OxFan: "Riyadh would likely be grateful after an Israeli strike in Iran..."

Oxford Analytica: Excerpts:

"EVENT: Iranian Minister of Intelligence and Security Haidar Moslehi on August 25 claimed that more than 1 billion dollars of US aid has been funnelled to Iranian protestors through Saudi intermediaries. As Iran comes under growing diplomatic and military pressure over its nuclear programme, the Gulf states are being drawn into the evolving stand-off. With a 30-60 billion dollar US arms sale on the cards, Riyadh is gravitating towards the tougher US stance on Iran.....

The deal will significantly boost Saudi ability to defend its airspace against aircraft and missiles, to undertake very painful deterrent strikes and to police coastal areas. The deal will also lock Riyadh into a close military relationship with Washington for at least another 20 years. 

Politics. King Abdallah and US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates were the driving forces behind the proposed sale, ....  behind the scenes, Abdallah has been slowly convinced of the sincerity of US commitment to Riyadh and the GCC. The king pushed the arms request despite opposition from the RSAF head and other defence officials who wanted to distribute the sales between US and European vendors. By confronting his own defence officials (and in a number of cases sacking them) Abdallah made a significant statement of support for the US-Saudi relationship at a time when the Iranian threat is looming large on his agenda .....

To avoid potential political complications, the administration will wait until after the November 2 mid-term elections to present the arms sale formally to Congress.....

In the case of the current arms request, the usual critics of such deals -- in the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) -- have been fairly muted, and the Israeli government has given its tacit support for the deal. These factors should assure it a relatively quick passage through Congress and reflect the changing political realities in the region, namely the shared threat assessments of Israel and Saudi Arabia vis-a-vis a nuclear Iran. 

Regional implications. The Saudi arms request signals Riyadh's willingness to reassert its GCC military leadership and to recognise and counter growing Iranian military power. While the UAE and Kuwait have invested in primarily defensive equipment since 2007, the Saudi deal includes significant offensive capabilities and is by far the largest defence deal in the region since the early 1990s. 

These features will probably further raise the temperature of Gulf security, straining relations between Riyadh and Tehran. Whereas most GCC states -- Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait -- counterbalance their status as US allies with reassuring gestures of non-aggression to Iran, Riyadh appears to be willing to back the United States up to, and possibly beyond, a potential (but still unlikely) strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. 

This also gives some indication of a Saudi response to a potential Israeli strike on Iran. While Riyadh would demonstrate public outrage at such a strike, it is likely to be privately grateful. Though possibly showing token military retaliation for Israeli passage through Saudi Arabia for this, Israel would probably be able to use Saudi (and also Iraqi) territory with little real resistance. ..."