Will players in the Gulf establish a new security framework?

With the United States and Israel signalling possible attacks, and Iran promising it will respond, a meeting in Tehran is being viewed as the last chance to defuse tensions in the Gulf. Top officials from the Mecca pact nations – Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkiye – have sat down with Iranian leaders in Tehran. Diplomacy has so far failed to secure a peace agreement between Iran and the US.

But with fighting in Yemen spilling over into Saudi Arabia, can the Mecca alliance work with Iran to help secure the region? Hamid Reza Gholamzadeh – Director of DiploHouse, a Tehran-based think tank Khaled Batarfi – Saudi political analyst and academic Joey Hood – Former acting director of the Office of Iranian Affairs at the US State Department