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On 25 June, Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al- Thani, marked one year in office (GSN 950/1). It has been a busy year in the region; for the most part, the trajectory marked by Qatar in that time has been a continuation of the path envisaged by his father, Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa, but there are some areas in which 34-year-old Tamim has started to make himself heard.

The ability of the Islamic State group (IS or Daesh) to finance its military operations in Iraq, Syria and its growing franchise in Libya using revenue from oil production in Iraq and Syria is in great doubt – putting into question the international focus on the jihadist group’s supposed hydrocarbons-driven business model. Far from controlling an informal but highly profitable export business – as it likes to claim – IS, and the area it controls, may be importing fuel from its neighbours

Ambiguous statements over the UAE’s commitment to the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen may have created some confusion over the Emirati leadership’s intentions, but the federation continues to wrack up casualties in the conflict. Lieutenant Rashid Ahmed Abdullah Al-Habsi was killed while on duty in Yemen on 5 September and Lance Corporal Saeed Anbar Juma Al-Falasi was buried on 22 September, having received treatment in Paris, France before succumbing to his wounds. The official death toll among Emirate forces involved in the conflict has now reached 97, according to GSN’s research, with the majority of casualties coming from the Northern Emirates.

Qatar's Emir Hamad is once again feeling isolated in the Gulf, having irritated his neighbours and other Arab states by refusing to cancel the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Summit scheduled to take place in Doha this November. He has therefore turned to more powerful friends further afield - in Washington and London. Both are eager to fuel his ambitious plans for the emirate.

Among the more significant recent comings and goings in the kingdom was the one-day visit last week by Shaikh Jaber al Ahmad, the Amir of Kuwait, to see King Fahd at the latter's spring resort in the Eastern Province. In Kuwait, the Amir's visit was described as "a fraternal call upon the Saudi monarch". In Saudi Arabia the meeting was reported without official comment of any kind. It is not unknown for the rulers of the GCC states to see each other informally from time to time, although the practice can scarcely be described as commonplace.

The foreign ministers of the six Gulf Co-operation Council countries, meeting as the Ministerial Council of the GCC, were gathered in Abha, Saudi Arabia, last week to review, as the official statement put it, developments in the Iran-Iraq war, the recent escalations in the "tankers war" and its impact on the security of the GCC member states. The foreign ministers held a joint session with the GCC oil ministers, to discuss a working paper prepared by the Secretariat on the world oil situation and its effect on the member states.

Reformist-backed Hassan Rouhani won over half the vote in Iran’s 14 June poll. The high turnout, and the reformist effort to rally around him, point to the public’s rejection of the extremist policies – both domestic and foreign – that have characterised President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s tenure.

The overhaul of the upper ranks of Iran’s defence and security apparatus has continued this month, with Rahbar (Supreme Leader) Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appointing Brigadier General Gholam Hossein Gheibparvar as commander of the Basij volunteer forces, in a decree issued on 7 December. It is the latest in a string of senior appointments within Iran’s military establishment this year. Among others, in June Major General Mohammad Bagheri was appointed as Chief of the Armed Forces General Staff, Iran’s highest military policy body, replacing the long-serving Major General Hassan Firouzabadi who had held the job since 1989.

Relationships between arch rivals Bahrain and Qatar remain tense notwithstanding their agreement on diplomatic recognition earlier in the year. Thus far, no diplomats have been accredited in either capital. Meanwhile, the two neighbours have recently intensified their military build up while hostile media campaigns may well be initiated despite an agreement to halt propaganda attacks.

THE ANNOUNCEMENT BY KING HUSSEIN on the formation of Jordanian volunteer force to fight on the side of Iraq in the war with Iran immeasurably widens the scope of the conflict. The terms in which Baghdad welcomed the Jordanian initiative makes it plain that Iraq now feels in need of more than only financial help. The leading Iraqi newspaper AI Thawra paid tribute to the Jordanian king in "forming the nucleus of a pan-Arab force" and should "encourage other fraternal states to follow Jordan's suit".

Three people were killed when Saudi special forces freed more than 100 passengers from a Russian airliner hijacked to Medina airport, as GSN went to press. The 16 March rescue was a success for the security services, but the episode underlined some of the problems that confront the Saudi authorities in their stewardship of the land that houses Islam’s holiest places.

Jamming of pirate radio and televisionbroadcasts into Iran has continued. Interference was originally aimed at calming the inflammatory effects of such media ahead of the 9 July anniversary protests but the struggle over the airwaves goes on.

In the second of two articles on the security of the member states of the Gulf Co-operation Council, Newsletters considers the GCC's position on external defence in the light of its announced doctrine of self-reliance.

ARAB NATIONALISM fuelled by the Palestine issue hit the Arab Gulf States as wealth was giving them both the opportunity and the incentive to stop being protected by one outside power as an alternative to being threatened by some other. But their societies, Iraq perhaps excepted, were not ready for speedy natural evolution through domestic resources.

DURING THE PAST FIVE YEARS military expenditure in the Middle East has increased at a far higher rate than in any other area of the world, according to the authoritative London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). In the latest edition of its annual publication, 'The Military Balance', the Institute notes that since 1978 defence expenditure in the Middle East has risen at an average rate of 7% a year - an overall increase of 35%.