Since the United States and Israel began intensive airstrikes against Iran on Feb. 28, Iran has retaliated with missile and drone strikes against multiple Arab countries. Although Iran says it is striking U.S. military targets based in the Arab states, it has also hit civilian infrastructure and buildings. Iran has hit targets in Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, and Jordan. The war marks a hard stop to a recent warming in relations between Iran and some Gulf Arab states.Arab states are now trying to understand the war, its consequences, and how to adapt their foreign policies. We asked five experts to assess how Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt are responding — and how they are re-assessing their approach to key regional and global relations.Read more below.Kristian Coates UlrichsenFellow for the Middle East at the Baker Institute and Co-Director of the Middle East Energy Roundtable at Rice UniversitySince the mid-1990s, Qatari foreign policy has been based on strategic hedging and diplomatic mediation, not least because the world’s largest non-associated gas field straddles the maritime boundary with Iran. The balancing of relationships — the United States and Iran, or Israel and Hamas — was designed to shield Qatar from spillover of regional threats and volatility. Similarly, the emphasis on mediation was intended to project Qatar’s ability to serve as an interlocutor to ensure flashpoints could be addressed before they became security challenges. Although Qatar has now come under attack three times in a year — twice from Iran and once from Israel — the country’s small size and conventional power capability mean there is little alternative to redoubling its focus on dialogue and diplomacy. In recent years, Qatari officials sought to magnify their presence by aligning closely with the United States, but