Iran claims Rouhani's Gulf visit was 'an opportunity' – it wasn't

Jennifer Attieh tastes the mood of the Arabic press following Rouhani's trip to Oman and Kuwait

Iranian president Hassan Rouhani. Lucas Jackson / Reuters

Before Hassan Rouhani's visit to Oman and Kuwait on Wednesday, his deputy chief of staff Hamid Aboutalebi called on the Gulf states to seize the opening the Iranian president’s short trip presented. “Opportunity passes like a cloud,” Mr Aboutalebi tweeted on Tuesday. “Take advantage of it.”

Writing in the London-based pan-Arab daily paper Asharq al-Awsat, the Saudi columnist Tariq Al Humaid did not see Iran’s initiative as a window that would not open again, nor did he deem it as a particularly good option to pursue at this juncture.

According to the writer, this is not the first tactic utilised by the Iranian regime to draw closer to Gulf countries in an effort to avoid clashes with the West, particularly the United States.

“Hashemi Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have all gone down that road before, but in vain.

“One only needs to look at the regional map to take in the scope of the devastation caused by Tehran – from Iraq to Yemen and from Lebanon to Syria, not to mention Bahrain,” Al Humaid noted.

As such, the writer wondered why all of this would make the Gulf think that the Iranian president’s visit was an opportunity not to be missed.

“In truth, it would be futile to believe Iran based on statements made or visits paid.

“The history of the region shows that the real path towards mending relations begins with deeds rather than slogans,” he said.

Al Humaid quoted Mr Rouhani who said that good relations with neighbours and the security of the Gulf are the basis of Iran’s policy.

However, the writer wondered why the Iranian president has not worked on this basis before now and why he has not previously visited the Gulf countries since he was elected in 2013.

“The answer is clearly his country’s concern over [American president Donald] Trump which makes it hard to believe Tehran,” he concluded, suggesting that the change of administration in the United States is already beginning to complicate Iran's worldview.

Writing in the pan-Arab daily paper Al-Arab, Iraqi columnist Ibrahim Al Zubaidi said Arabs must ask themselves whether their visitor could get the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, to give his blessing to a real reconciliation with neighbouring countries and the region.

Al Zubaidi noted that the Iranian regime is mainly based on the use of violence as a political means to impose itself as the custodian of the region.

As such, he wondered whether this same regime could pay the exorbitant price of a real and true reconciliation with neighbouring countries. This would require it to give up the ideology of “exporting revolution” and to stop funding, training and arming terrorist parties and militias with a view to prove its good faith.

Whatever the final outcome of Mr Rouhani’s visit to the Gulf, Al Zubaidi commented that Iran will not get out of Syria.

“Nor will it give back Iraq to the Iraqis, Lebanon to the Lebanese, Yemen to the Yemenis, Bahrain to the Bahrainis, Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabians or Kuwait to the Kuwaitis for that matter.”

According to the writer, any real reconciliation between Iran and the region would, almost inevitably, lead to two outcomes, both of which are equally threatening to the Iranian regime’s existence.

“The first outcome will be a revelation to the Shiites of the world, and particularly Arab Shiites, that they are pawns of the Iranian regime, which sends them off to kill and be killed in its never-ending wars in lieu of Iranians.

“The second will see the regime transformed into the object of gloating among Iranians, particularly those millions of people that oppose its oppression, dictatorship and barbarity,” he concluded.