The cold war between Saudi Arabia and Iran that's tearing apart the Middle East, explained

by Max Fisher · Monday, January 04

The supposedly ancient Sunni-Shia divide is in fact very modern — and it's not really about religion.
Only a few days into the new year, the Middle East has already taken a significant turn for the worse. The region's greatest rivalry, between Saudi Arabia and Iran, has become rapidly and significantly more toxic in the past few days, and it could have repercussions across the Middle East.
On Saturday, protesters in Tehran attacked the Saudi embassy, ransacking and burning it as Iran ignored or refused Saudi requests to protect the building. Saudi Arabia formally broke off diplomatic relations with Iran on Sunday, on Monday saying it would cut commercial ties and ban Saudi travel to Iran as well. Sudan and Bahrain, both Saudi allies, severed ties as well.
In some ways, this sort of diplomatic confrontation was perhaps inevitable: Saudi Arabia and Iran see one another as enemies, and are locked in an escalating competition for influence and dominance of the Middle East. That rivalry goes far beyond just words, with both countries backing militant groups and proxy forces throughout the region, particularly in Syria. Their competition is a major driver of conflict in the Middle East, including the growing violence along Sunni-Shia lines.
There had been hints that Saudi Arabia and Iran, perhaps exhausted by their conflict, might be willing to deescalate in 2016, maybe even finding peace deals for the wars in Syria and Yemen. But this week's events have ended those hopes, and suggest things may rather get worse. That's not just bad for Saudi Arabia and Iran — it is bad for the entire Middle East, as both regional conflicts such as Syria and generalized Sunni-Shia tension are likely to increase.
We are only four days into 2016, and already it is a year in which things in the Middle East have taken, impossible though it may seem, a significant turn for the worse. Here's how it happened and why this has Mideast analysts so worried.
This began with an execution in Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia announced on Saturday that it had executed more people in a single day than most death penalty countries, including the United States, kill in an entire year: 47, at 12 different sites across the country. Some were killed by beheading, according to the Guardian, and others by firing squad.
What makes the mass execution most significant is not its scale but rather the name of one man among the 47, many of whom were Sunni jihadists and al-Qaeda terrorists. That name is Nimr al-Nimr: a prominent religious leader from Saudi Arabia's Shia minority.
Nimr's execution outraged the Middle East's Shia communities and the leaders of Shia-majority countries. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi condemned the execution, warning of "repercussions" for regional security. Iran threatened vague consequences, with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards telling Saudi Arabia to expect "harsh revenge." Protests broke out in Bahrain, Pakistan. In Iran, protesters set fire first to a Saudi consulate building in Mashhad and then to the embassy in Tehran.
The government's choice to kill Nimr wasn't just about this one religious leader. For Saudi Arabia, Nimr represented the danger of internal Shia dissent, behind which it saw Iran's nefarious hand — and perhaps also an opportunity to generate more support for its struggling war in Yemen. For Shia throughout the region, though, Nimr was a symbol of Saudi Arabia's oppression of Shia, and of the dangers that Shia face in the mostly Sunni Middle East.

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