Iberia merged with BA, a founding member of OW, so they are effectively one airline with two brands. It's also one of the oldest airlines in the world, being established in 1927. They carried 19 million pax in 2017, making them about 50% larger than Air Zealand. Hardly a "Tin Pot" airline.
As for Alaksa - you know despite the name, they're based in Seattle, not Alaska right? A bit like Qantas and QLD/NT. They have about 45 million pax per year which is roughly the same as Qantas and Air Canada.
Both are full service airlines, for what you'd expect in continental Europe and the US respectively.
As for QF/EK, I think QF pulling out of DXB and EK pulling out of TT is more of a truce than an alliance. Despite the big words neither's actions demonstrate a commitment to the other. QF knows its never going to have the one stop European coverage that EK gives and figures it can at least get a piece of the pie, while trying to incentivise PAX flying via PER/SIN-LHR as much as possible. EK is happy for the extra business. .