Yoel Guzansky, and Emily B. Landau
In an unusual statement, the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates recently compared the Iranian occupation of the three Gulf islands it claims – Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb – to “the Israeli occupation of Arab land.” Both the highly irregular statement and the sensitive analogy dramatize the concern in the Gulf that Iran, under the aegis of its nuclear program, seeks to dominate not only the region’s agenda but also Arab territory.