Iran International
Qatar's diplomatic prowess was lavished with praise by US President Donald Trump on his visit this week, suggesting the maverick mediator state may be set for more involvement on one of the region's trickiest dossiers: Iran.
Trump's remarks could herald a bigger role for Qatar as the US-Iran talks mediated by Oman appear headed for crunch time.
During a state dinner in Doha this week, Trump appeared to acknowledge Qatar’s crucial role in helping put off a US military strike on Iran amid high stakes talks over Tehran's disputed nuclear program.
Trump praised Qatar’s leadership, specifically Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, for resisting calls within Washington and its allies to deliver a “hard blow” to Iran.
“Iran should seriously thank the emir of Qatar, because there are others who want to deal a hard blow to Iran, unlike Qatar,” Trump said. “Iran is very lucky to have the emir because he’s actually fighting for them. He doesn’t want us to do a vicious blow to Iran.”
Hashem Ahelbarra, a correspondent for Qatar-owned Al-Jazeera, said the comments strongly indicate a potential larger role for Doha in mediating a settlement between Tehran and Washington.
“They played quite a crucial role in mediating between the Iranians and the Americans in the past.”
Increased Qatari engagement would come at a time Iran is signaling openness to include its Sunni Arab neighbors in the nuclear negotiation process.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi’s visits to Riyadh and Doha earlier this month just ahead of the fourth round of nuclear talks held in Oman and Abu Dhabi highlight Tehran’s willingness to broaden the regional dialogue.
Perils of potential US-Iran military confrontation for Qatar
The gas-rich microstate has been key mediator for the United States in regional conflagrations from Afghanistan to Gaza.
Qatar, which has strong ties with the US and hosts Al Udeid Air Base—the largest US military base in the Middle East—opposes any US or Israeli military strike on Iran and its nuclear facilities, emphasizing the risk of regional destabilization, and seeks a diplomatic solution.
Iranian officials, including Defense Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh, have issued multiple warnings that Iran would retaliate against US military bases and interests in the region if Washington initiates a military strike.
“We have no hostility toward our neighboring countries, and brotherhood prevails among us. However, US bases located in the region's countries will be considered targets by us in the event of an attack on the Islamic Republic of Iran,” he said.
Additionally, Iran has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, a vital oil shipping route, if a war breaks out.
In March 2025, Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani warned that military strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities could have catastrophic environmental consequences, such as contaminating the Persian Gulf’s waters.
This, he said, would imperil the water security of Qatar, along with other states like the UAE and Kuwait, all of which rely heavily on desalinated water from the Persian Gulf.
Good neighbors
Iran and Qatar, which share stewardship of South Pars, the world’s largest natural gas field, have maintained close economic and political relations over the years.
Iran played a crucial role in helping Qatar maintain economic stability and connectivity with the outside world when Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt imposed a blockade on Qatar in 2017, partly due to its close ties with Iran.
Tehran offered Doha diplomatic support, opened its airspace to Qatari aircraft, sent dozens of cargo planes and ships loaded with food, and expanded maritime trade routes to Qatar through its southern ports.
More recently, Doha initiated indirect talks between the US and Iran in 2023, focusing on potential compromises around Iran’s uranium enrichment levels in exchange for phased sanctions relief.
Qatar also played a pivotal role in facilitating the release of five American citizens detained in Iran in September 2023, hosting multiple rounds of indirect negotiations between US and Iranian officials in Doha.
The detainees were freed in exchange for five Iranians held in the US, alongside the transfer of $6 billion in Iranian funds previously frozen in South Korea.
The unfrozen funds, stipulated to be used solely for humanitarian purposes, such as purchasing food and medicine, were transferred to Qatari banks and Qatar committed to overseeing the disbursement of these funds to ensure compliance with US sanctions.
The funds, however, have not been made available to Iran due to a quiet agreement between Washington and Doha.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei blamed Washington for obstructing the release of the funds during his meeting with the Emir of Qatar in Tehran in February and said Iran expected Doha to resist US pressure.
President Trump arrived in Saudi Arabia on May 13 on the first leg of a four-day, three-country trip to the Middle East that included stops in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
The choice of Saudi Arabia for the first state visit of Trump’s second term mirrored that of his first, except this time he did not go to Israel, signaling that the administration is doubling down on its Arabian peninsula partners as key supporters of US regional interests.
Iran was naturally not on the itinerary but ever-present in Trump’s public statements, with the president using a characteristic blend of carrot-and-stick which urged Iranian leaders to take a “new and better path” and warned of “massive maximum pressure” if Tehran “rejects this olive branch.”
Trump expressed his desire to reach a deal with Iran on many occasions, even hinting that a deal was almost agreed. For that to happen, however, Tehran "must stop sponsoring terror, halt its bloody proxy wars, and permanently and verifiably cease its pursuit of nuclear weapons,” he added.
Later, aboard Air Force One, Trump told reporters that Iran had to “make the right decision” about its nuclear program because “something’s going to happen one way or the other” and "we’ll either do it friendly or we’ll do it very unfriendly.”
Arab, Iranian audiences
There are various takeaways for leaders in Iran as well as in its neighboring Arab countries, from Trump’s commentary.
For the latter, Trump’s demand that Iran end its sponsorship of terror and involvement in proxy wars will be welcomed as a signal that any agreement with Tehran might not be narrowly confined to its nuclear program alone, as was the case with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2015.
For leaders in Riyadh, Doha and Abu Dhabi - not to mention in Tel Aviv -it was Iran’s regional activities that were as much a priority as its nuclear program, and their exclusion from the negotiations for the 2015 nuclear deal caused alarm in the region.
However, any such optimism in regional corridors of power may be tempered by concern that the president’s unconventional approach to deal-making may create openings for an agreement that gives Trump the optics he desires at the expense of nuts-and-bolts details on specific Iranian commitments.
Deals, details and differences
Comments by Steve Witkoff, Trump’s chief negotiator and one of his closest confidants, in podcast and other appearances, have not given the impression of a details-focused approach to diplomacy, whether in terms of Russia and Ukraine or Iran.
Witkoff and other members of the Trump administration have also sent mixed messages about whether Iran would be able to enrich uranium in any agreement, reinforcing concerns by domestic and regional critics of US engagement with Iran that a new deal may be worse than no deal.
For the leadership in Tehran, beset by economic challenges, energy shortages and geopolitical setbacks that left its regional "Axis of Resistance" weakened, the optics of Trump’s regional procession offer glimpses of opportunity.
The fact that Trump met with Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Riyadh and declared that sanctions on Syria would be lifted was further illustration that Trump is transactional rather than ideological, and willing to take decisions that break the mold of conventional American policy thinking.
This was underscored in Trump’s remarks in Riyadh on May 13 when he slammed the failures of generations of western interventionists and neocons in the Middle East who “told you how to do it, but they had no idea how to do it themselves” and, he argued, did far more damage than good.
In making these comments and receiving al-Sharaa, Trump has shown himself willing to break free of traditional constraints on US policymaking in the region, at least on the surface, and this may yet extend to Iran.
Unclear outlook
There are nevertheless multiple uncertainties for Iranian officials as they begin to digest the outcomes of Trump’s visit to the Middle East and assess the implications, both short- and long-term, for Tehran.
The plethora of major deals signed in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE have cemented these countries’ deep and longstanding ties with the US across the defense and security, economic, and energy spectrum.
Any concerns in the region of US disengagement from the Middle East may be dissipated by the sight of Trump bestowing such significance on the region, in stark contrast to the disdain with which the administration has treated its formal allies in Europe and North America.
And yet, if Trump is to reap the benefits of the hundreds of billions of dollars of planned investments into the US, he will likely return from his trip with a conviction that the pledges, and the returns, require stability and would be jeopardized by any conflict with Iran.
This not only plays into the de-risking and de-escalatory approach that Iran's energy-rich Arab neighbors have taken since 2020 but may also fortify Trump’s desire to burnish his credentials as a peacemaker in the explosive region.
