At the end of May, President Donald Trump came to Riyadh on his first foreign trip as president and cemented a strong political and military relationship with Saudi Arabia and the “Sunni” military alliance being shaped by it. Even before his arrival, Trump had overturned Obama’s reluctance to engage militarily in the region by initiating bombing campaigns in Mosul, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan. These interventions have taken place alongside an active US role in mobilising, arming, training and backing armed forces that are attacking ISIS strongholds in Mosul and Raqqa and making territorial gains in Syria at the expense of the Assad regime.