The Middle East is kicking the U.S. to the curb

And why not? Of course we don't know how long this Iran-Saudi glad-handing will last. But in any case U.S. influence will still be tanking. Looking at history, the only "surprise" is that it took this long.

In an interview with Al Jazeera English, veteran Washington Iran watcher Hillary Mann Leverett asserted that, in the wake of the reestablishment of Iran-Saudi diplomatic relations in an agreement brokered by Beijing, China is now “the indispensable nation” in the Middle East. She underlined that the United States could not have achieved this accomplishment.

The joint statement issued on Friday, crafted by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and diplomats of the two feuding Middle Eastern states, pledged non-interference in each other’s domestic affairs. Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal Bin Farhan tweeted that the agreement formed part of the Saudi vision for peaceful cooperation in the region toward a common efflorescence...

Now, half a century later, it is China that has 99% of the cards when it comes to relations across the Oil Gulf. The hardest of hard lines taken by the United States against Iran, with the imposition of a de facto global financial and trade embargo on that country’s oil exports, putting the two countries on a war footing, has led to the US utterly lacking influence in Iran or Syria, and to its having alienated most of Iraq. This invisible blockade was imposed on Iran even though it had carefully adhered to the 2015 nuclear deal it signed with the Security Council, a deal from which Trump withdrew and which he more or less destroyed. - Informed Comment