In UAE, life goes on amid Iran's attacks but the future is uncertain

A weird sense of normality in Dubai and Abu Dhabi these days sits awkwardly with the news coverage of burning buildings and reports of strikes on airports.

"It's incredible how humans adapt," says Mina Al-Oraibi, editor-in-chief of The National.

"There is still, of course, an unease. When you hear the alert, when you hear the thuds of interception and so forth, incredible unease. Nobody can take it away."

But for the locals, expatriates and diplomats who live here, there has had to be a rapid adjustment to a new normal.

The war between the US and Israel against Iran began during the Holy Muslim month of Ramadan when there is fasting during the day, but family and friends come together in the evening to break the fast with the iftar meal.

In the first few days of the war, amid the shock to Emiratis of finding themselves under attack — when the United Arab Emirates had been urging the US and Israel not to attack Iran — people stayed at home.

Some rushed to get cash or stock up on food. But then the adjustment was quick.

"You know, food isn't affected," Ms Al-Oraibi says. "The internet isn't affected. General day-to-day life isn't affected.

"So then a feeling of resilience started to set in. People are like: 'We will not be cower. We didn't want this fight.'

"We actually were aiming for peace, and we will not be cowed into not at least having our Friday prayers.

"The mosques are full in the evening. For Friday prayers the mosques are full. People haven't stepped back from that."

But not everything is the same, of course.

The UAE's leaders — and ordinary citizens — have been profoundly shocked to find themselves under attack.

The Ramadan cannon which has traditionally been fired in Dubai to mark the end of daily fasting has been put on pause for now. As have regular fireworks displays.

Drive around town and you often find your GPS has been scrambled or frozen, a phenomenon put down to either security blocks or malign foreign actors.

The timing of school holidays was changed. Most people in the public and private sector have been instructed to work from home.

The UAE sits precariously on the small promontory of land that ends at the Strait of Hormuz — a stretch of water which is always contentious but particularly so at the moment with Iran blocking vessels from travelling through it, including those carrying around 20 per cent of the global oil supply.

The Emirates have faced the biggest bombardment by Iranian drones and missiles of any country in the Gulf, including Israel.

A well-financed and well-armed defence force has meant more than 90 per cent of the incoming Iranian armaments have been intercepted. Most of the small number of deaths have been caused by debris from interceptions, rather than actual strikes.

There have been some conspicuous incidents reported: at Dubai Airport — on the first night of the war and then a few days later as flights resumed; at the Fairmont Hotel on the famous man-made island Palm Jumeirah; and perhaps causing the most shock, in the heart of the international financial district.

On Monday, local time, a drone again hit infrastructure at the airport, forcing several flights to be cancelled.

Gulf nations, and Israel, have warned people they need to be careful about the information they post and publish about the war. Sharing videos of missile and drone strikes can lead to arrest in some countries, including the UAE, depending on what the target is.

Giving away the location of a military site, for example, is completely off limits, even if a plume of black smoke is obvious.

'You stay away from windows … but everyone's marching on'

For Australian ex-pat businessman Brett Evans, "it feels like COVID, is the best way to describe it".

"We sort of kick into gear, there's protocols in place. When the alarms go off, you seek shelter, you stay away from windows. But everyone's marching on. There's this innate human ability to normalise things," he says.

"We're all working from home at the moment, and to me COVID helped us with that, to a certain degree, in terms of digitising a lot of things, and systemising a lot of things that enable us to do that.

"So, we just put into place our business's country plan and all staff work from home as a precaution. And we get on with the job.

"We still go to the parks and still walk the dogs and go to the store, go get groceries. So that hasn't changed. You're just doing things with more awareness and sort of consideration."

Australia's ambassador to the UAE, Ridwaan Jadwat, has found himself living an increasingly solitarily life in Abu Dhabi, where the intensity of rocket and drone attacks, and air defences, seems much closer at hand than it does in Dubai.

His family went back to Australia when the edict went out for all embassy staff families to leave. And in the last week, the embassy has emptied out even further with all essential staff directed to go as the security situation has deteriorated, leading several airlines to suspend services to the Gulf for the foreseeable future.

In the immediate aftermath of the war starting, thousands of travellers who were transiting through Dubai and Abu Dhabi suddenly found themselves grounded. Their airlines took responsibility for finding them accommodation and food.

And for eventually getting them home. Safe air corridors were negotiated within a few days to let a restricted number of flights per hour leave.

The job for Australia's diplomats was primarily to get people out of places where there were no flights and, in places where there were flights like Dubai, to press the airlines for as many flights home to Australia as possible as the most efficient way to move the largest number of people.

On February 28, he says, "there was something like 30,000 people at Dubai Airport, and about 7,000 people in Abu Dhabi Airport that had to be put into hotels and accommodation, and the airlines and the UAE government made sure that people were taken care of".

The backlog has gradually eased. But providing advice and assistance where needed to the stranded travellers, and to the 24,000 Australian expats who live in the UAE, was happening in a very different world.

"It's been a surreal experience for us, because we were used to living in what has been frequently described as the safest city in the world," ambassador Jadwat says.

"And then all of a sudden, within the space of a few days, we're living with constant missile and drone activity and sheltering in place.

"So, throughout the day, we hear the piercing sounds of the emergency security alerts, and we have to either go down to a basement, or a garage, and try and seek shelter.

"We're going to have a skeleton crew here. But we remain focused and very much dedicated to our job at hand".

The COVID experience has even framed people's optimism and expectations that, for example, the tourism which is such a huge feature of Dubai and the Emirates generally will bounce back.

"Almost everybody says, 'we'll see tourism bounce back because of what we saw in COVID' when everything ground into a complete halt, then started again," Mina Al-Oraibi says.

Even now, "most of the museums are reporting between 1,300 and 2,000 visitors a day, because people are off school, and there are some visitors who have not left and will go and visit".

In the medium term, she says, "of course, everyone is looking at what this means for the energy sector: what it will mean long term, how long production needs to be cut".

"In the immediate term, people don't feel a difference, but there is, again, that sense of uncertainty.

"Capital doesn't like high risk and doesn't like long-term uncertainty. I've asked officials about this point. We've spoken to business leaders about this point, and the answer continues to be, 'it's too soon to tell'.

"People are asking questions about property prices, about tourism, about airlines. But so far, it's still quite early days to be able to assess those."

Financial and aviation analysts are a bit more gloomy.

War expected to cost Gulf nations billions

The ratings agency S&P Global Ratings released an assessment 10 days after the start of war saying the UAE's economy is expected to remain resilient despite escalating geopolitical tensions in the Middle East.

"Our base-case scenario remains that the UAE's substantial fiscal, economic and external buffers will act as an effective shield against the impact of regional conflict," the analysts said.

But it has still lowered its near-term growth forecasts, dropping its outlook for the UAE's real GDP growth to an average 2.5 per cent in 2026–27, down from its earlier projection of 4.2 per cent.

The ratings agency puts that down to weaker tourism demand, potential expatriate outflows and declining real estate activity if the conflict persists.

The UAE has an advantage over some of its Gulf neighbours: a port on the Indian Ocean side of the Strait of Hormuz — Fujairah — though this has come under attack in recent days.

The bigger question may hang over the Gulf's central role as an air transport hub and what happens to the big airlines based here: Emirates, Etihad and Qatar.

"We've got some major hubs out there for airlines, and they have built themselves into an indispensable force for connecting passengers," Mike Malik, the chief industry officer at aviation data firm Cirium told the New York Times.

"But when something like this happens, those hubs get shut down and you basically break the system."

Cirium says that more than 52,000 flights to and from the Middle East — more than half of all flights planned in the region — have been cancelled since the war began on February 28, affecting an estimated 6 million passengers.

Estimates of lost tourism spending, also quoted by The New York Times from analysis by the firm Tourism Economics, range from $US34 billion ($48.2 billion) to $US56 billion this year, depending on how long the war lasts and how much it scares off travellers.

Mr Evans, who runs a wealth management business, says that when he talks to clients "the overall message that is coming up from everyone is that everyone feels there's obviously a level of concern".

"I mean we've got, you know, artillery and munitions flying above their heads. But people in general aren't fearful."

Evans has been reassured by the fact that he feels the UAE government has been open about the number of drones and missiles that have been coming in, and how the country is dealing with the situation, and therefore feels confident the country will weather the storm.

Like most other expatriates, he is not planning to leave.

"Not at all, not at all," he says.

"To me, the government's been very forthright in terms of keeping us informed. Information flows through, and we're able to get direction from the government. And as long as we are able to make informed decisions, then I can't see any reason to leave."

Reflecting the general optimism people living in the UAE seem to feel that things will bounce back quickly, ambassador Jadwat observes that the UAE has "been such a remarkable success story and once this is finished, I think I have great confidence and optimism that they will get back on track".

"They are very optimistic people. They're very focused on the future and I've never been in a country before and in all my five postings where I've seen vision match by implementation.

"They're very, very good at implementing their strategic vision: their economic vision, but also social cohesion and coexistence, which is a key part of that plan."

Laura Tingle is the ABC's global affairs editor