Middle East expert James Dorsey said the Qatar Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani’s statements indicated “Qatar punching back rather than seriously considering giving up mediation”, which he called “a key pillar of the country’s soft power”.

He explained to AFP that while Qatar was primarily targeting “Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu and his backers in the US Congress”, there was also “an attempt to pressure the Biden administration to stand up for Qatar”.

Gulf expert Andreas Krieg said Qatar had played an “instrumental role” in securing November’s hostage exchange and the emirate had become “very disgruntled about the way that this isn’t recognised by everyone, particularly not in Israel”.

But he also said it was unlikely that “Qatar is really sincere in trying to withdraw from this mediation effort” after it had “monopolised this relationship in a way that no one else can do what Qatar can do”.