THE Arab Gulf states are in a bind. They argue that they are neutral and don’t support the US-Israel war on Iran. Tehran, on the other hand, sees the presence of American bases on their territories as compromising their status as neutral powers. One way to look at it is to innovate — for the purpose of this crisis — a distinction between the political neutrality of the Gulf states and their legal neutrality. Legal neutrality, or the absence thereof, is to be ascertained from the texts of defence...