The summit builds upon a joint Egyptian-Saudi framework approved by the Arab League just days before the attack on Qatar, according to diplomatic sources.

On September 5, the 22-member body backed a plan for joint cooperation to combat terrorism, secure shipping lanes and shield strategic infrastructure “thereby strengthening the region’s stability”.

That plan is now being fast-tracked following Israel’s air strike on a residential compound in Doha where officials confirmed Hamas mediators were being housed.

“What occurred was not merely a targeted attack, but an assault on the principle of mediation itself and on everything diplomacy represents as an alternative to war and destruction,” said Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani at the opening of the summit on Sunday.

In remarks laced with frustration, Thani condemned the “international community” – in effect, the West – for its “inability” to hold Israel accountable. Instead of welcoming Qatar’s negotiations over a ceasefire and the release of hostages, he said, Israel had chosen escalation.

Thani urged Muslim countries to take “real and tangible measures” to curb further violence or “inevitably, we will find ourselves facing an endless cycle of bloodshed and destruction from which no one will be immune”.

Washington on the sidelines

But some Arab governments appear to be losing patience, according to Hussein Ibish, a senior scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, who called the coalition proposals “yet another clear reflection of the alarm about the unwillingness and/or inability of Washington to serve as a security guarantor in the Middle East, especially for its traditional Arab military partners”.

“They [Arab countries] really feel they have no choice,” Ibish said, adding that if the US were to start making clear the terms on which it would be providing closer security coordination “then they would not feel the need to go forward with this uncharacteristic and uncomfortable effort at military integration”.

Paradoxically, the Arab world was moving towards the kind of cooperation Washington had long encouraged, he added, but the crucial difference was that the US had envisaged an Arab-Israeli alliance against Iran. Instead, Israel now finds itself named as the threat.

Barbara Slavin, a Middle East fellow at the Stimson Centre, told This Week in Asia that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had “gone too far in striking Qatar”.

“Whatever gains Israel has made regionally in the past two years … are jeopardised by its brutality in Gaza and overall hubris,” she said. “If the US won’t stop it, the region has to try.”

Before his arrival, the US secretary of state reiterated that the Trump administration was “not happy” with Israel’s air strikes on Doha – wording that fell far short of outright condemnation.

The military coalition proposal served as a “plea to the United States to get re-engaged” with the Arab world, Ibish said.

“Washington will find that it comes at a huge cost to US influence,” he said, further cautioning that “the US may not like what ultimately emerges, but if they don’t move to stop it now, they won’t be able to later on.”