by Samer Al-Atrush

Dubai
May 15, 2026
from TheTimes Website
Article also HERE

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A FlyDubai aircraft prepares for landing

as smoke rises from a drone-related fire

near Dubai international airport in March
AFP/Getty Images



Since Iran began

focusing its fire across the Gulf

the UAE has transformed

into something of

a spartan merchant state,

'more resilient' and aligned with Israel...

For decades, the leaders of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) could look across the Gulf and just about see the distant lights of Iran in the darkness.

It was a looming presence that endangered a young country founded on business and oil.

From time to time, Iranian officials would raise the threat with their counterparts in the UAE.

"The conventional wisdom was that all it takes is two missiles and two drones and Dubai is done," explained Nadim Koteich, an Emirati journalist and analyst.

When the missiles and drones finally arrived at the end of February, the threat was put to the test.

The UAE, viewed by Tehran as a glass skyscraper much like Dubai's glittering Burj Khalifa, did not shatter.

Yet it has emerged from the war changed, and the repercussions are being felt across the region as new alliances are strengthened and old ones unravel.

"It was a baptism by fire," said Koteich.

 

"And there was a silver lining to the war, that it vindicated the [UAE] model."

The Address Creek Harbour hotel in Dubai

after it was hit by a drone strike in March
Fatima Shbair/AP

That model has turned the UAE into something of a spartan merchant state,

wielding a powerful and occasionally interventionist military in one hand, and in the other a tax-free laissez faire economic lifestyle attractive to foreign companies.

Officials and analysts say the country now has a clearer view of who its friends are, beyond the hackneyed slogans of solidarity among Arab and Muslim countries.

When Iran began focusing its fire on the UAE after the US and Israeli attack that started the war, the Emiratis received a call from Israel.

"They called the UAE. The UAE didn't call them.

 

They said, 'How can we help'?" said one source familiar with the matter.

Soon the Israelis deployed an Iron Dome battery, among other aerial defence weapons, with a team of soldiers to operate them.

Israel's Iron Dome air defence system

intercepts missiles launched

from the Gaza Strip in 2023.
MOHAMMED SABER/EPA

What impressed the Emiratis the most, said another source, was that,

the Israelis did not boast about it at the time, as is their wont when they assist an Arab country.

In Egypt, during the Islamic State insurrection in Sinai, Israel had done much of the heavy lifting against the extremists, even killing their leader, Abu Duaa al-Ansari, in a 2016 airstrike, while constantly leaking their involvement and angering the Egyptians.

"The Israelis really showed up and they showed up fast and quietly and they didn't wait to be asked - they got in touch," said the source.

 

"They were on the ground from the first week."

The unusual reticence from Binyamin Netanyahu, who is normally eager to flaunt his relations with Arab leaders, was set aside this week when he confirmed that he secretly met the Emirati president, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, known as MBZ, during the war, which his office said resulted in a "historic breakthrough".

Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed
Getty images

The UAE has angrily denied this.

"Any claims regarding unannounced visits or undisclosed arrangements are entirely unfounded unless officially announced by the relevant authorities in the UAE," the foreign ministry said.

It would not be the first time an Israeli leader let slip what was meant to be a secret meeting with an Arab official, although the UAE and Israel established diplomatic relations in 2020.

Netanyahu, however, is a toxic figure in the region due to the devastating wars in Gaza and Lebanon, and Abu Dhabi would have viewed his disclosure as an attempt to score political points at home.

That the war strengthened the bonds between the two countries is undeniable, however.

With its oil refineries and infrastructure under daily attack during the war, the UAE began launching numerous strikes on military positions in Iran, using French-made Mirage jets and Chinese-made attack drones, said one source.

Shared Israeli and US intelligence made those sorties possible, as it would have for Saudi Arabia, which is also said to have launched several strikes in retaliation.

The UAE, meanwhile, has drifted from the regional organizations and alliances led by its rival Saudi Arabia, with one official, Anwar Gargash, questioning the usefulness of the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council.

It seized the moment to withdraw from the Saudi-led Opec, sending shockwaves through the cartel that controls the world's energy prices.

Following air strikes

 from Iran in Dubai

"I think that when it comes to postwar it's driven by the fact that MBZ is not ideological about identity.

 

Yes, we are Muslims, we are Arabs, but this not how he sees the world," said Koteich, who said the UAE, which plays an outsized military and financial role, remained engaged with the region.

Koteich added that the war vindicated the UAE's view that Iran was the main threat to the region, not Israel, making the country something of an "outlier" in the Arab world.

The Iran war,

"tells us who we are and tells us who our enemies are and it helps us rate our friends", he said. "It changed our conviction in the country. We will double down on believing the UAE project."

That project, a socially and economically liberal country with an expatriate majority kept in line by firm security services, appears to have weathered the war beyond expectation. Businesses that considered relocating their staff are now doubling down on the country.

Brookfield, the Canadian investment management company whose headquarters in Dubai was targeted by a drone during the war, announced this week a new 480,000 sq ft complex in the upscale Dubai Hills neighborhood, citing Dubai's "dynamic growth".

An estate in the Dubai Hills

Emiratis, officials and intellectuals alike say they have found renewed pride in their country for its handling of the war.

Privately, some admit missteps have been made, excusing them as the acts of a young country involved in its first war.

Dozens of people, including Britons, were rounded up during the war for filming missile impacts or drones in the sky, and others for spreading "misinformation" online.

Some long-time Iranian residents reported that their residency permits were cancelled, while at least dozens of Pakistani Shias have been deported, according to accounts from the deportees.

One said he was deported after attending a Shia religious gathering, in what was possibly seen by UAE authorities as an incubator for support for the Iranian theocratic Shia regime.

UAE officials have denied they were targeting Iranians or Pakistani Shias.

The Emiratis insist that those excesses pale when compared with what they view as a victory in an existential war.

"The UAE now stands ten feet taller: more confident, more resilient, and proven as both an oasis of stability and a well-defended fortress capable of standing up to a hugely aggressive Iran," said Abdulkhaleq Tharwat, a leading Emirati political scientist.

"Its citizens feel safer, prouder and more united than ever," he added, even with the presence of Iran visible across the Gulf.