Rising Middle East tensions call for restraint: China Daily editorial

The Middle East has the knack for turning yesterday's ceasefires into tomorrow's battlefields.

On Saturday, a Houthi attack on Riyadh's King Khalid International Airport caused heavy casualties. Further strikes followed against airports and energy facilities. Saudi warplanes retaliated across Houthi-held territory. A conflict that had largely subsided following a truce in 2022 is once again threatening to engulf the Arabian Peninsula.

The immediate causes are tangled. Saudi Arabia's estrangement from the United Arab Emirates has weakened the anti-Houthi coalition. The UAE's withdrawal left military and political gaps that Riyadh struggled to fill. Fighting involving Iran further complicated Saudi calculations. Meanwhile, the Houthis have demonstrated that drones and missiles can inflict damage far beyond Yemen's borders.

Then there is Washington. Saudi Arabia's security partnership with the United States was supposed to provide reassurance. Instead, Riyadh has reportedly discovered that US guarantees come with qualifications. Its requests for strikes against the Houthis were rejected, while Washington pursued separate understandings intended to protect US shipping.

With the November midterm elections approaching, the White House has little appetite for another Middle Eastern military adventure. High oil prices are already a domestic political liability. A wider regional war, particularly one threatening energy supplies and maritime trade, would make an awkward electoral backdrop. US reluctance may be understandable. But it also exposes the hazards of treating an external security umbrella as a substitute for regional diplomacy.

The familiar response is retaliation. Yet each side's attempt to restore deterrence supplies the other with justification for further violence. Military superiority may destroy infrastructure or disrupt an offensive; it cannot manufacture political legitimacy or settle competing claims to power.

The Middle East needs an inclusive framework capable of accommodating rival security interests without requiring one side's humiliation.

This is where China's approach deserves consideration. Beijing advocates common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security. Its four-point proposal for a new security architecture of the Middle East, put forward last month, emphasizes unleashing internal drivers, adopting an integrated approach, strengthening the foundations of development and improving international coordination.

Saudi Arabia and its adversaries now face a choice between another exhausting cycle of escalation and a negotiated arrangement addressing their underlying grievances. The former has been tested for more than a decade, at appalling human and economic costs. The latter remains difficult, but indispensable.

Security cannot be sustainably achieved at a neighbor's expense. Renewed hostilities serve nobody's interests and squeeze the space for political settlement of related issues.

As Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning noted on Monday in reply to a question on the Houthis' attacks on the airport in Riyadh, China condemns the attacks that resulted in heavy civilian casualties and expresses grave concern over the escalating conflict.

Mao said that China consistently opposes attacks targeting civilians and civilian facilities, urging relevant parties to resolve differences and disputes through dialogue and negotiation and refrain from actions that escalate regional tensions.

International pro-peace coordination should be anchored in the United Nations Charter, respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity as well as consistent application of international law, not the selective rules of competing powers.

The Middle East does not lack weapons, alliances or external patrons. What it lacks is a security order in which adversaries can coexist without perpetually preparing for their next war. Until that changes, every ceasefire will remain merely an intermission in the fighting.