Mohammad bin Salman, the Saudi crown prince and the Defence Minister have recently gone on the offensive. A few months after the Qatar blockade, Salman went further in an attempt to stifle regional opponents and instigated an event which was interpreted by a vast majority of experts as basically a kidnapping or detainment of Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad Hariri. Hariri (a Saudi ally) who had been mentioning the possible cooperation of his own Future Movement with a coalition which includes Hezbollah. It is not improbable that Salman concluded that such a cooperation between Saudi Arabia's man in Lebanon and the leading ally of Iran is unacceptable. Together, Hezbollah and Iran have helped President Bashar al-Asad to stay in power in Syria while helping to train and arm Shia militias in Iraq, all in opposition to Saudi moves in the region.

A further move made by Salman inside the kingdom was the detainment of several wealthy and influential Saudi princes in what seems to be an attempt to consolidate power. Many are now worried that Salman's moves inside the kingdom, as well as a series of increasingly bolder moves in the region (an apparent cozying up to Israel being one of them) is a sign that Salman has been given free reign by Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son in law and Senior Advisor who has been announced by Trump as the man to lead the charge in brokering a new peace deal in the Middle East. It is unclear where such a concentration of power and influence in Kushner's hands leaves Rex Tillerson, the US Secretary of State and the person which should nominally be one of the leading voices in the White House on such matters.

Perhaps a question worth asking is whether Salman understands the state of chaos which has engulfed the White House in the last 10 months, particularly given the increasingly mixed signals the region has been getting from the Trump administration, with statements from various branches of the government contradicting themselves, sometimes within a few hours of statements being made. If he does understand it, and if he is of the opinion that the house of cards built by President Trump and his staff with increasingly apparent Russian help is soon to fall down in a spectacular fashion, maybe he also understands that the 'rule of Trump' presents a limited window of opportunity during which he can try and aggresively mold regional politics in a fashion he prefers while keeping US military power and logistics on his side. Short-term gains of such a strategy are clear but it is questionable if it is feasible in the long run. Salman should not mistake the chaos in US politics for elevated support and if the Democrats secure the presidency after the Trump Presidency and establish a foreign policy more critical of Saudi regional influence and more open to negotiations with Iran, his whole gamble could fail.

While implying that the rise in Saudi aggressiveness as being due to the lack of coherence in US foreign policy would be an oversimplification, it cannot be dismissed altogether. Saudi Arabia, the United States and Israel now seem more than ever united against a common enemy, Iran, and Saudi Arabia is attempting to exploit the decline in US authority and sense of direction in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia's war in Yemen against a force partially consisted of Iranian allies, their anti-Hezbollah move in Lebanon, the increased rate of Israeli strikes against Hezbollah and Iranian targets inside Syria and the aggressive US rhetoric on Iran, including the refusal of Donald Trump to recertify the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action implies that the three countries are willing to engage Iran and its allies more strongly than ever. If the price of that is the destruction of Yemen with bombings, drone strikes, famine and disease, that is a risk they seem to be willing to take.