Tiny Qatar refuses to bend on foreign policy despite a blockade by other Persian Gulf nations
The Persian Gulf this month has been gripped by an unprecedented crisis involving Qatar and several other countries that could see thousands of people forced to move and start new lives.
Ongoing tension in the region escalated to crisis level June 5 when a coalition of Arab states in the Gulf Cooperation Council announced a coordinated diplomatic break with Qatar, a small nation with big clout thanks to its wealth of oil and natural gas.
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, plus non-GCC member Egypt, accused Qatar of harboring, funding and championing Islamist terrorists, in part via the Doha-based satellite news channel Al Jazeera.
The countries cut air, sea and land links with Qatar. Several ordered Qataris in their countries to return home, and their citizens to leave the country within two weeks.
Although gulf countries have staged blockades of Qatar before and scored concessions, some analysts said the situation had not been quite like this.
“This is a major crisis. Saudi Arabia, UAE and Bahrain will not back down this time. The stakes are high because it can undermine what the GCC has achieved since its inception” in 1981, said Omar Mohamed, a strategic analyst with the government of Bahrain based in Manama, the capital.