Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is under attack by Iranian drones and missiles. The airport (footage below), and civilian buildings have been targeted along with the US military installations across the UAE. The attacks have prompted a wide exodus of expats who have lived in Dubai for its generous tax concessions and on which Dubai has built is international brand.
What was once a glittering and supposedly safe tax-haven façade, is crumbling along with the crashing Iranian drones. But the war by Iran is not the only factor that is hampering Dubai’s most valued branding – it is also the Emirati regime itself which is damaging this brand as it has gone in a frenzy of censorship and arrests against its residents including foreign nationals who are publishing imagery and videos of the Iranian attacks in the UAE. Dozens of foreign nationals have been arrested including British citizens along with Filipino and Indian workers.
So much for the freedom that this desert prison was supposed to provide.
The UAE tried to diversify away from its energy economy by building cities for the rich and wealthy, but this economic model is collapsing in real-time during an active regional war which only involved the UAE indirectly. The property market in Dubai is currently crashing with contractors begging to do projects at a loss just to receive the liquidity and stay afloat. Gold can no longer be moved in large volumes in the UAE due to the shipping issues in the Strait of Hormuz and some banks are also restricting large withdrawals. Bitcoin is getting a bid with expats in the UAE trying to to get their money out of their country via bitcoin.
The war will eventually end and Dubai will regain normality, however its tax-haven model, which has attracted criminals across the world, has been exposed as fickle as the drones crashing to the ground.
Newsroom
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