The 2026 Middle East Forecast

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Hello, dear listeners. And for me, hello, dear listeners. Yeah, Eamon, I'm always the one saying hello. Why am I the one always saying hello? Ah, well, no luck in it. Basically, I give you the benefit of the seniority in age. Hey, you're older than me, buddy. I know you can't tell because of my long beard. Today, dear listeners, we're doing something different.

Instead of peering deep into the past or drilling down into the chaos of the present, we're turning our attention to the future, specifically the year 2026. 2026. Goodness gracious, Eamon. How'd 2026 roll around so fast? Do you know what that means? That before long, it'll have been 25 years since 9-11. 25 years since the event that set our whole era into motion. Can you believe it? Well...

Ironically, just a few days ago, I met my brother. He's six years older than me. So, you know, roughly about 53. So we sat down and we were reminiscing about things. Oh, do you remember that thing we did? Do you remember that place we used to go and buy things from? Oh yeah, that was 40 years ago. The fact that we were talking about things that happened 40 years ago and we are like remembering it, I mean, it's just set in motion.

A train of depression. It also means, Eamon, that you have been deep inside the world of geopolitical analysis and intrigue for like 30 years now. three decades of watching your region and the wider world twist, turn, burn, rebuild, collapse. Then repeat. Yes. Sometimes I feel, you know, the cliché, been there, done that, or repeat. Well, that's what living in the Middle East, no doubt, feels like a lot of the time. But for us, thank God.

you're going to bring those 30 years of experience and expertise to the table today. Dear listeners, Eamon is going to share with us his forecasts for 2026 across a range of Middle Eastern politics, geopolitics, war and conflict, economics, you name it. I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say, Eamon.

I am not an analyst, certainly no prognosticator. I depend on you, we all depend on you, and your slightly cracked crystal ball to help us understand what might be waiting just around the corner. Let's get right into it. For the first time ever, Eamon, and dear listeners, I promise this is the case. For the first time ever, I'm flying here without a parachute. Is that even the right metaphor?

I've got no notes. I literally have no idea what you're going to tell me about 2026. That's the element of surprise. Now you feel like one of my audience. members whenever I go into one of these events in either the UAE or Saudi or UK or Europe, where I go and I have no idea what I'm going to say. And then I start blithering around talking about this and this and that. And by the end of it, I feel like there are still...

confused, so I hope, like, I mean, it's not going to be the case today. I hope that you don't leave our dear listeners more confused, but you never know, you're peering into the future. But before you launch into your forecasting, Dear listeners, we want your 2026 forecasts to... For that reason, we've created a 2026 forecast card, which you can find through the link in the show notes. We would love for you to click the link and fill out a card.

Tell us what you think is going to happen in 2026, politically, economically, geopolitically. Whatever you think is important, we want to know. And as the year unfolds, we'll be returning to your predictions. More on that soon. Okay, Eamon, before we get to the particulars of your forecasts. I want you to talk about how a professional analyst like yourself actually makes predictions. Because as you've told us many times...

This is your day job. You provide analysis and, yes, forecasts for some very important clients. And your reputation, even your livelihood, rides on the quality of those predictions. So how do you do it? How does an analyst begin the process of forecasting? It's like saying, you know, how does a weather forecaster predict the weather? You have to look at a set of fundamentals. We start with the historical patterns.

That's the first thing, historical behavior. The historical patterns is how people react and proact towards events. And also at the same time, you have to look at certain... previous behaviors. You have to look at precedent, you have to look at new factors. These new factors have to be covering the geopolitics. It has to be covering ideological, ethnic and nationalistic. You have to look at economics from everywhere, from the...

Energy, cost, change in the currency and bond markets because the bond market is important. Many people don't understand that the bond market is like a barometer. You know, you can tell like, I mean, from the movement, like in the nervousness of...

people, you have to look at the insurance premiums attached to the supply chains. Why is that? Because Lloyds in London, when they start pricing risk according... to what they see or what they hear because they have a network of people around the world looking i mean looking into

predictions and events and all of that. And these people also their livelihood depend on getting it right. You know, I'm pricing the risk accordingly when it comes to insurance premiums, whether for the shipping lanes, for the aviation industry. So we look at that too.

I would look at the movement of the price of insurance, especially for the shipping and aviation maritime routes in particular. Since your expertise is specifically in the Middle East, really, what factors in the Middle East are particularly important to keep an eye on when you're...

forecasting for that region. I know it's knit into the whole world, it's intimately connected to everything, the Middle East, but still, you must sort of have a few factors that are special to the Middle East that you make sure not to miss. First of all, I rely a lot on intel, as in, I mean, just phoning up people, meeting people and talking to them. Now, why would people tell you things? Because you also have a lot of things to tell.

So you act like a junction, you know, you are like in that exchange, you know, where you would get information from inside Iran. that some people inside Saudi would be interested in. So they will tell you things about things from inside of Saudi, which, you know, some European powers would be interested in. And the will go on, like, I mean, and so...

That is how you start, first of all, with intel about the movement of things. And people learn that they can trust you. They tell you information. They learn that you pass it on. reliably, and therefore they trust that the information you give them in return is trustworthy. And people like you serve a positive function because sometimes trust levels are low. So you need a trustworthy person whose incentive.

is to be honest, to say, I heard this from that guy. What are you going to tell me? I'll tell him, et cetera. I remember. I mean, it was very weird. It's just a little story where I was introduced. to the ambassador of a major European power in one of the GCC countries, and I was introduced to him by his political officer in the embassy, which is the fancy name for the chief of station, intelligence station for that nation. So I was...

introduced to him, oh, and this is Ayman Deen, our trusted information broker. And it's like, oh, wow. Information broker. That's an interesting title. I would love to be called that on a regular basis, information broker. So first, you look at the intel. That's the first thing. The second thing is you look at rhetoric. Yes, rhetoric. Rhetoric is extremely important. First of all, you look at what heads of states and their subordinates.

at cabinet level and the deputy ministerial level what are they saying publicly that would you know, allow you to gauge the temperature of what they're saying. We call it rhetoric temperature. So if we start to see rhetoric temperature rising, you know, whether not only like, you know, just from the state apparatus, also like, you know, from non-state actors. So we look at...

rhetoric, heated, conciliatory, business as usual, and we add it into the mix. Furthermore, you also look at the prices of certain commodities especially oil and gold now in the in the middle east whenever you see gold started to edge up a little bit and there is more demand because you see the price of gold is generally So even if there is so much demand in the Middle East,

Less demand from China could actually offset the high demand in the Middle East. So as you know, I live in the UAE and the UAE is one of the most important gold centers in the world. And so I have friends inside the Golden Diamond Park here, like in a business park. which is almost like in the unofficial exchange. And so I would call him, and he's a Portuguese guy, living here in Dubai. Hey, I don't want to call his name, but let's call him Diego, just as a reference.

Diago, I mean, who's buying, who's selling, and what is the temperature like in the market? So if he is telling me Russians are selling, okay. They are selling, they are cashing in, they're going back, which means there could be peace in Ukraine. Okay, that's the first thing. Oh, Ukrainians are actually like in a buying, ah.

They are not trusting, like, you know, Zelensky's plan will work. Or he will tell me, like, you know, Indians are buying and buying in big quantities, or Chinese are buying and buying in big quantities. So I will understand then what's happening. Iranians, if they have started buying and buying more and more... which is what's happening in the past several days.

That is not good. It means they are worried about something going to happen because it's the highest we've seen in three years. I've never seen more Iranians coming into the market and buying physical billion. By the way, we're talking about physical billion here. So I look at all of this. And then I add with it the intel, the movement of troops, business deals at a sovereign level or semi-sovereign level. And I mean, I look at future visits.

plan visits. I just like, I mean, incorporate all of this. I know like basically it's so much to take in, but somehow God bless me with a mind that can spot the patterns that connect the dots. And then I come up with the plan.

This might be a stupid question. It's the last stupid question I'll ask before you launch into your forecasts. Oh, no, perish the thought. I know I will have many from you. Don't worry, I can basically throw it. What about, what about... The notorious black swan events. This is a stupid question because the whole point about a black swan event is you don't know when it's going to happen or what it is. You know, it's unknown. How can you factor in?

Unknown, unknown. Is there any way that you can kind of, what's the word, preconceive of a possible black swan event? I can tell you honestly, I mean, there is no way you can factor in a Black Swan event because of three fundamentals here. The first fundamental, you don't know what it is. You know, the second fundamental...

You don't know when it is going to happen. So you don't know what it is. You don't know when it is. And the third thing, you don't know where it is. When, where, and how. If I think of black swan events in recent memory, let's say the 7th of October, it's something. like a black swan event, although of course that is an event that one could have known about if you'd had some extremely good intel source from within Hamas or something.

Yeah, it wouldn't have been a black swan because then it would have been prevented and that black swan wouldn't have happened. So just the same as 9-11, imagine if there was an information about it before it happened and the arrests were happening. If only you decoded that dream. or that code you were given. So imagine if it was foiled. First of all, no one is going to build a statue for the man who...

prevented 9-11 because no one would have even conceived of the magnitude of 9-11, you know, let alone the conspiracy theories that will fly out that, oh, this is all rubbish. Like, you know, basically, how could anyone have conceived of this plan? So for me, that's how I... come up with predictions, and I always caveat it to the clients by saying, this is what's most likely going to happen with the percentages, barring a Black Swan event. Okay, now that's all very clear.

Now, as I said, dear listeners, I literally have no script. I'm just staring at Eamon's sweet face. Oh, thank you. Waiting for him to tell me what he thinks is going to happen in 2026, focusing especially... on the Middle East. So Amon, I don't even know where you want to start. Where do you want to start? Do you want to start with a specific country? Do you want to start with a specific category like economics or conflict? Where do you want to start?

I think I'm going to look at an outward conflict that is most likely on its way to resolution in 2026 that will have a great impact on the Middle East. And I'll tell you what, Ukraine. So there are signs now, visible signs, that finally Zelensky is going to accept a peace plan adopted by Trump. that would entail territorial concessions to Russia in exchange for ending the war and there will be other terms and conditions. However, the ending of that conflict, because...

President Trump is very keen on ending that conflict for his own American national interest, is to focus on two other arenas that he feel that needs attention. more than Ukraine. He doesn't stand Zelensky, he doesn't like the Ukrainians that much.

Unfortunately, I mean, that's the way of the world. So regardless of whatever you think about Ukraine and Russian conflict. Well, I don't suppose you're happy with the idea of the Ukrainian war ending with significant territorial concessions to Russia because as you. explained a couple of weeks ago, your whole thing is borders and they should be sacrosanct. Exactly. So this might be a precedent that is maybe slightly worrying in terms of the future that if you do launch a war of...

of something like aggression. And again, I know it's a complicated scenario what's been going on in Ukraine and Russia, but if you launch a war to then get some land for that act of aggression, that's a bit worrying in terms of future prospects. Actually, I was debating this with a friend of mine. She said, look, there is nothing wrong with certain parts of Ukraine that are majority Russian speakers that can, these territories can be ceded to Russia by Ukraine in exchange for peace.

I didn't feel good about it, but then she said to me, oh, look at South Sudan. It seceded from Sudan after a war and a conflict and all of that. But I was thinking, yeah, but that's different. It was a civil war. And the two sides agreed and there was a... a UN-mandated referendum, hugely different. Yeah, hugely different. Hugely different. Nevertheless,

I'm not going to debate the pros and cons of the Ukrainian peace deal. I'm going to debate the effect of that peace deal if it happens on the Middle East. That would free up a lot of American... resources towards solving a problem that, until recently,

was important, but now it became far more important because suddenly the Middle East now isn't only going to be an important source of energy, but also an important source for rare earth minerals again, as we have talked about it before. Okay, the rare earth...

We don't want to go into great detail. There's new sources of rare earths in Saudi Arabia that might really shift the dial in terms of the global economy, supply chains, etc. And also the US is coming back into Saudi Arabia and the UAE in a much bigger way than before in terms of supporting their artificial intelligence, you know, with the building of new data centers.

I mean already the Saudis and the Emiratis are about to up their power output by 20 gigawatts. So that's massive and that would free up. some of the pressure on the grid in the United States because they can barely, I mean, build up more and more power stations there. So suddenly, the GCC seems to be very attractive. Rare earth minerals, data centers.

AI, investments, and of course, more control on the energy price index across the globe in natural gas and oil. So suddenly the Americans, especially from last July until now, they started paying more and more attention. The connection to Ukraine is the fact that if there is a peace in Ukraine, part of that would be that on the global stage as a thank you from Russia to Trump, Russia will throw Iran under a bus.

Because from the point of view of the Trump administration, Iran has only two choices right now. Either join the American train that is now... moving across the Middle East, join the caravan, as I call it there, or basically be coughed. Now. Why is that? Some people say again, Ayman, Iran. Yes, Iran. Unfortunately, we have to talk about Iran again because of the three fundamental...

points of disagreement with the rest of the GCC, the rest of the region and the world. Well, number one is a nuclear issue. It has to be resolved one way or another. And right now, you remember when we talked about the rhetoric? Abbas Araqji, the foreign minister of Iran, have signaled that they have cut now their ties with the International Atomic Energy Agency. They have now upped the rhetoric. That's not good news.

The second thing is the ballistic missile program. The Americans are insisting that they shouldn't have ballistic missile programs that could reach Europe. or Cyprus or Israel or any of the allied nations in the region. And of course, from Iranian point of view, yeah, good luck with that. We're not going to give up a deterrent weapon here. But you see... The first two can be negotiated. The third one is non-negotiable. Non-negotiable. Which is the dismantling of the...

proxy non-state actors that belong to Iran and the region. Okay, Eamon, let me just stop you there. Some long-term listeners will be like, how has this changed? This is the same demands that have been placed on Iran for years. And also, weren't some of these objectives met or supposed to have been met last May and June during the so-called 12-Day War? I mean, did that war just...

achieve very little in the end. I thought that Iran's ballistic missile program had been destroyed. I thought that Iran's nuclear program had been... Seriously hobbled? So how is any of this new to say that we're making these demands on Iran? Well, haven't we been making demands like that on Iran since 1979? No, the 12 Days War objectives were...

barely met. When it comes to the nuclear program, yes, it delayed the program by a year or two maximum. They can revive it within a year or two. The ballistic missile program is... nowhere near damaged enough in order to say it has been dismantled. If anything actually has been repaired and now back to 80 or 90% of its capacity prior to the war.

So nothing was done. In addition, Hezbollah and the Houthis and the Iraqi militias have rebuilt their capabilities. I mean, how is this possible? Listen, we've got to take a commercial break. We're already... thick into it. I'm just, I'm so distressed to learn that 2025 seems to have achieved nothing. All of this sounds like stuff you could have told me 12 months ago. Anyway, we'll take a quick break. And when I get back, Eamon will no doubt contradict my assertion there.

We'll be back in a second. We're back. I'm here with Eamon Dean. He's telling me about his forecast for 2026, which at the break I said sounded similar to things he might have said about 2025. If you've been looking ahead to 2025. you would have said maybe, well, what we must do is get Iran, prize it away from Russia, make sure that its ballistic missile program, its nuclear program, and its proxy networks are destroyed throughout the regions. But like...

OK, I mean, we're back in the—it's just—it's like a hamster wheel, that region, honestly. Yes, but several fundamental new factors came into the picture here. Number one, that, yes, the Iranian nuclear program was semi-crippled. but not entirely crippled. The ballistic missile program is back to normal, and the proxies are there still in a posing significant threat. Now, what changed, Thomas? We explained it, that America...

is now back to the GCC with vengeance, like absolute vengeance in several ways. Number one. The AI revolution and the need for power in order to power the AI revolution and the data centers that open AI, Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon Cloud Services, Google, you know, all of them are coming in and building this big mess.

of data centers there. Why? Because power is cheap. It is at, you know, three, four and five cents per kilowatt per hour. Now, listeners who know what I'm talking about, they know that this is bloody competitive. like extremely competitive way competitive than the us where it's 13 and 14 and 15 cents per kilowatt hour so that's one two the discovery of rare earth minerals in the Arabian Peninsula again. And there are all these mines within 350 kilometers of the Yemeni border.

Well, I know. So that's what I want to say. Doesn't this actually increase instability risk? Because if you have these massive data centers that the whole world, especially the United States... rely on. I can imagine that there's a big map somewhere in Iran and Yemen and elsewhere with a big target right on that spot. Well, we can just knock it out and their huge capital expenditure is just evaporated and the whole new AI revolution hobbles.

Exactly. That's why you have to get rid of the risk before you even start. The whole idea is to de-risk the Middle East. I know this sounds too ambitious, but... De-risking the Middle East now is becoming a new slogan within the US administration. They want to make sure that the risk goes away before they even start digging. for the data centers and for the rare earth minerals. The reason for this, one, they don't want China to be the one doing the rare earth minerals and the data centers.

number one number two they want to make sure that they are the ones who have a greater sway in the region now you tell me that How can they do that in a region where Iran could be targeting them with ballistic missiles and cruise missiles and drones and the same thing from the Houthis, the same thing from the Iraqi militias? Well, that's the whole point. A decision has been taken already.

that non-state actors in the region need to go. That's it. There shouldn't be any more non-state actors. That includes Hezbollah. That includes Hamas and Hamas are on life support now. And that includes the Houthis and the Iraqi militias. Now the Iraqi militias need to be incorporated into the state. The Houthis need to...

really like be defeated by a combination of the allied forces from the U.S., from the region and from within Yemen itself. And Hezbollah will be taken out by Israel. All of this will happen in 2026. But I see the ambition. I understand. the rationale for the ambition, but I'm reading that Hezbollah's capabilities are almost back to where they were. before last summer, you know, 2024, and that these capabilities have largely been reconstituted by armaments from Iran.

You know, you say about the Iraqi militias, we hardly talk about Iraq and conflicted. This is something I want to address in the near future. But the Iraqi militias, OK, they tend to be allied with Iran directly or indirectly. And yet I'm reading that. Politics in Iraq is shifting back in a pro-Iranian direction. How are you going to achieve this ambition of de-risking the Middle East? I mean, it's easy to say it. American regimes...

And I'm using the word regime there. Amazing how things change. American regimes have been saying it for decades. Again, the latest fundamentals that enter the picture. You see, I could also say, oh, it's business as usual. But the last six months, Thomas. suddenly opened the door for massive investments in nuclear power in the GCC. With it... powering off the AI revolution not only in the GCC but across the world because it will be extremely competitive limiting at least you know slowing down

the advance of China's influence in the region. So all of these objectives really, really came into being. In the last six months. Okay, I understand the incentive to de-risk the Middle East. I still don't understand how it's going to happen. Ah, you mean the mechanism. Exactly.

Yeah, yeah. First of all, basically, if I was them, I would say, well, forget it. It's not going to happen. Not in the way you... I see. Suddenly, you're very pessimistic. I see. Okay. Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah, yeah. Okay. I told you what they want to achieve. I didn't say they would achieve it. I see. Well, we're talking about what's going to happen, not what people are going to want to happen. So what is going to happen? What is going to happen?

is the fact that the Houthis are now being pushed into their last limits of endurance. And what do I mean by that? Why the Houthis' rhetoric? And that is something I've been picking up a bit. Why the Houthis' rhetoric is so heated right now? with threats of attacking Aramco, the Saudi oil giant, attacking Adnok, the UAE equivalent of Aramco, talking about airports being attacked, even Iranian politicians with... significant sway and power are threatening Saudi Arabia's water desalination.

Some Saudi politicians, like members of the Shura Council or, you know, political commentators are coming back and saying, excuse me, don't you have water shortage right now to worry about instead of worrying about our own water?

When you look at all of this rhetoric, it's because of how the Houthis been pushed into a corner indirectly by the Trump administration. How? Everyone knows, well... I mean, everyone in the know knows that in April 2022, after the Biden administration stabbed Saudi Arabia in the back. with a knife and then twisted that knife so much, cutting off the supplies of air defense missiles that could intercept the Houthi ballistic missiles. The Biden administration

in order to please and appease Iran so they can get their precious nuclear agreement, which never happened. The Iranians were just stringing them along. The Iranians said, You must pressure the Saudis to end the war against our allies, the Houthis. So the Biden administration did that stupidly, unwisely, call it whatever you call it. Sleepy Joe.

decided to stab the Saudis in the back, preventing them even from defending themselves against ballistic missile and cruise missile attacks. And the Houthis accelerated that rate of attacks when they learned... that Biden wasn't sending the missiles anymore, the Patriot missiles and other air defense capabilities. So the Saudis, by April 2022, were only six weeks away from running out, and they cannot stop the missiles anymore.

coming from the Houthis. So they signed a deal where they will pay the Houthis $550 million a month. $550 million a month, basically paying them off, don't attack us in exchange for this money? Yeah, it's a ceasefire. Yeah, because that's what bloody Biden and his loonies at the State Department did.

I'm glad we're inaugurating the new nuanced era of conflicted, Eamon. Exactly, exactly. No, we call a spade a spade. I mean, at the end of the day, the right-wing people do damage in politics, but the left-wing... also do damage in politics, and this is exactly an example of it. Okay, so that April 2022 agreement, what bearing does it have for 2026? So they kept paying and paying and paying. By the way, it's not $550 million in cash, all of it. It is...

Partly in cash, 133 million is in cash, and the rest is in petroleum products, food, and building materials. So basically it is... a package of 550 million dollars but the real cash is 133 million and it is used to pay the salaries of the civil servants and the teachers and the civil defense that are working under the Houthi government. But then, as soon as, you know, the Houthis showed the world why the Saudis were fighting them...

And they started attacking shipping in the Red Sea. And then after that, attacking Israel with ballistic missiles. Then suddenly the Trump administration designated them back as... terrorist organization after Biden lifted them off from that because he thought, like, I mean, we need peace with Iran at any cost, appeasement. So when they returned them back to the terrorist organization designation, what happened here is... that the Saudis were told stop the payments. So...

The Saudis, they said, we can stop the payment for several months, but we can't stop them forever. At some point, the Houthis will say, you are not abiding by the ceasefire agreement. However, the Saudis successfully with Omani mediation. use the excuse that you are now a designated terrorist organization. We cannot pay you. But I will tell you why the future now is going to be bleak a little bit. Why? Because the Trump administration...

Never over nine months period granted the Saudi state any exemption to pay this amount and to supply the package that has been agreed upon. And the Houthis patience is running thin. Then, when the rare earth minerals thing started to become an issue between the two countries, Saudi and the US, in July and August of this year, they...

Again, the Saudis asked for an exemption so they can pay. They said, no, no, no. But they said, OK, if we don't pay, the Houthis are going to attack. They said, no, we are having a plan for them. In 2026, it's not going to be a good year for them. because we will begin the process of putting together a dismantlement plan of the Houthis in Yemen. Now, it's very ambitious, but the Saudis said we will not participate in it.

Unless if we are given a special status as a major non-NATO ally with a specific defense agreement. that would stipulate that if the U.S. were to attack the Houthis and the Houthis attack us back in return for Saudi giving the U.S. access to its airspace, air bases, territorial waters, then...

The U.S. must come to the defense of Saudi Arabia and on top of this, will continue supplying the defensive weapons that it needs to counter the Houthi's attacks. And the answer was, oh yeah, hell yes, because guess what? Now we are buddies. Now we are the... AI, REE, buddies. Therefore, it is my prediction and my forecast. I give it a 70% likelihood that we will see a conflict of a sort.

involving the US and possibly involving the Saudis with Yemen again. And that will be in the first half of 2026 because the fundamentals are there for the conflict to happen.

I see. What a complicated narrative that was. So clearly the Trump administration has been preparing for something like this for quite a long time. For all of those months, they were refusing to exempt Saudi Arabia from a ban on paying the Houthis, you know, knowing that The Houthis attacking Saudi Arabia is a terrible thing. It has only negative outcomes, including for U.S. interests. So that was a risk.

to basically exacerbate tensions between the Houthis and the Saudis. So they must have known a long time ago that they were going to do this. Exactly. And also the thinking within the Department of War now. is no longer the DOD, it's the DOW. The thinking among Hexeth advisors in the Middle East is that we cannot kick the can down the road anymore. Apart from... pressing US interests that need to be looked after in the region.

The fact that if we leave them, they will just grow stronger and stronger and they will supply with more and more weapons and the technology will even get better. And it will become more and more difficult in the future to get rid of them. And they are crazy. They've done it. I'm not entirely sure that the American secretary of war isn't crazy himself. But, you know, I just I wonder now and I don't wonder really anymore why you're a little bit.

negative about 2026, because this sort of strategizing, this sort of thinking is not new for America. The idea we've got to stop kicking the can down the road, we must act, and we'll act with our military to dislodge a, in this case, non-state actor, but they have been in place for over 10 years now. They're a semi-state actor at the very least. And it's Yemen. How are they going to achieve this? No one...

ever achieves their ambition of dislodging a government in Sena. It just never happens. It's too hard. So what do you think is going to happen when this war or this conflict breaks out? The entire bet of the whole strategy. is not on US air power or Saudi air power. It's on the disparate factions of the Yemeni government. As you know, there are several factions. So you have the Ma'rib coalition of the Muslim Brotherhood, you have the STC, the Southern Transitional Council people.

the giant's brigade. And then of course you have the uncle and nephew Ahmed Saleh and Tariq Saleh forces making the bulk of the remainder of the Yemeni army. These are, you know, they're related to Ali Abdullah Sa, the former president of Yemen. His son and his brother, basically, yeah. So the idea is that these three giant bulks...

will unite together, and it's not out of the question once there is an incentive, and the incentive will be money from Saudi and the UAE. In addition to the fact that Saudi Arabia is going to station... at least three brigades from Pakistan on the Yemeni Saudi border to prevent any infiltration based on the treaty that they signed with Pakistan recently and with the willing participation of Asim Muneer, who's trying to please Trump as much as possible. So...

All of this means that there will be a significant firepower on the ground with a significant firepower from the air to achieve that. Now, while many people are... pessimistic entirely, oh, you can't achieve, it's impossible. I say, no, it is possible, but only under one condition, that the three elements that I mentioned that mix up the bulk of the Yemeni army.

are to work together and in coordination, which happened before. And it could happen again provided the right incentives are there. And right now, movements are happening. from Riyadh to Abu Dhabi to DC in order to coordinate between all of these forces for an upcoming offensive. Then maybe we can see them out of Sana'a. Also, the wild horse here is...

to really buy off some of the tribes that are loyal to the Houthis. Classic, classic strategy. But OK, so let me just put the pieces together. So you started out by saying that Trump wants to solve the Ukraine crisis. so that Russia can be pried away from Iran. Now I understand as part of a larger strategy to deal with Iran's proxy network, especially the Houthis, which...

proved themselves to be particularly destructive over the last two years. That kind of makes sense. It's tremendously risky. It involves all of these dimensions with the GCC, with actors on the ground. in Yemen, some institutional, some tribal. Okay, what about like the other proxies like Hezbollah, which has been so...

fantastically, from what I understand, rearmed in the last year? And what role will Israel play in this larger plan, if any at all? I mean, again, the pieces are being put together better for me now, because when we saw at the end of this summer, When we saw Trump treat Netanyahu so critically and put him in the corner and reach out to the Saudis, he made it clear to Netanyahu that unipolar.

foreign policy in the region was no longer acceptable because it was getting in the way. Clearly now we see. of the Trump administration's plans. So will Israel play any role at all in this 2026 Middle East adventure? Are they expected to just watch as it unfolds? Oh, no. And you mentioned it already, the front. where I expect Israel to be bearing the full brunt almost of the burden and the cost and the military effort will be Lebanon. Lebanon has now been given until the end of the year.

until the end of this month, until the end of 31st of December. And should New Year come and no significant effort were undertaken by the Lebanese army to dismantle Hezbollah's military... infrastructure south or north of the Latane River, which is only about 30 kilometers north of the Israeli border. If no significant efforts are taken by then, then the Israelis are going to have the green light.

to go as far as even bombing Beirut, especially bombing the southern suburbs of Beirut to the ground if necessary, which would be extremely disruptive. to the people of Lebanon. The whole idea is to give the Christians of Lebanon some time, first of all, to support the president, President Joseph Aoun, to give him the mandate to dismantle Hezbollah's military.

Hezbollah is not going to dismantle its military. I have a relative inside the Lebanese military intelligence because I'm half Lebanese, as you know, who... tells me, you know, on a regular basis what's going on. And he said, like, I mean, there is no way these idiots of Hezbollah are going to give up their weapons, despite the fact they know it's going to invite certain destruction again, because the...

The Ayatollahs of Tahran are telling them, never, ever, ever, ever dismantle. We need you. Yeah, you need them for what exactly? So, you know, my prediction, January, February. These are the two months to watch and it's going to be an escalatory ladder. where Israel is going to launch one all-out attack. It's going to be basically intensifying day by day until you reach a full-fledged dismantling operation, giving also the Lebanese state...

some chance of either give up, you know, the weapons of Hezbollah or we will destroy them ourselves. I see. So early 2026 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.

In Lebanon, obviously. I would say 80%. Let's say first quarter or first half of the year conflict in Yemen coordinated by the United States against the Houthis. 70%. 70%. And a renewed conflict with Iran all depends on... Iran's behavior, because what's gonna happen is that Iran is gonna now push the envelope. 29th of October, I was meeting 60 regional CEOs here.

My life is sometimes, like, basically, it's very weird. So I will meet 20 of them for breakfast, 20 of them for lunch, 20 of them for dinner. Of course, all organized by a certain business network here in the UAE and, you know. It's like kind of like in a very posh place. So I would sit with them and I would brief them about it. And they were all texting me, you know, a few weeks later saying, how did you know it was going to happen? I said, well, because I know the Iranians. I said...

The Iranian escalation is going to start with a return to the war of the tankers. You remember in 2020, 2021, when the Iranians used to either fire at or hijack basically tankers in the GCC. especially in the Hormuz Strait. And it happened again. So over the past several weeks, we had, you know, two incidents and the incidents are going to rise.

Because the Iranians are not going to, like, basically escalate with a bang. They always escalate slowly and gradually, and that's how it's going to happen. But the question is, at some point, they will reach a threshold where it would necessitate, you know, a strike back or something like that. So Iran is snapping against what? Snapping against the snapback. We have a joke in the industry here, among the friends, you know, basically in the industry here, in the sector.

where we talk about that the snapback mechanism that Germany France and the UK enacted in order to punish Iran for their violation of JCOPA, like in the joint plan of action for the nuclear deal for Iran.

enacted the return of the sanctions the snapback mechanism and now it's very difficult to lift it up and you know and of course like i mean the iranians were extremely upset about it because the sanctions are so hard now and do you remember i told you i look at like in the commodities trading now The buyers of Iranian oil in the market and the amount of barrels basically being sold in the open market with exemptions or with no exemptions but with a blind eye.

has dropped significantly, which means Iran is going to be short of cash very soon. Not only short of water. but they're also short of cash. And that would push Iran again towards the reaction that the Trump administration is waiting for in order to justify one or two slaps in the face in order to either force them to come back to the negotiating table.

they are not willing then okay no negotiations continue the pressure the pressure at the beginning of the year will be against the proxies as we said but Do not take away the possibility, 50-50 I would say, that we will see round two of the war against Iran. But this time it will not be Israel alone, it will be with the participation of the US, in fact possibly led by the US.

I guess we got to bring this to a close. My goodness, this was a lot. War. War is returning to the Middle East and peace is as— It never left, man. You're talking all— I know. I like to think that just— around the corner, that poor benighted corner of the world will have some good news. But, you know, here's the thing. If Trump's plan is to work, and I'm no forecaster, I think it's not going to work. But if it's to work.

There has to be coordination and cooperation between the GCC, especially Saudi, clearly an important pillar in this plan, and Israel, another important pillar in the plan. So Trump needs to knock all these heads together. It needs to get the GCC states to overlook what...

has become an unconscionable dissatisfaction with Benjamin Netanyahu's way of prosecuting things, especially in Gaza, etc. So is that going to work? Are they going to be able to do that? I mean, you said... in a previous episode that Israel needs to have new elections soon so that the crazies can be ejected from the Israeli cabinet, even if Netanyahu remains prime minister.

Was this part of what you were saying? Because there must be this cooperation if this plan is going to succeed. Even during the 12 Days War. There was a level of Saudi-Israeli coordination that was brokered by the Americans when the Saudis intercepted several drones and missiles that were actually on their way to Israel, but they were just too close.

For comfort, they could have fallen either over Saudi territory or Jordanian territory. So there was a coordination before. The U.S. is good at it. They can do it. And they can pull it off again if necessary. Well, Eamon, thank you. genuinely, for that bracing account of what you think is going to happen. In fact, you only covered the first half of 2026. God knows what the second half of 2026 will hold in store for us. Thank you for the clarity, for the...

Occasional moments of terror. Goodness gracious, the poor Middle East, the miserable East. We'll be keeping an eagle eye on these predictions over the next few months. And dear listeners, we'll let you know, gleefully, no doubt, just how... So, right or wrong, our dear Mr. Dean turns out to be. And remember, we want your forecasts too. You can find the 2026 forecast card through the link in the show notes. Click it, fill it out.

Send it in. Tell us what you think is coming in 2026. We'll be returning to your predictions as the year unfolds. And who knows, some of you may even earn a shout out. on the show. Next week, we'll be offering you something specially wrapped and bowed for Christmas. That's right. Our next episode is a conflicted Christmas special.

Amen and I will be diving into all things Christmas, conflicted style, the history, the theology, the traditions, and of course, the profound differences in how Christians and Muslims understand the figure at the heart of it all. Jesus. It's going to be a fascinating one. Until then, thank you as ever for listening. And Eamon, try to stay alive. I will do my best. Conflicted is a Message Heard production.

Amon Dean was your host alongside me, Thomas Small. Our executive producers are Jake Warren and Max Warren. This episode was produced by Thomas Small and edited by Lizzie Andrews.