The quiet earthquake in Washington in January 2026 will not stay confined to American domestic politics. When the United States withdrew from dozens of international organisations tied to the United Nations, climate governance, global health and development, it sent tremors across every region that depends on rules rather than raw power. Nowhere will those tremors be felt more acutely than in the Middle East — and, by extension, across the Asia-Pacific.

For decades, the Middle East sat at the centre of the US-built multilateral system. UN peacekeeping missions, humanitarian agencies, climate funds and diplomatic forums formed the scaffolding that prevented regional crises from cascading into global disorder. That scaffolding is now visibly weakening. The United States was the largest single contributor to the World Health Organisation, providing roughly 18 per cent of its core budget in 2024. It was a central pillar of UN climate negotiations, a major funder of UNRWA, and a decisive voice in peace and security debates. The sudden retreat has created not just a funding gap, but a strategic vacuum.

The Middle East understands vacuums better than most regions. When global engagement falters, local power fills the space — often violently. Iran’s expanding network of non-state allies, stretching from Lebanon to Yemen, has proven resilient even under sustained military pressure. It’s been noted that despite heavy losses in 2024, the so-called ‘Axis of Resistance‘ has adapted rather than collapsed, embedding itself in political economies and state institutions. In the absence of strong multilateral constraints, such networks gai room to manoeuvre, shaping regional order on their own terms.

At the same time, Gulf states are recalibrating. Saudi Arabia’s costly intervention in Yemen left more than 21 million people dependent on humanitarian aid, a reminder that unilateral or coalition-based force cannot........

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