What worked?

 Helping them gang up against Iran sems to have worked. https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/09/expert_admits_he_was_wrong_for_decades_on_israel.html

I've asked people about the Mid-East issues who have lived in the region. All of them mentioned different things. The way you rally people is to hand them a common enemy. Maybe Obama had  a plan to strengthen Iran enough to make it a real threat and then use that threat to rally the  rest of the Mid-East against them. Somehow I doubt it.