South-East Asian countries are broadly siding with Iran in its conflict with Israel. This isn't surprising

Activists during a solidarity protest in support of the Palestinian people, in Jakarta, on Thursday. EPA

While some western leaders have been shredding what little remains of the rules-based international order by bizarrely insisting that the appropriate way to respond to Israel’s illegal attacks on Iran is to state that “Israel does have the right to defend itself”, there is a different view in South-East Asia. The leaders of Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei have all condemned the aggression of the Israeli government, while Singapore has called for an immediate ceasefire.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim was typically straightforward. “We must stand up for the rights of our friends, including Iran, which has been wronged,” he said on Sunday. “We defend Iran’s right to retaliate in order to uphold its national dignity.” Referring to that retaliation, he said: “Many European nations criticised and express outrage against Iran. But when Israel launched its attacks, they remained silent. I do not share that view.” His government would continue “to uphold the principle of defending the rights and sovereignty of all nations,” he added.

Brunei is a signatory – as is the UAE - to the joint statement by 21 Arab and Islamic countries which states their “categorical rejection and condemnation of Israel’s recent attacks on the Islamic Republic of Iran since the 13th of June 2025 … while emphasising the necessity of respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of states, adhering to the principles of good neighbourliness, and the peaceful settlement of disputes”.

Malaysia Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim (C) at the opening ceremony of the Energy Asia Conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on June 16. EPA

Asked about the Israel-Iran conflict on Monday, the head of Indonesia’s Presidential Communication Office said: “In every conflict, Indonesia’s stance is always the same: condemning military aggression, encouraging de-escalation and ceasefire, and calling for a resolution through diplomacy and international law.”

The stance in Jakarta is unsurprising. Iran’s late president Ebrahim Raisi paid a state visit to Indonesia in 2023, and earlier this week local media quoted the Iranian ambassador as saying that a reciprocal invitation was being issued to President Prabowo Subianto. “If Prabowo accepts [Iranian] President Masoud Pezeshkian's invitation, we can arrange the perfect time for their meeting,” he told them, a little precipitously, some may think, given the current circumstances.

Mr Prabowo also appeared to speak for Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong on Tuesday, when the two appeared before reporters at Parliament House, Singapore, after a bilateral meeting this week, and said: “We emphasise the importance of peaceful solution negotiations, and we call for an immediate ceasefire.”

If the Israeli government wasn’t a pariah before, it is now

Only last month Mr Prabowo said that: "Indonesia has stated that once Israel recognises Palestine, Indonesia is ready to recognise Israel and open the diplomatic relationship." Don’t expect much more of that kind of talk in the region for now. The words “valid for all countries except Israel” are unlikely to disappear from Malaysian passports any time soon.

As it is, international sporting events have already been stripped from Malaysia and Indonesia over the past few years after prominent politicians objected to Israelis taking part. Singapore’s leadership probably keeps as quiet as possible about the city-state’s long and close ties to Israel, which have caused protests this year and last.

In fact, all countries in the region with significant Muslim minorities, and that includes Singapore, Thailand, Myanmar and the Philippines, need to tread carefully on the Israel-Iran conflict – which may be why their governments appear to have said or done little or nothing thus far.

The reason for that is opinion among the region’s about 250 million Muslims is, broadly speaking, pretty black and white: the government of Israel is – yet again – the aggressor, and Iran has the right to fight back. From my own experiences at conferences involving South-East Asian countries, I would suggest, however, it's important to note that the friendliness is with Iran as a state and as a fellow Muslim country.

It's not about approval of the Islamic Republic per se, nor its activities interfering in other states in the Middle East. First of all, distance matters. Iran’s support of the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon is in a faraway neighbourhood.

Second, the South-East Asian view would be that all of that, including Iran’s domestic political set-up, is none of their business. The principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of other states applies, and Iran does not seek to intervene in South-East Asian states.

This is also why the fact that Iran is Shiite, a form of Islam that is a tiny minority and not exactly encouraged in the overwhelmingly Sunni region, is not an issue. That is seen as an internal matter for Iran, and doesn’t need to affect relations between states.

Seen from South-East Asia, Iran is a state which has for centuries been an important part of the Islamic world. There is no reason at all why it should not be treated warmly as part of the “friends with all” approach common in the region.

The US and its allies may regard it as “the principal source of regional instability and terror”, as the recent G7 statement put it, but that doesn’t persuade people in Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta or Mindanao. After all, even if Tehran managed to achieve the nuclear bomb that it has always denied trying to build, it is highly unlikely that it would ever be pointed towards South-East Asia.

And, in any case, I have heard pointed out many times: Israel has a nuclear bomb – why shouldn’t Iran? The latter is simply not viewed as any kind of threat at all.

Support for Israel, on the other hand, has always been low to the point of unmeasurable among the Muslim masses in South-East Asia, even if some elites were open to co-operation on security matters, for instance. Now it is hard to find anyone who isn’t troubled by Israel’s constant flouting of international law and complete disregard for civilian life.

Iran has sometimes been said in the last few days to have “no friends”. But if Tehran looks east, it will find hundreds of millions who are, at the least, well-disposed towards them. And in the current conflict, there’s little doubt about whose side they are on.