For 30 years, the Gulf monarchies rested their security on a single assumption: that the United States would keep them safe.
The war that US President Donald Trump and Israel waged against Iran has buried that assumption.
The American bases scattered across the Gulf did not shield states from a conflict they never chose. They made it a target. Iran could not easily reach Tel Aviv or Washington, so it struck the softer prizes within range, and the Gulf absorbed the blows.
This was the old bargain exposed for what it had become.
Trump proved he could start a war, but he could not end one. His impatience, his appetite for flattery and his constant swing between the Israel lobby and the Gulf lobby left him incapable of the patient bargaining a settlement demanded.
