Last week’s Hamas-Fatah cease-fire was hardly an extraordinary event. There have been numerous aborted cease-fires proclaimed by the two major Palestinian factions throughout the past year.

What was different was the venue — Mecca, Saudi Arabia — and the convener, King Abdullah. Abdullah invited Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas, together with Hamas’ Damascus political bureau chief Khaled Mashaal, to see if he could persuade them to adopt a viable cease-fire and establish a feasible working governmental arrangement.

This invitation had importance far beyond quelling the persistent fighting in Gaza and on the West Bank. In the year since Hamas was elected in an upset election, the two factions have been fighting almost nonstop. Clearly, the king was concerned about their inability to set aside their petty squabbles and move ahead in trying to help the Palestinian people. Abdullah also wanted to see if such a move could persuade the United States and the West to resume the funding for Palestinians that they had frozen in hopes of isolating Hamas. In addition, he held out a hope that a cease-fire achieved on a more grand scale might reenergize the floundering Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

There was, however, a much more critical agenda on the king’s mind: Abdullah clearly wants to counter the Iranian influence spreading into his backyard.

Historically, Saudi Arabia has kept a very low public diplomatic profile, with the exception of its central role in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and related international economic issues. Since the 1990 Persian Gulf War, however, Saudi Arabia has taken on an ever-greater role, driven by self-interest to participate in, if not control, the regional stage.

The Saudis saw the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 as a threat to their long claim of regional hegemony. It was also a source of concern for their oil reserves. Admittedly, the secular Saddam Hussein was less threatening than the radical Shi’ites in Tehran, but considering that the 10-year war between Iran and Iran had resolved nothing, the Saudis wanted stability in the Gulf. Their successful role in dictating the “non-resolution” of the Gulf War demonstrated their political power.

In their political calculus, as has always been the case in Riyadh, everything in the Gulf had to be calculated against the power and the reach of the Iranians. Stop the Gulf War, they reasoned, lest Iran exploit the ensuing chaos.

In 2001, the kingdom was buffeted by news of the Saudi origin of most of the 9/11 terrorist attackers. Saudi or Saudi-born terrorists also had their hands in the 1996 terrorist attack on Khobar Towers and numerous subsequent terrorist incidents reputed to have been masterminded by Al Qaida. In 2002, then Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah took a dramatic step and convened the Beirut Summit. The goal was to demonstrate to the West that even the Arab world recognized the need to address terrorism and the Arab-Israeli conflict. The summit developed an unprecedented unified position. Participants agreed to recognize the State of Israel and proposed — from their perspective a dramatic concession — to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict as a first step toward reducing the growth of radical Islamic forces.

Since then, the Saudis have watched the United States’ failure in Iraq. They are genuinely concerned about a ruling coalition ultimately taking hold in Iraq that would ensure Shi’ites (read: Iran) an increased share of the region’s oil reserves. The Saudis recognize that despite the toppling of Saddam, civil war between Shi’ites and Sunnis in Iraq is only escalating. The king has sensed not only the growing presence of Iranian infiltration into the Iraqi conflict, but also the dramatically increased role being played by the Iranians politically, militarily, and financially throughout the region.

So genuine was the Saudi fear of growing Iranian influence during last summer’s Lebanon War, that the Saudis and other Sunni states were said to be privately “rooting” for the Israelis to soundly defeat the Iranian-backed Hizbullah in the war’s early stages.

Last week’s meeting in Mecca had a number of clear sub-agendas for the Saudis. First, they wanted Fatah, but especially Hamas, to understand that they were prepared to support the Palestinian people with major financial assistance if Hamas would agree to share power with Fatah and reject any further Iranian aid.

Second, they sought to convince the parties that if they established a working relationship — with some gesture toward the Quartet’s threefold conditions — the king was prepared to work to persuade the West to reopen its own financial support for Palestinians.

Recognizing the United States’ weakened credibility, a growing internal fear of terrorism, and a geopolitical threat from Shi’ite/Iranian-led radicals, the Saudis may indeed be readying to play a role of serious deal-maker. The monarchy’s days of quiet dominance may be rapidly moving onto a truly open stage. Their own “road map” may be more pragmatic than ever.