The epic smackdown on Qatar continues: Qatar’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani blamed “media fabrications” for the escalations that led to severing ties with his country. He said in an interview with Al Jazeera, covered by his ministry, that the “unprecedented escalation” will be met with “dialogue,” denying any knowledge of the “real reasons for this crisis.” Al Thani stuck with Doha’s official story that Qatar News Agency was hacked and this is what resulted in publishing “fabricated statements” by the Qatari emir that enraged regional allies. One thing we took note of was Al Thani’s remarks that “there are question marks over the future of GCC because internal ties in the council should be based on solidarity and cooperation.”

Saudi Arabia was unwavering about keeping the statelet boxed in.Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir said on Tuesday thatQatar needs to sever all ties with Hamas and the Ikhwan if it hopes to get back into the good graces of its Arab neighbors, according to Reuters. “We want to see Qatar implement the promises it made a few years back with regards to its support of extremist groups, its hostile media and interference in affairs of other countries,” Jubeir said. “We took this step with great pain so that it understands that these policies are not sustainable and must change.”

Qatar may have to pull the plug on Al Jazeera as a condition of even starting official talks on a way forward. That’s the contention of Sultan Al Qassemi, the gadfly Emirati commentator on Arab affairs who rose to prominence tweeting the 2011 uprising in Egypt and who is a well-liked in western circles. Al Qassemi, a member of the royal family of Sharjah, contends that, “It is likely that this time the Gulf States will demand the complete shuttering of the Al Jazeera TV Network before any mediation can take place. Additionally, the plug will have to be pulled on networks funded by Qatar such as Al Araby Al Jadeed [among other ‘news’ outlets]. … The Gulf States and their Egyptian ally will also demand the expulsion of all Muslim Brotherhood leaders and their Hamas affiliate figures from Qatar.” Read Al Qassemi’s piece for Newsweek.

Is the statelet giving in — or looking for room to maneuver?Israel’s Haaretz contends that a number of top Hamas officials left Qatar on Monday at the authorities’ request, citing unnamed Palestinian officials, who said that Musa Dudin and Saleh al-Arouri were among those to depart.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump inadvertently played into the Iranian narrative to score cheap points at home: A day after saying he wanted to “calm the Gulf flareup,” US President Donald Trump gave himself credit for Qatar’s isolation, tweeting: “During my recent trip to the Middle East I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology. Leaders pointed to Qatar – look.” In his rush to score minor political points, Trump may have inadvertently lent credence to Iranian accusations, and the move is not going down well with the East coast foreign policy elite (cf: Times, the New York).

The domino effect: Yesterday saw French Justice Minister Francois Bayrou saying his country should end tax breaks granted to Qataris by former President Nicolas Sarkozy’s administration on profits from the sale of properties in France. “Can this situation continue? I don’t think so. I think it’s very important that in France we have tax fairness,” Bayrou says. This came as the French Foreign Ministry’s stance was to express its wishes that “current tensions are resolved through dialogue.” Russian President Vladimir Putin called for diplomacy and dialogue in resolving the split in a phone call with Qatar’s Emir, TASS reports. He reportedly also rang President Abdel Fattah El Sisi on Tuesday to follow up on the situation, according to Russian news agency. The Philippines also decided yesterday to bar nationals from traveling to Qatar for work temporarily, according to Reuters.

Other countries in the region went with the tide and took action against Qatar yesterday, with Mauritania officially announcing that it would be cutting diplomatic ties and Jordan shutting down Al Jazeera’s Amman office and moving to “limit” its diplomatic relations, according to Al Shorouk. Morocco’s national flag carrier also announced yesterday that it would be rerouting flights to Egypt, Saudi, and UAE that typically pass through Doha.

Domestically, Egypt Post said it is suspending all service to Qatar, according to Al Masry Al Youm. This means that residents in Egypt will not be able to send letters or packages to Qatar. The decision follows the suspension of flights between the two countries.

Qatari investments in Egypt are protected by law and will not be affected, a top government official told Daily News Egypt. These investments are “secure” unless businesses choose to pull out of the market, he added.

Collateral damage: Asian tourism to Egypt? Travel and tourism businesses in Egypt are not so thrilled about the suspension of flights to the statelet, Al Shorouk says. The cutoff of flights to and from Qatar will hit the (frankly small) Japanese and other Far Eastern tourism markets hard, warned Magdy Haneen, tourism committee head at the British-Egyptian Chamber of Commerce. They’re among a handful of Asian markets that made stopovers in Qatar on their way to Cairo.

Qatar has reportedly confirmed that the flare up will not affect the status of Egyptian workers in Qatar, Labor Minister Mohamed Saafan said in a Tuesday statement, according to Al Mal. The Egyptian embassy in Doha received confirmation from Qatari authorities that labor contracts will be honored.