Introduction

The 21st century has witnessed economic, political, and normative transformations as a result of protracted economic crises, technological developments used to overcome these crises, shifts in global value chains, and the consequent shifts in power distribution among great powers and leading regions. The relations between the US and China are among the most contentious dynamics in the contemporary world. With the so-called “rise of China” as a result of China’s successful economic reform since the late 1970s, which has turned China into the second largest economy of the world following the US only, scholars and diplomats alike are wondering how the relations between the two powers in our world today will evolve. Many recent developments, such as the revival of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue between the US, Japan, Australia, and India since 2017, the Sino-US “trade war” since 2018, and the US-led “diplomatic boycott” of China’s Winter Olympics in 2022, seem to reveal the emergence of the Sino-US rivalry and the increase of the tension between the two in our international system. In this context of growing Sino-US conflicts, it is both academically and practically important to study their relations in one of the most strategically important regions in our world, the Middle East, which is producing one third of the oil for the whole world.

The Middle East is composed of multiple subregions with distinct political and socioeconomic backgrounds. However, the positions of these subregions in relation to regional and global powers are interconnected, forming the regional relations of the Middle East. Intriguingly, despite the huge strategic importance of the region, the tension between the US and China over the Middle Eastern issues has not been very high. While the US has been actively taking actions to intervene in regional affairs to protect and promote its interests in the region, China has been adopting a hands-off approach toward the region (that is, a less assertive and non-interventionist policy toward the Middle Eastern countries). Many studies that examine China’s responses to such issues as the US invasion of Iraq, the Israeli–Palestinian relations, and the US policy toward Iran even reveal that China has intentionally avoided being too assertive in the Middle East in order to prevent conflict with the US (Lai 2007; Wehrey et al 2010; Chen 2012; Ehteshami et al 2018; Conduit and Akbarzadeh 2019).