying off. They said they would take a hard line on funding … extremism, and all reference was pointing to Qatar.”
Some observers read the statement as a weakening or even breaking of a key US partnership.
The US military’s central command has its forward headquarters at Al Udeid airbase in Qatar, with about 10,000 US servicemen. Centcom runs the coalition fight against ISIL in Iraq and Syria, and operations in Afghanistan.
US treasury officials have in the past called on Qatar to do more to prosecute citizens involved in raising funds for militant groups, but the US military and intelligence agencies work closely with Doha and the airbase is a key component of Washington’s security strategy in the Gulf.
Mr Trump’s tweet raises questions over whether his top officials’ stance on helping to broker a mediation still holds. It could also complicate the Kuwaiti and Omani efforts within the bloc to begin talks on resolving the crisis.
Qatar has also made strategic alliances with other regional and global powers. Turkey is its closest regional ally, and Ankara is building a permanent military base there. But Turkey has also sought to rebuild ties with Riyadh and Abu Dhabi, and has not outright sided with Doha. Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has spoken to the leaders of Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait as well as to Sheikh Tamim in an attempt to reduce tensions.
Al Azhar in Cairo, the centre of Sunni Islamic scholarship, commended the measures taken against Qatar to “guarantee the unity of the Arab nation”.
Tensions had escalated since Mr Trump’s visit to Riyadh last month. The kingdom and Abu Dhabi are angered by Doha’s backing for Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, its support of extremist ideology and its links with Iran.
A similar spat in 2014 was defused, but the UAE’s suspicion over Qatar never dissipated. Both the UAE and Saudi Arabia say Qatar never honoured the commitments it made at the time.
At the heart of the tension is the support Doha has given for decades to Islamist groups that intensified after the Arab Spring, and its maverick foreign policy choices that undermine the stability of GCC states.
While Qatar has appeared to pin its hopes on mediation, there were also signs of defiance. Sheikh Tamim hosted the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Youssef Al Qaradawi, at a televised iftar on Monday.
Al Qaradawi was at the centre of the 2014 row, when the UAE and Saudi Arabia demanded that he not be allowed on Qatari media.