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Diplomats from Saudi Arabia, China and Iran at a summit in Beijing.

Reuters

​Is China’s Saudi-Iran diplomatic deal for real?

“Welcome to the post-America moment in the Middle East,” one commentator wrote after the surprising news broke last week that China had mediated a diplomatic breakthrough between two forever enemies: Iran and Saudi Arabia. Others hailed the exciting prospect of peace between two countries that have long been locked in regional proxy wars.

But are these hot takes jumping the gun? Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the country’s de facto decision maker known as MBS, once said Iran’s supreme leader “makes Hitler look good.” So why has he bought into this rapprochement – and why now?

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Can Saudi Arabia and Iran really be friends?

Few rivalries in the world today are as bitter and bloody as the struggle between Iran and Saudi Arabia. For more than forty years, they have vied for sectarian and strategic influence across the Middle East, waging proxy wars that have wreaked havoc in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and elsewhere.

But now it appears the two old foes might be looking for ways to patch things up.

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