The United Arab Emirates says it backs the creation of a Palestinian state – but it is also one of the few Arab countries to have normalised relations with Israel. That dual role has become harder to maintain during the war in Gaza, and with the continuing expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, illegal under international law.
Abu Dhabi was the first Gulf capital to join the United States-brokered Abraham Accords in 2020, establishing diplomatic relations with Israel. Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan later followed suit.
At the time, Emirati officials said the deal would help bring peace and stability to the region. But critics saw things differently.
“The justifications presented by the Emirati regime for signing the Abraham Accords have proven to be blatant lies,” Muhammad Jamil, director of the Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK, told the Middle East Monitor.
He said Israel’s actions after 2020 – such as settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, illegal under international law – had undermined the UAE’s justifications for the accords, yet Emirati leaders still chose to deepen their relations with Israel.
Growing links with Israel
Despite the war in Gaza, trade and business links between Israel and the Emirates have grown. In 2024, bilateral trade rose 43 percent to reach €2.76 billion.
Nearly 600 Israeli companies have opened offices in the Emirates, and around 1 million Israeli tourists visited last year. The only flights to and from Israel not suspended during the Gaza war were those from the UAE.
“In this alliance with Israel, I believe there is both a desire to please the Americans... and also a kind of similarity between two countries that are ‘artificial’,” Middle East researcher Marc Lavergne, of the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), told RFI.
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Support for Palestinians
The Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October, 2023 – and Israel’s subsequent offensive in Gaza – put the UAE’s dual role under new pressure.
In response, Abu Dhabi launched its “Valorous Knights” humanitarian campaign. In November it opened a field hospital in Rafah, and it has since hosted thousands of Palestinians evacuated for medical treatment at the "Humanitarian City".
More recently, the UAE announced a project to bring desalinated water from Egypt into southern Gaza.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza has reached a critical and unprecedented level,” foreign minister Abdullah bin Zayed wrote on social media in July. “The UAE remains at the forefront of efforts to provide vital aid to the Palestinian people... whether by land, air or sea.”
When several Western governments suspended funding for UNRWA in January 2024, the UAE doubled its contribution to the UN agency.
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Palestinian statehood and US ties
The UAE has at times toughened its language in support of a future Palestinian state, while also sticking closely to Washington.
In February 2025 – less than a week after Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled a plan to relocate 2 million Palestinians and turn Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” – UAE ambassador Yousef al-Otaiba told the World Government Summit in Dubai that he saw “no alternative” to the US-backed proposals.
State news agency WAM later reported that Abu Dhabi opposed the forced displacement of Palestinians.
The Emirates have also hosted Mohammed Dahlan, a rival to Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas – a move seen as undermining Abbas’s position.
“The UAE may pay for this stance in terms of image and political clout,” said Lavergne.
In September 2024, then-US president, Joe Biden elevated the UAE to the status of “major defence partner "of the US.
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Domestic sensitivities
The war in Gaza and illegal Israeli settlement growth in the West Bank are highly sensitive issues for the Emirati leadership.
Demonstrations in support of Palestinians are banned, and at Cop28 in Dubai in November 2023 pro-Palestinian protests were tightly monitored.
“How can we maintain relations with Israel when there is no two-state solution? And how can we say that Hamas is a terrorist group without calling the settlers and everything they do terrorists?” a senior Emirati official told the Times of Israel.
Lavergne said Emirati leaders “have chosen the West, or at least globalisation”. But he added they are also “dancing on a volcano” as public opinion grows, especially in the poorer, more pro-Arab emirates.
