Saudi Arabia and its allies must curb the growing Israeli-Emirati axis

Saudi Arabia and its allies must curb the growing Israeli-Emirati axis Submitted by David Hearst on Mon, 05/04/2026 - 11:28 The UAE's increasingly overt involvement in Israel’s plans is a recipe for conflict that could last decades  The foreign ministers of Egypt, Pakistan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia meet on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Antalya, Turkey on 17 April, 2026 (Reuters) On US President Donald Trump has hit a brick wall with Iran.  Whatever path he now takes, and whoever was stupid enough to follow him, will lead them into more danger. If Trump opts for war, he can be sure it will be more costly in US lives than the first round was.  If US Marines land on any of Iran’s islands in the Strait of Hormuz, they would become sitting ducks for drones and missiles on terrain that gives them no cover. Such a campaign could be Trump’s Gallipoli. In case he does not remember what happened there, it is one of Winston Churchill’s decisions that Trump will not want to repeat. If the war restarts, it will also extend geographically. Iran is not bluffing when it threatens to close the Red Sea and Suez Canal if the US and Israeli bombing campaign resumes. If Trump opts for peace, it will be on terms that fall far short of his war aims. Let us discount nuclear enrichment. If Iran had wanted a nuclear weapon, it could have got that a long time ago.  Successive reports by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) found no proof of a structured, active nuclear weapons programme. Its stock of highly enriched uranium (HEU) was only created after Trump pulled out of the nuclear accord Iran reached with Barack Obama.  The HEU is a bargaining chip which, for the right price, Tehran will have little difficulty disposing of either by dilution, as it has already offered to, or by sending it to Pakistan. No Plan B Trump’s three big losses in a negotiated settlement are these: no regime change, in fact quite the opposite; Trump has achieved regime enhancement. No surrender of Iran's missiles and drones, with the Strait of Hormuz under de facto Iranian control. War on Iran has triggered a fundamental crisis of trust in the nuclear non-proliferation treaty Read More » Any deal structured around these pillars would make it hard even for Trump to brand it as victory, let alone a bang for his buck, roughly between $630bn and $1 trillion of them. Trump’s attack on Iran could have made sense from a military perspective if Mossad had succeeded in toppling the Islamic Republic within days of the killing of its supreme leader and its top brass.  It is now clear from both US and Israeli security sources that regime change by decapitation was the real plan all along. When it failed, neither Trump nor Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a Plan B, other than to carry on bombing Iran, as they indeed did for two months. To add to Maggie Haberman’s and Jonathan Swan’s reconstruction of the 11 February meeting in the White House situation room, when Netanyahu convinced Trump to go to war, Israeli journalists Nahum Barnea and Ronen Bergman report that the original plan for regime change went in three stages. Netanyahu and his Mossad director David Barnea seemed to have become intoxicated by the "success" of the pager attacks, which killed 42 and maimed thousands in Lebanon.  In fact, the pager attacks and subsequent assassinations of Hezbollah’s top leadership only revitalised an army that is today exacting a continuous stream of Israeli military casualties just kilometres from the border. Regime change failed After the assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, regime change was planned in three phases, the first of which was a ground invasion by Kurdish militias.  This was stopped not only by the Iranian Kurds themselves, four of whose groups dissociated themselves from such a suicidal venture, but by pressure from Baghdad and Ankara. The idea that Trump and Netanyahu were coming to rescue Iranians from their regime has turned into a sick joke Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called Trump to stop it and he did.  The second phase was for mass street protests, while the Israeli airforce bombed the Basij paramilitary forces from the air. The third was the establishment of an alternative leadership.  Trump soon got cold feet. He also encountered strong opposition from his own cabinet. Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the CIA Director John Ratcliffe all expressed strong opposition to the regime change plan; Rubio called it bullshit, Ratcliffe called it a farce. And so it was. The invasion was an idea Kurdish militia leaders nervously dropped almost as quickly as it was raised. Sirwan Barzani, the Peshmerga major-general and millionaire businessman who earned the nickname "Black Tiger" fighting Saddam Hussein’s forces, told MEE that his forces had no plans to invade Iran.  Other Kurdish leaders distanced themselves from the plans.  A series of Iranian Kurdish militia leaders denied they had received arms from Trump. They had been warned off the idea both by Baghdad and Ankara. Street demonstrations did materialise, but they were pro-government. The bombings, particularly of a school in Minab, which killed 156 people, 120 of them children, turned public opinion in Iran decisively against Israel and America. Before the war, Iranians were at the very least divided in their support for the Islamic Republic. They did not have an axe to grind with the West. They just wanted a normal life. When the US and Israel bombed Tehran, I did not flee. Here’s why Read More » The view that Iranians were caught between two extremes, the Mullahs and America, was frequently expressed by the traders in the market of central Tehran. All that has gone.  If before the war "Death to Israel" was a slogan on a missile, today it is said with feeling. The idea that Trump and Netanyahu were coming to rescue Iranians from their regime has turned into a sick joke. Support for an alternative to the Islamic Republic fell through the floor.  Unable to win the debate, supporters of Reza Pahlavi, son of the last shah, are now resorting to violent attacks on anti-war protesters in the UK. Iran is now dividing families in the diaspora on generational lines. Each of the three pillars of regime change have failed. The Islamic Republic is more in control of Iran than it was before the attack. More importantly, the Islamic Republic has found, through its closure of the Strait of Hormuz and its drone attacks, that it retains the casting vote on what business takes place, or does not take place, around the shores of the Persian Gulf.  To the shock of its Gulf neighbours, this stretch of water has become more Persian than it has ever been in its history. Bursting the Gulf bubble Iran has burst the glittering, but ultimately fragile, bubble of wealth and privilege in which the ruling elites in Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Qatar lived for so many decades, untouched by the turmoil around them.  Iran’s drones and missiles have not only damaged the physical infrastructure of the oil terminals, the AI centres, and the hotels of the Gulf. That is reparable. It has destroyed, possibly irreparably, the Gulf brand as the playground of the rich, immune from the neighbourhood it lives in and accountable only to itself.  Nowhere is the Islamic Republic’s boot more keenly felt than in Dubai and Abu Dhabi Nowhere is the Islamic Republic’s boot more keenly felt than in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Iran has pummelled the UAE. By 28 March, it had launched 398 ballistic missiles, 1872 drones and 15 cruise missiles at the Emirates, making it the most targeted country after its ally Israel. The effect has been dramatic. More than $120bn has been wiped from the market capitalisation on the Dubai and Abu Dhabi stock exchanges with 18,400 flights cancelled. Goldman Sachs estimates that real estate transactions have dropped by 37 percent year on year. Seven of Dubai’s landmark hotels, including the Armani, Burj Al Arab, Park Hyatt and the St Regis, are closing their doors as nearly 2000 rooms are set for refurbishment.  Various attempts are being made to shore up Brand Dubai and spin this as good news - it's the low season, it's an opportunity to renovate, the same thing happened during Covid. This being a dictatorship, with a lipgloss of western liberalism, a clampdown has been imposed on foreign residents filming the destruction that damages Dubai’s global image.  At least 70 have been arrested. Sharing footage will lead to fines over $260,000 and prison sentences of up to 10 years. The attacks have not just shut down the tourist industry and the oil fields. Aluminium production has been stopped after the Al Taweelah smelter was struck by missiles and drones. The halt to production at Emirates Global Aluminium, along with reduced operations at Qatar’s Qatalum smelter, takes offline three million tons of annual capacity, close to half of Middle Eastern aluminium output. It turns out the Strait of Hormuz is not just a chokepoint for oil gas, and fertiliser, it is also one for the global aluminium market. The Dubai gold market has lost its shine. Singapore has shipped 1,446kg of gold bullion out of Dubai since the war began, as investors fret about insurance provision and the ability to get at the gold at short notice. Jewellery exports from Dubai have dropped by 80 to 90 percent. Pure Data Center Group has put investments in the region on hold after two of its data centres in the UAE and Bahrain were hit by drones, causing outages in banking and payments. CEO Gary Wojtaszek told CNBC that investment decisions had been paused on "all data centre opportunities. "No one’s going to run into a burning building, so to speak," he said. The targeting of the UAE was neither accidental nor unannounced. Iran had warned anyone who would listen that it would do this.  UAE: A platform for Israel interests Iranian sources told MEE that Iranian intelligence had established the Emirati role in the attacks went beyond hosting US bases. One official said: "Iranian intelligence believes the UAE also made some of its own air facilities available for operations against Iran." Abu Dhabi has served as an advanced platform for Israeli interests in the region, the official said. Iran told Saudi Arabia it planned to 'crush the UAE': Report Read More » He suggested this included "deception operations" - false-flag Israeli attacks on Oman and at least one other country intended to look like Iranian ones. Iran also believes that cooperation included the use of the AI infrastructure within the UAE to support data collection and analysis for US and Israeli targeting. If Iran were to be invaded, the UAE would be treated as an aggressor, one diplomat told MEE. That the UAE has gone way beyond its Gulf neighbours in supporting the US and Israeli attack on Iran, is down to one man, its President Mohammed bin Zayed, often referred to by the acronym MBZ. This public school educated prince has already done more damage to peace and stability in the Middle East in the last two decades than anyone else I can think of, bar Netanyahu and Mossad. But MBZ comes a close third. MBZ stopped the Arab Spring in its tracks, funding and organising the deposing of Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically elected president, and then doing the same in Tunisia. He funded and armed civil wars in Libya, Yemen and Sudan. He employed mercenary snipers to kill Yemeni figures from civil society. Abu Dhabi is ‘Israel’s Trojan horse’, senior Saudi figure tells The David Hearst Podcast Read More » He has bankrolled the war criminals of Darfur, the Hemedti brothers, and supplied them with arms. Literally millions of Arabs have suffered from these wars. For MbZ, it's water off a duck’s back. Like Netanyahu’s project of  expanding Israel’s borders, MbZ plans to turn his tiny emirate into a "Little Sparta" with a military and financial reach into the Horn of Africa far beyond its size. MbZ modelled his strategy on Israel’s. He was the first to replicate its well oiled and powerful lobby in Washington. He used that lobby to promote a then unknown Saudi prince called Mohammed bin Salman and introduce him to the Trump clan.  This was the essential precursor to the ousting and disgrace of the then powerful crown prince and interior minister, Mohammed bin Nayef, who at the time was the CIA’s preferred man in Riyadh. The mentor and pupil have since fallen out with each other spectacularly and irreparably over Yemen.  Aidarous al-Zubaidi, the leader of the UAE backed separatists called the Southern Transitional Council (STC), had to be extracted by the UAE from Yemen after his forces overreached themselves by trying to capture a port on Saudi Arabia’s southern border. Saudi Arabia and Egypt are now challenging the UAE’s international network of client militias in Sudan, Libya, and Yemen by funnelling arms and money to their military opponents.  MbZ ups the stakes But MbZ is not a man to back down. Last week, the UAE announced it was pulling out of Opec. This was a move which went beyond releasing itself from the straitjacket of oil quotas.  It was designed to hit its neighbour, Saudi Arabia, where they could hurt it most and destroy a cartel that had functioned for six decades. This is MbZ rolling the dice once more. He has decided the only way forward is to double down on his attack against his two biggest neighbours, Saudi Arabia and Iran. It could also be a sign of weakness, because Abu Dhabi’s dependence on oil will be increased as a result. Jettisoning all previous attempts to diversify the economy into tourism, AI, and industry will also not go down well in the other emirates who are less dependent on oil than Abu Dhabi is. Mohammed bin Rashid, the emir of Dubai and prime minister of the UAE, is a poet who uses ellipsis to express himself. Yet, he posted a tweet which only had one meaning: criticism of his president.  "The official who does not strive for the success of the rest of the officials in the homeland is not trustworthy ..selfishness in success in public work ..is a betrayal of the trust .. because the homeland is indivisible," bin Rashid wrote. Algeria, another member of Opec, was unimpressed. In his monthly interview with the media, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune called the UAE’s withdrawal a "non event", adding that Saudi Arabia remained the main pillar of the cartel. He also said the rift between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi was permanent. A huge gamble This is a huge gamble for MbZ, considering how vulnerable his Emirate is, how small its armed forces are, how dependent its economy is on foreign mercenaries and migrant workers, and how fickle Trump an ally has shown himself to be. The only explanation for going after Riyadh after he has already been punched in the stomach by Tehran is that MBZ’s next move is to announce a military pact with Israel. 'Empowered': UAE's exit from Opec appeases Trump, delivers blow to Saudi Arabia Read More » No other regional power could secure the Emirate physically. It certainly can not do so itself. This military pact already exists in reality. The Financial Times reported that Israel flew in a laser system called Spectro to help the UAE detect incoming drones at a distance of 20km and another laser called Iron Beam which vaporises short-range rockers and drones, and which was first deployed against Hezbollah in Lebanon.  Israeli personnel were also flown in to operate the systems. A person briefed on this told the FT: "It’s not a small number of boots on the ground." Along with lasers, Israel sent its Iron Dome missile defence system to Abu Dhabi and Dubai. Increasing military cooperation between Israel and the UAE can also be seen in the number of tracked flights between the two countries. Flight-tracking websites show military transports have shuttled between the Israeli air base of Nevatim and the UAE throughout the conflict. But to declare a military pact between the UAE and Israel would gift Netanyahu, and any Israeli leader who follows him, with a military base and toe hold far beyond its borders, from which it can continue to attack Iran. Because whatever Trump decides, Israel will not give up on its ultimate goal of regime change in Iran. The Emiratis' increasingly overt involvement in Israel’s plans is a recipe for conflict that could in itself last decades and stifle post-war reconstruction on both sides of the Persian Gulf at birth. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Pakistan and Turkey, the key regional diplomatic, military and economic players, should not simply stand by and watch these plans unfold.  The large-population countries of the region now have a real and urgent common interest in containing Israel and its Emirati ally with a regional security pact.  The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.   War on Iran Opinion Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:29 Update Date Override 0