The war of words between Iran and Saudi Arabia and the breakdown in diplomatic ties is bad news for President Hassan Rouhani and his efforts to bring Iran out of isolation. It also threatens to escalate the sectarian tensions pushing the region deeper into crisis.
The 3 January mob attack on the Saudi embassy in Tehran and the consulate in Mashhad, protesting the execution of Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr in Saudi Arabia, was reminiscent of both the attack on the US embassy in the wake of the 1979 revolution and the 2011 ransacking of the British embassy in Tehran.
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