President Donald Trump’s announcement, on June 14, of the end of the war in Iran and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz came as a relief to countries around the world. A negotiated settlement was in the United States’ interest, but its likely terms fall far short of what Washington hoped the war would achieve. After nearly four months of fighting, concerns over Iran’s nuclear program, ballistic missile arsenal, and support for proxies across the Middle East remain largely unresolved. The regime that Trump set out to change is still standing, and it may now be set to receive economic relief in exchange for restoring free passage in a strait that was open before the war began. Iran has emerged from the conflict battered but in a stronger strategic position, with its regime and its ability to threaten the region intact. This outcome, after months of destruction and global economic disruption, is the greatest foreign policy failure of both of Trump’s terms. And the consequences of that failure will persist long after the war ends, making the United States’ growing strategic challenge in the Middle East even more difficult to address.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States underwrote a regional order in which the Gulf depended on Washington for its security, sanctions and military deterrence contained Iranian aggression, and a track toward Arab-Israeli normalization slowly advanced. This arrangement kept oil flows stable, limited Iranian and Chinese influence, and positioned Washington as the indispensable broker of regional stability. When the United States and Israel launched an attack on Iran at the end of February, this status quo was already fraying. But the fighting accelerated its breakdown.

For many Middle Eastern states, the problem with the war’s resolution is not only that the United States was unable to achieve a decisive victory against Iran but also that throughout the conflict, it was erratic and unpredictable. This has damaged confidence in Washington’s ability to maintain its role as the sole guarantor of stability in the Middle East. As Washington’s credibility erodes, U.S. partners in the region have resorted to forming new coalitions that afford them greater agency.

States in the Middle East are coalescing on two opposing sides. On one side is the Abrahamic coalition, anchored by Israel and the United Arab Emirates, which is aligned closely with the United States and sometimes includes Greece and India on military, economic, and energy issues. The roots of this bloc go back to 2020, when Israel normalized relations with the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco in the Abraham Accords, brokered by the first Trump administration. Israel and the UAE are brought together primarily by their shared perception of the Iranian threat, but also by their growing respective rivalries with Turkey and Saudi Arabia and their deepening commercial ties in technology, trade, and investment.

On the other side is an Islamic coalition, which is anchored by Sunni heavyweights such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, and increasingly Egypt. These regional middle powers still rely on Washington for their security, but they have moved closer together in response to perceived threats coming not just from Iran but also from Israel, as it projected power beyond its borders in Gaza and the West Bank, Syria, Lebanon, and the Horn of Africa.

The United States’ prosecution of the war against Iran has further convinced countries on both sides of the divide that their deep dependence on Washington could be a liability and that they need to develop greater local agency. “The days when a phone call from Washington issued instructions which we were quick to follow are behind us,” a senior official explained to one of us. “We are no longer interested in being an American satellite state. … We are partners, even if junior partners.”

China, meanwhile, is taking advantage of this shift, positioning itself to play a greater role in the postwar Middle East without having to assume the burdens of leadership that Washington once bore. Aspiring middle powers, such as India and Pakistan, are doing the same. The cease-fire does not mark the end of this chapter of conflict and regional division in the Middle East; it is instead driving a geopolitical realignment along new fault lines. That dynamic extends beyond the region: from East Asia to Europe to Latin America, most governments are reaching similar conclusions about Washington’s reliability, increasingly viewing alternatives to U.S.-centered security, trade, and diplomatic arrangements as a strategic necessity rather than a luxury. The Middle East’s realignment is thus a harbinger for U.S. partnerships around the........

© Foreign Affairs