ABU DHABI—Battered by Iranian strikes and the disruption of the Strait of Hormuz, the United Arab Emirates and some fellow Persian Gulf states have come to view Iran’s theocracy as an existential enemy. They now want the regime they once courted to be neutered, if not dismantled, when the conflict ends—so the ordeal is never repeated.
The U.A.E. has borne the brunt of Iranian attacks: more than 2,000 drones and missiles have been fired at the country since the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Feb. 28.
Over 80% of those were aimed at civilian infrastructure, including oil facilities, refineries, airports, ports, hotels and data centers, according to the U.A.E. government, killing six civilians and injuring 157 others. All six states in the Gulf Cooperation Council have, so far, refrained from striking back openly, limiting themselves to self-defense.
“This is not a military exchange. This is an attack on a peaceful nation, a nation that has been working diligently and very hard for diplomacy,” Sultan al-Jaber, the U.A.E. Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, said in an interview.
“Any long-term political settlement must address the full spectrum of threats, including Iran’s nuclear program, ballistic missile capabilities, and their network of regional proxies,” added Jaber, who also serves as CEO of the country’s ADNOC oil giant.
In talks with the U.S. before the war began, Iran discussed its nuclear program but ruled out any negotiations about curbs on its missile arsenal, or on the activities of the paramilitary organizations that it sponsors across the Middle East, including the Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon and several militias in Iraq.
Iranian leaders have said in recent days that they would only accept a cease-fire with Israel and the U.S. if Tehran receives reparations and ironclad guarantees against future attacks on the regime. Iranian officials have also insisted they only target U.S. bases and interests in the region, a claim that has infuriated Gulf nations.
“Let me make it very clear. Since the Iranian attacks have started on Qatar, the threats and attacks on civilian targets have not stopped,” said Majed al Ansari, an adviser to Qatar’s prime minister. Iranian attacks caused civilian casualties in all six Gulf states, a toll that would have been much steeper if they hadn’t possessed sophisticated U.S.-made air defenses.
Given the indiscriminate nature of these Iranian barrages, and the willingness shown by Tehran to rain death and destruction on its neighbors, another senior Gulf official said, the only acceptable outcome of the war would be an Iran so defanged and enfeebled that it could never imperil its neighbors again.
For now, despite the massive U.S. and Israeli bombing that destroyed much of Iran’s air force and navy, and killed on Monday the top surviving security leader, Ali Larijani, the Iranian regime continues inflicting pain on its neighbors. This week, it caused flight disruptions in Dubai after setting ablaze the fuel depot of the city’s main international airport, once among the world’s busiest—a blow to the U.A.E.’s carefully nurtured image as a safe and glamorous global tourist destination.
Iran’s decision to disrupt the Strait of Hormuz, through which 35% of global crude oil and 20% of global liquefied natural gas used to pass, represents an attack on the entire world rather than just the Gulf states, and will hit low-income nations especially hard, the U.A.E.’s Jaber added.
“By taking Hormuz hostage, Iran is committing global economic warfare,” he said. “This is a global economic issue. It is not a regional problem. The disruption is going to increase inflation, it will slow economies, it will affect everyday lives. Families will end up paying more for food.”
Leaving Iran in control of the Strait of Hormuz once the guns fall silent would be a disaster for the Gulf states, said Muhanad Seloom, a professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies in Qatar.
“The Iranian regime has crossed every red line,” he said. “Now it is in everyone’s interest, and this includes the Gulf countries, to have the U.S. finish the job. Imagine if the war stops now, and Iran declares victory saying that the U.S. has been defeated? Iran would hold the whole region hostage, and every time Iran would be under pressure, it would hit the Gulf countries—because that taboo has been broken, and hitting them worked.”
How to reopen the Strait of Hormuz is an especially vexed question. A United Nations Security Council resolution, passed with Russia’s and China’s abstentions last week, described Iranian obstruction of the waterway as a “serious threat to international peace and security.” But, in the age of drones and portable antiship missiles, reopening the Strait to international traffic by force would be extremely difficult in the immediate future—even for the U.S. Navy, military analysts say.
Some officials in the Gulf think the only way the Iranian regime could be compelled to reopen Hormuz would be if the U.S. seizes, or appears ready to seize, the Iranian island of Kharg in the Gulf, through which more than 90% of Iran’s own oil exports flow. President Trump has already ordered a Marine Expeditionary Unit, a force that could be used for such an operation, to sail to the Middle East from Asia. It is currently more than a week away.
While Iran’s oil-export infrastructure at Kharg and elsewhere has been largely untouched so far, even after recent U.S. strikes on the island, Iranian drones set ablaze oil refineries, export terminals, ports, LNG facilities and oil fields in the six Gulf monarchies. Abu Dhabi-based ADNOC, one of the world’s largest oil companies, has had to shut down some offshore operations because of the war. Iran has also repeatedly struck the port of Fujairah on the Arabian Sea, which the U.A.E. is using to export oil bypassing the Hormuz.
“Our operations have been impacted and we will continue to do everything possible to mitigate the situation as we assess, location by location, product by product and shipment by shipment. We will continue to act as a responsible, reliable energy supplier to the world,” Jaber said.
Once the conflict concludes, “we will be in a position to quickly turn around and ramp up our production to go back and reach our capacities,” he added. “The brutal Iranian aggression will not break us.”
Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at yaroslav.trofimov@wsj.com