Iranian press review: Calls grow to maintain military pressure on Gulf states
A younger generation of analysts close to Iran's ruling establishment says the only way to reach trade deals with the Arab states of the southern Gulf is to maintain military pressure on them.
The group has gained more space to express its views after many senior Iranian political and military figures were killed in this year's US-Israeli war on Iran.
Speaking on a television roundtable, Majid Shakeri, an analyst close to Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said there was no way to secure a practical trade agreement with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) without continued military pressure.
"Having a trade agreement with the Persian Gulf countries is not incompatible with continuing military pressure on them because previous experiences have shown that pursuing a neighbourhood policy with them leads nowhere," he said.
Shakeri said the same approach should apply to Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
"If we want to reach economic deals, we must keep up the [military] pressure because we have seen many times that the Emiratis, Qataris and Saudis promise investment in official meetings, but later it becomes clear that those promises were only meant to influence Iran's behaviour," he said.
To read a wrap of other recent stories from Iranian media, check out the press review below.
Iranian press review: Calls grow to maintain military pressure on Gulf states
The sun sets over a vessel off the coast of Dubai on 2 June 2026 (AFP)