Could China Mediate between Israel and Iran?

By Dr Benjamin Houghton:

This article was written on 18th June 2025.

Amid a stark escalation in violence between Israel and Iran over the last week, Beijing has not been pushed too far out of its comfort zone. Ties with Israel have not been in the best of states for the last couple of years, with China making no secret of its disdain for Tel Aviv’s war on Gaza since October 2023. Relations with Iran have progressed with few substantial roadblocks in the same period. Accordingly, statements condemning Israeli actions and calling for de-escalation more widely carry little in the way of political costs for China.

But the looming threat of the current exchange of attacks between Israel and Iran possibly escalating into a wider conflict involving Washington (and possibly, by extension, the GCC states) poses a serious challenge to Beijing after decades of carefully balancing ties between Tehran and its rivals.

Trump wades in

While the United States claims that it had no role in the preliminary attacks by Israel that sparked the current crisis, the Trump administration is taking no prisoners in its warnings to Tehran of deeper US military involvement. Calling for Iran’s “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!” in a post on his Truth Social account, President Trump threatened the Iranian Supreme Leader directly, stating: “We know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding. He is an easy target but is safe there – We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now.”

Tired of negotiating with the Iranian regime over its nuclear enrichment activities and reportedly strongly considering joining Israel in strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, the United States has mobilized a larger military presence in the region over recent days. The USS Nimitz has set sail from the South China Sea to the Gulf, alongside its multiple air squadrons and destroyers. Further, around thirty air refueling tankers have been deployed to the region, facilitating more extensive and durable aerial capabilities if used.

Perhaps the most coveted aspect of US military capabilities from the Israeli perspective, though, are the GBU-57 bunker-buster bombs. Only capable of being deployed by US B-2 Stealth Bombers, Tel Aviv is lobbying for these bunker-buster bombs to be used on the Fordow nuclear enrichment plant based nearly 100 meters below the surface of a mountain range near Qom. Without Washington, Israel has no hope of targeting this site.

In response to these warnings and the deployment of more extensive US military capabilities, Iran’s Supreme Leader has warned that “any form of US military intervention will undoubtedly be met with irreparable harm.” The broadening and deepening of this conflict is a real and looming threat to the region.

China: Mission Impossible?

Putting aside for the sake of this debate the challenges that Beijing may face from an energy security perspective if the Middle East, or Gulf, as a whole becomes embroiled in this conflict, for China, any such broadening of the violence would pose a huge challenge to its long-term strategy of cultivating positive ties with the US and all regional states.

For over four decades, Beijing has expended considerable effort to maintain solid ties with Iran while also courting its American and GCC rivals. Being Iran’s friend has not always been easy, not least of all due to the ire it can attract from the Gulf, Israel, and the West. On occasions, that has involved China letting Tehran down at key junctures, but broadly Beijing has devised a carefully choreographed strategy to keep its ties with all states in decent form.

A primary issue of importance in this regard is that of US-GCC relations. Amassing an even greater military position in the region, Washington may soon be more reliant than it has been for decades in using GCC states as bases for operations, logistics, and launching attacks against Iran. Any such scenario could seriously risk damaging Iran’s ties with its neighbors, ties that have been in better shape over the last couple of years following China’s brokering of a normalization agreement between protracted rivals, Saudi Arabia and Iran.

While Beijing may not have had to work particularly hard to make that agreement happen from a mediation perspective – Oman and Iraq presided over the bulk of the negotiations – it was within a framework of deepening Chinese economic engagement in the region resulting in an atmosphere of belief that win-win-win cooperation may be possible that the deal was formed.

If the current escalation ends up involving the GCC states, perhaps even simply insofar as hosting US military installations, China may face a reversion to some of the more challenging periods of its balancing strategy, such as during the Iran-Iraq war and the tanker war in the 1980s. Sure, China has navigated some tense episodes, for example the 2019 attacks on Saudi oil facilities and subsequent finger-pointing towards Tehran. But, this would be a behemoth of a challenge for Xi’s administration.

This time, though, Beijing’s economic and political footprint in the region is far deeper. Managing a conflict that involves several of its foremost energy suppliers, the global superpower with which relations are frequently strained, and the onlooking of vital global economies would be seriously challenging for Beijing. Remaining in all sides’ good books would border on the impossible, and that is if the Iranian regime even survives such an escalation.

China as Mediator?

It might be reasonable to question at this point whether China could do the impossible and act as mediator between the conflicting sides. After all, it is in the fairly unique position of having wide-ranging and good-quality ties with Iran and the GCC states, not to mention passable relations with Israel and a relationship of manageable mutuality with the United States.

China’s successful brokering of the Saudi-Iran normalization agreement two years ago displays its ability to bring about win-win-win engagement amid tough rivalries, but current events are far too challenging and multi-faceted for Chinese incentives to produce effective results.

Put simply, Beijing simply does not have the clout to mediate between Israel and Iran, never mind managing the type of complexity that a broadening of the conflict would entail. Washington has struggled to keep its allies in Tel Aviv in line, even despite the fact that the United States more or less underwrites Israel’s security. The notion that China could exert the necessary levers of pressure or incentives to shift Israel’s position is impossible to imagine.

Perhaps the foremost issue in this equation is the fact that Beijing has no desire, never mind the capabilities, to underwrite any type of deal. With a security presence in the region that has barely evolved in recent years, Beijing would simply be unable to guarantee any type of agreement or to bring transgressors into line in the event of violations. Its military footprint is too minimal.

The core question returns, then, for China. Amid a widening of this conflict that involves other regional states and the foremost global superpower, what chances would Beijing have of maintaining ties with all of these conflicting states? If the Iranian regime were even to survive a protracted conflict with Washington, will Beijing manage to stay in Tehran’s good books and navigate relations with the US, the GCC states, and any other states that may become embroiled? The biggest challenge of China’s 46 year-long Middle East balancing strategy may be on the cusp of arrival.

Dr Benjamin Houghton is Director of Houghton Policy Ltd. He is the author of China's Strategy in the Gulf: Navigating Conflicts and Rivalries (Lynne Rienner Publishers) and co-editor of two books. He has also published his research and expertise in several world-leading outlets including Asian Affairs and Al-Monitor.