By Arif Ansar
Context
The fragile security landscape of South Asia is increasingly tied to the volatile geopolitics of the Middle East. As the tripartite tensions involving the United States, Israel, and Iran simmer, the shockwaves are felt acutely in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and for that matter India as well. To fully comprehend this equation, one must analyze the internal regional dynamics of South Asia first and then trace how they intersect with the unfolding Middle Eastern crisis.
The successful negotiation and remote signing of the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on June 17, 2026, by U.S. President Donald Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, marked a monumental achievement for Pakistan’s civil-military leadership. If the Islamabad MoU sticks, in its current or reformed form, and transitions into a durable peace agreement, it holds the potential to fundamentally rewrite Pakistan’s domestic security, energy, and economic paradigms.
- The Regional Dynamics: South Asia’s Internal Fault Lines
The relationship between Pakistan and Afghanistan is currently defined by severe friction rather than neighborly cooperation. At the center of this tension is the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an extremist group that has escalated its terror campaign inside Pakistan. Pakistan accuses the Afghan Taliban of providing safe havens and tacit support to the TTP—a claim the Taliban administration in Kabul denies, though the cross-border nature of TTP attacks remains a persistent flashpoint.
Concurrently, Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan is facing a severe security crisis. The insurgent groups such as Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and Baloch Liberation Front (BLF) are demanding independence for the resource-rich province, has dramatically escalated its attacks against the Pakistani military.
Media reports suggest that the BLA is receiving strategic cooperation and material support from the TTP, creating a combined internal security challenge for Islamabad. Pakistan alleges that the BLA receives external backing from India to destabilize the country. India and Israel are exceptionally close strategic allies, sharing deep defense, intelligence, and counter-terrorism partnerships.
There is great power rivalry part of the equation too. BLA has repeatedly targeted Chinese infrastructure projects and personnel associated with the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in Balochistan in other parts of the country, aiming to disrupt Pakistan’s economic lifeline and strain its relationship with Beijing.
- The Middle East Equation: The Islamabad MoU and Saudi Defense Commitments
To understand how these South Asian fault lines link to the Middle East, one must look at Pakistan’s diplomatic balancing act. The nation has historically maintained a delicate equilibrium: keeping close ties with Saudi Arabia, and other GCC nations, while managing a long, porous border with its neighbor, Iran.
The Islamabad MoU
In mid-2026, Pakistan’s diplomatic corps, alongside Qatar, achieved a historic breakthrough by mediating the Islamabad MoU. This 14-point framework agreement successfully brought the U.S. and Iran to a temporary ceasefire, temporarily halting direct military hostilities, lifting the U.S. naval blockade on Iranian ports, and opening the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz. This diplomatic triumph cemented Pakistan’s role as a vital regional mediator. However, as hostilities have broken again indicating the stability of the Islamabad MoU remains incredibly fragile.
The Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement (SMDA)
Compounding this fragility is Pakistan’s security obligation to Riyadh. On September 17, 2025, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed the Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement (SMDA). Echoing NATO’s Article 5 language, the SMDA treats “any aggression against either country as an aggression against both”.
If an all-out war breaks out in the Middle East, a dangerous chain reaction is highly likely. Ansar Allah (the Houthis) in Yemen are highly likely to close the Babul Mandab Strait and launch retaliatory ballistic missile and drone attacks against Saudi Arabia. Faced with direct attacks, Saudi Arabia will almost certainly invoke the SMDA. Reports indicate that under the confidential terms of the pact, Pakistan could be required to deploy up to 80,000 troops to secure Saudi borders. Sooner or later, Pakistan will be forced to choose between entering a foreign conflict to defend Saudi Arabia or reneging on its defense pact, which would devastate its economic and strategic relations with the Gulf.
- Implications of a Worsening Middle East Conflict on Pakistan and Afghanistan
If the Middle East situation continues to deteriorate, the consequences will ripple across South Asia, severely impacting Pakistan and Afghanistan, and India across military, economic, and social domains.
Pakistan is already heavily engaged in counter-insurgency operations in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) against the TTP, and in Balochistan against the BLA and BLF, the Pakistani military is stretched thin. Faced with a domestic security crisis, coming to the active defense of Saudi Arabia would be an immense logistical and military strain. Knowing this, adversaries like India and Israel are highly likely to speed up their destabilizing activities inside Pakistan. By utilizing existing proxies, they can ensure that Pakistan remains too deeply entangled in internal security crises to project military power or assist its Gulf allies.
This regional sabotage directly undermines Washington’s strategic goals. The U.S. relies on Pakistan’s diplomatic weight to mediate with Tehran, as seen with the Islamabad MoU. A destabilized Pakistan is a nation that cannot play a constructive role in preventing a wider regional war in the Middle East or contribute towards the success of new vision for the Middle East – under the Abraham Accords and subsequent establishment of Board of Peace.
The Explosion of Sectarian Strife
A direct conflict involving Iran—the primary Shia power—and the U.S., Israel, or Sunni Arab Gulf states will instantly inflame sectarian fault lines in South Asia. Both Pakistan Afghanistan have sizable Shia minorities that have historically been targeted by hardline Sunni extremist groups. While India also has a sizeable Shia population, and while Muslims there face state repression, Shia’s there have not been targeted in a similar fashion.
A worsening Middle East war will be actively exploited by transnational terror networks, most notably Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISIS-K). ISIS-K, which operates across both Afghanistan and Pakistan, views Shia Muslims as heretics and has frequently targeted their mosques, community centers, and schools.
In Afghanistan: The ruling Taliban, while ideologically hardline Sunni, has sought to maintain basic internal stability. However, a regional sectarian war will severely test their control. ISIS-K will use the anti-Iran, anti-Shia rhetoric of the wider conflict to recruit disgruntled fighters, escalating attacks on the Shia Hazara community and challenging Taliban authority.
In Pakistan: Sectarian violence has historically claimed thousands of lives. An active war involving Iran and Saudi Arabia could trigger a revival of sectarian proxy wars on Pakistani soil, pitting localized militant groups against one another and further fracturing the country’s social cohesion.
- Economic Devastation and Connectivity Collapses
The economic fallout of a prolonged Middle East war on Pakistan and Afghanistan would be catastrophic.
Energy and Remittance Shocks
Pakistan imports the vast majority of its oil and gas from the Gulf. A disruption in the Strait of Hormuz or the Bab el-Mandeb would cause global oil prices to skyrocket, triggering hyperinflation in Pakistan’s fragile, debt-burdened economy. Furthermore, millions of Pakistani expatriates live and work in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. If the Middle East slides into a broader war, many of these workers could be forced to return home, cutting off the vital stream of foreign remittances that keeps Pakistan’s economy afloat.
The Death of Regional Connectivity
Both Afghanistan and Pakistan have pinned their economic futures on becoming trade hubs. Afghanistan under the Taliban has sought to utilize Iran’s Chabahar Port and the International North–South Transport Corridor (INSTC) to bypass landlocked constraints and reduce its dependence on Pakistani transit routes.
While the Islamabad MoU briefly revived hopes for these transit corridors, an escalation of the war would render these infrastructure projects dead on arrival. Iranian ports would once again become military targets, isolating Afghanistan economically and pushing it deeper into poverty, which in turn breeds further radicalization and instability. Moreover, in the recent escalation, reports indicate that US has also targeted Chabahar port to increase pressure on Iran.
- Conclusion: A Dangerous Convergence
The potential escalation of the U.S.-Israel-Iran conflict is not a localized Middle Eastern issue; it is a direct threat to the stability of South Asia. For Pakistan, the war represents an existential geopolitical trap, forcing it to balance a strict mutual defense treaty with Saudi Arabia against the reality of a heavily armed neighbor in Iran and a domestic theater crawling with active insurgencies. For Afghanistan, the conflict threatens to fuel the fires of ISIS-K’s sectarian violence and destroy any hopes of regional economic integration.
As external actors seek to exploit these vulnerabilities, the line between the Middle East’s conflicts and South Asia’s internal wars is rapidly dissolving. If the Islamabad MoU completely unravels, Pakistan and Afghanistan will find themselves directly in the line of fire of a wider, highly destructive regional war.
Conversely:
If the Islamabad MoU “sticks” and transitions from a fragile ceasefire into a durable peace agreement, it holds the potential to fundamentally rewrite Pakistan’s domestic security, energy, and economic paradigms.
a. Security: Strangling Proxies
By capitalizing on its diplomatic leverage from mediating between the U.S. and Iran, Pakistan can demand reciprocal action against cross-border threats. A secure Iran, freed from Western military threats, can work with the Pakistan Army to seal the lawless border, choking the logistics and safe havens of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) favored by India and Israel. Simultaneously, a stabilized region enables a unified U.S.-Pakistan-Iran diplomatic front to pressure the Afghan Taliban. Highly dependent on Pakistani and Iranian transit trade (like Chabahar Port), Kabul would be forced to dismantle the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). This double clampdown effectively ends the multi-front subversion designed by adversaries to keep Pakistan tactically entrapped.
b. Economy & Energy: Resurrecting the IP Pipeline
A durable reformed MoU triggers the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Iran, allowing Pakistan to complete the Iran-Pakistan (IP) Gas Pipeline without fear of international isolation. This removes the looming $18 billion “take-or-pay” penalty from Tehran, while injecting cheap natural gas to end rolling blackouts and slash industrial costs. Moreover, Gwadar Port is likely to take-off.
c. Autonomy: Balancing GCC Ties
Abundant energy and secured Central Asian trade routes drive organic growth, offering financial self-reliance and breaking Pakistan’s dependency on Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) bailouts. This shields Islamabad from strategic entrapment under its Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement (SMDA) with Riyadh, preserving its neutrality instead of dragging its military into regional proxy wars.
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