(18.Juni) JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia—After launching into a tirade about the malicious designs of their perfidious foe, three Saudi academics and analysts on separate recent occasions began by pronouncing “Israel”—and then, catching their error of habit mid-word, corrected themselves to say “Iran.”

The custodian of Islam’s holiest sites in Mecca and Medina, Saudi Arabia has long preached the message of Islamic unity, albeit on its own terms. That…