Some Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Oman, Bahrain, and Kuwait, have all come under missile and drone fire from the Islamic Republic of Iran. Yet their response to Tehran has been measured, and several have actively pushed to end the conflict. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is the exception. Abu Dhabi sees the solution in a renewed war waged by the United States and Israel against Iran. Saudi Arabia, for instance, encouraged Pakistan to mediate an end to the war, but the UAE rebuked Islamabad for doing so. Although Pakistan is mired in economic hardship, the UAE responded to its mediation efforts by recalling three billion dollars in debt. Saudi Arabia later covered that debt following Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s visit to Riyadh. The contrast is telling: Saudi Arabia, despite absorbing heavy Iranian strikes, still seeks an end to the war, while the UAE does not.
The UAE has stood at the center of regional and global attention for years. Over the past few decades, it has cast itself as a “developmentalist” state, leveraging oil revenues and a strategic partnership with the West. Abu Dhabi has skillfully balanced relations among the major powers, the United States, Russia, and China, and has posted remarkable gains in the economy, infrastructure, and technology. Its trajectory has become a model many regional states hope to emulate. Yet these achievements sit uneasily alongside a set of field policies and risky coalitions the country has pursued for some time.
The clearest expression of this contradiction is Abu Dhabi’s warm rapport with Israel’s most extremist factions. Unlike most Arab states, and indifferent to the prevailing sensitivities of the Arab world, the UAE has drawn closer to Israel’s far right. According to Western media reports, it has even hosted Israeli air-defense systems on its soil. Other Arab governments, including those that have officially recognized Israel, have sharply condemned its conduct in the region. The UAE not only refrains from such criticism but openly takes pride in its ties with the Israeli far right, with no apparent regard for Palestinian rights.
The UAE’s interventionist policies elsewhere in the region further undercut its developmentalist image. Its military role in Yemen in recent years, and its recent falling out with Saudi Arabia, its former ally, over that file, is one clear example. In Sudan, the UAE has fueled the country’s devastating war by arming one of the warring sides. Its footprint is also visible in the Libyan crisis. On closer inspection, this interventionist conduct bears no relation to economic, development-oriented, or stability-building policies.
Why Iran and the UAE Cannot Get Along?
Over the past two days, the UAE has claimed it was the target of missile and drone attacks launched by Iran. The Islamic Republic has neither denied nor confirmed the claim. What is clear is that the UAE’s industrial port of Fujairah came under attack and sustained serious damage. Despite repeated warnings, however, the UAE has not yet launched a retaliatory strike.
If Iran was indeed behind the attack, three factors are likely at play. First, Abu Dhabi’s backing of U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran, and its appetite for escalating the conflict. The UAE had previously said it would support and take part in any U.S. military operation to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Reports now suggest that if Washington and Israel resume strikes on Iran, the UAE would formally enter the war. The Iranian side likely possesses fairly reliable intelligence on this front, and a preemptive strike would serve as a clear signal of its resolve to Abu Dhabi. Tehran calculates that it can handle the UAE on its own and that the United States and Israel will not intervene unless their own interests demand it. Second, reports of Israeli air-defense systems being deployed on Emirati soil have alarmed the Islamic Republic more than ever. If those reports are confirmed, Iran will not stand still. Third, the UAE and Iran remain locked in a serious dispute over the three islands of Abu Musa, Lesser Tunb, and Greater Tunb. Both sides claim them, but they currently sit under Iranian control. Tehran believes Abu Dhabi is angling for the collapse of the Islamic Republic and the outbreak of civil war, hoping to exploit the chaos to assert its hold over the islands. The UAE has spent years pressing its claim and has won the support of major powers, whether through significant economic concessions or by other means. Russia and China, ostensibly Iran’s strategic allies, have repeatedly signed off on resolutions at Arab gatherings calling for the dispute to be settled through international mechanisms. From Iran’s perspective, however, any recourse to international mechanisms on this matter is a non-starter.
You can read the Persian version of this analysis here:
