Saudi plans for a Sunni Arab force is an indication of how anxious Sunni Arab states are about the security situation in the Middle East, Professor Uzi Rabi, Director of the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel-Aviv University, told Radio Sputnik.
"This is something the Saudis have said time and again, and states are double-checking, recalculating about their future strategy," Rabi said.
While Turkey might be included, the inclusion of Iran in a regional force put together at the initiation of the Saudis would be unlikely; rather, Rabi believes that any hypothetical Saudi-led force would be targeted against Iranian influence as well as fighting terrorist groups like Daesh.
"Let me remind you that even among the Sunni Arab states there are some disagreements about whether Bashar (Assad) should stay in power in Syria or not, not everybody actually sees eye to eye with the Saudis."
"But they are trying to find out the wider common denominator, and that would be states which are against Iran and at the same time against ISIS (Daesh), and this is a wider common denominator."
"We know that states like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco, Gulf States, even Turkey to some extent, as we know they have enemies other than Israel."
"It would be first of all ISIS (Daesh) and also Iran, and this is why this is a changeable chess board. Israel is not the main enemy of those states, and this opens the way for a tactical cooperation. I'm not talking about intimacy or peace but in this fragmented Middle East definitely, a tactical alliance could be forged."
"I don't think that it would materialize because there are many questions as to who is going to lead the way, what is going to become of this army or on what basis it would act," Rabi said.
