Gulf States

American  

[guhlf steyts] / ˈgʌlf ˌsteɪts /

plural noun

1. the states of the U.S. bordering on the Gulf of Mexico: Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas.

2. Also called Persian Gulf States.  the oil-producing countries bordering on or located near the Persian Gulf: Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

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Gulf States British  

plural noun

1. the oil-producing states around the Persian Gulf: Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman

2. the states of the US that border on the Gulf of Mexico: Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas

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Example Sentences

Robert Mogielnicki, of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Paris, said that building new pipelines "will take time" and such infrastructure would "still possess vulnerabilities".

From Barron's • May 1, 2026

“This constellation of foreign investment from China and from Gulf States, with complex and sometimes competing relationships with the United States, demands rigorous, not perfunctory review,” Booker and the others wrote.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 24, 2026

“No regime has the resources to fight the society, whose values have changed since 1979,” said Ali Alfoneh, an Iran expert with the Arab Gulf States Institute, a think tank in Washington.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 17, 2026

Andrew also cultivated his own independent sources of funding since leaving public life, including business connections with China, the Gulf States and a recently curtailed project with a Dutch start-up company.

From BBC • Oct. 30, 2025

North America west to the Rocky Mountains, breeds from the Gulf States to Minnesota and New Brunswick; resident.

From Color Key to North American Birds with bibiographical appendix by Chapman, Frank M.