Saudi Arabia was the center of regional and world attention on Friday, as it invited both the Syrian and Ukrainian presidents to the Arab summit it was hosting.
In an unexpected move, Volodymyr Zelenskyy attended the summit of the Arab League to canvas support for his people, while Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman expressed his readiness to mediate in the war between Moscow and Kyiv.
"We reaffirm the kingdom's readiness to continue mediating efforts between Russia and Ukraine, and to support all international efforts aimed at resolving the crisis politically in a way that contributes to achieving security," the Saudi Crown Prince said in his opening speech.
At the same time, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was given a warm welcome at the summit, winning a hug from Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince at a meeting of leaders who had shunned him for years, in a policy shift opposed by the US and other Western powers.
However, having Assad, a Russian and Iranian ally and Zelenskyy at the same summit was a diplomatic achievement by Saudi Arabia that reinforces it image as the main player in the Middle East and increasingly a key presence on the world stage.
The government in Tehran has so far not reacted to Riyadh’s move inviting Zelenskyy to the summit, although there was negative coverage by IRGC-linked Fars news agency.
Iran has supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by supplying kamikaze drones and other weapons to Moscow and signing several economic agreements with Moscow just this week.
Although Tehran initially welcomed Saudi Arabia’s decision to restore ties with Assad, Iranian media began mentioning that Damascus owes tens of billions of dollars to Iran for its economic and military support since the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011. If rich Arab countries, led by Saudi Arabia, succeed in winning over Assad, Iran will be the biggest loser, finding its decade-long effort to expand influence in the Levant as a failure.
"We hope Syria's return to the Arab League leads to the end of its crisis," Crown Prince Mohammed said in his remarks, 12 years after Arab states suspended Syria as the country descended into a civil war that has killed more than 350,000 people.
Oil powerhouse Saudi Arabia, once heavily influenced by the United States, has taken the diplomatic lead in the Arab world in the past year, re-establishing ties with Iran, welcoming Syria back to the fold, and mediating in the Sudan conflict.
Washington has objected to any steps towards normalization with Assad, saying there must first be progress towards a political solution to the conflict.
"The Americans are dismayed. We (Persian Gulf states) are people living in this region, we're trying to solve our problems as much as we can with the tools available to us in our hands," an Arab source close to government circles told Reuters.
The Saudi Syrian rapprochement followed a Chinese-brokered deal between Riyadh and Tehran in March to restore relations after a seven-year hiatus.
In 2018, the Qatari emir said the region could not tolerate "a war criminal" like Assad. Qatar hosted an Arab summit a decade ago at which the Syrian opposition sat in Syria's seat. Many regarded Assad as a war criminal for bombing and gassing his own people during the civil war.
With reporting by Reuters