For decades, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states invested trillions of dollars to transform their oil-dependent economies into diversified global hubs.Today, those blueprints are under severe threat.Caught between a United States-Israeli prosecuted war against Iran and Tehran’s asymmetric retaliation, the Gulf is paying a heavy price for its geography.Salem Al-Jahouri, a journalist and researcher, told Al Jazeera Arabic the GCC finds itself “between the hammer and the anvil”.This geopolitical squeeze has generated profound political shockwaves.Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani described the unprovoked Iranian strikes as a “betrayal,” noting that attacks on Gulf states began within an hour of the war starting, despite their active diplomatic efforts to prevent the conflict.Ultimately, these strikes leave Gulf capitals managing the economic fallout of a war they neither initiated nor endorsed, having pushed wholeheartedly for a diplomatic resolution that the US and Israel torpedoed on February 28.The cost of a closed chokepointThe most immediate shock is the virtual closure of the vital global artery, the Strait of Hormuz, which typically handles 20 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil, roughly 20 percent of the world’s seaborne oil trade. Export volumes have plummeted to less than 10 percent of pre-conflict levels.This blockade has triggered severe bottlenecks, with Iraq hit the hardest, possessing only a six-day storage capa …
