Iran and the Arab World: An Update

It is no secret that Arab governments have long worried about Iran’s growing influence in the region and they are trying to limit Iranian influence among its population.  Here are some of the current news stories that highlight this tense relationship between Arab countries and Iran:

• Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA) reported that Arabsat, leading satellite services provider in the Arab world, has once again removed Iran’s Arabic-language news television network Al-Alam from the air. According to Al-Alam, Arabsat measure has been taken under pressures by Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The network was removed once before from the air in November 2009 by Arabsat and Cairo-based Nilesat. ISNA described Al-Alam as “among the few satellite networks in the region that supports resistance and revealed the contradiction in information policies of regional countries and particularly Persian Gulf States during Israel’s invasion against Lebanon and Gaza.”

• The National, a Abu Dhabi based newspaper, published an op-ed by Emile Hokayem, which laid out policy recommendations for the Gulf countries on how to react to Iran’s growing regional influence and controversial nuclear program. In Arab Silence is No Substitute for Policy on a Troubled Iran, Hokayem recommends that the Gulf countries should be more pro-active in their approach to Iran and “devote more thought to how a normal relationship with Iran could and should look like.” He opines that the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) can serve as a great model for the Iran-Gulf relations.

• Today, in Baghdad, a gunman opened fire at two buses carrying Iranian pilgrims, killing an Iranian woman and an Iraqi driver. The Iranian tourists were on a pilgrimage to the holy shrine of the Shiites’ seventh Imam. According to the Fars News Agency, Iran and Iraq’s deputy foreign ministers for consulate affairs will meet in Tehran for a 2-day meeting to explore ways to resolve the problems faced by the two countries’ nationals and pilgrims. As the Khaleej times reported that overall sectarian violence has fallen sharply almost seven years after the U.S. invasion, but attacks by suspected Sunni Islamist insurgents aimed at undermining the Shia-led government ahead of the election continue.

• For more information on Iran’s influence on Iraq’s upcoming election, here is an analysis provided by Anna Smushkovich at Foreign Policy Association’s Middle East blog.