Iran struck Dubai's famous Fairmont hotel, setting the hotel on fire, as war launched by the United States and Israel on Iran quickly spread to the rest of the Middle East on Saturday.
Residents were shocked to see an Iranian missile hit the five-star hotel in Dubai's luxury Palm Jumeirah area. Videos posted on social media showed fires breaking out near the hotel entrance, leaving four people injured.
Later, Dubai authorities said debris from an intercepted drone caused a fire at the city's famous luxury hotel, the Burj Al Arab, and at Dubai International Airport. Abu Dhabi Airports said in an article on X that an incident at Zayed International Airport in the UAE capital left one person dead and seven injured. He then deleted the post.
“Civil Defense teams responded immediately and brought the incident under control. No injuries were reported,” Dubai Media Office wrote on its X account.
The media office also said part of Dubai International Airport “sustained minor damage during an incident”, without giving further details.
A Dubai resident said “everyone is very scared” as the situation continues to deteriorate.
“There are images of missile interceptions all over the city,” they said. “I'm packing a suitcase just in case…not that we can leave, because the airspace is closed. That's the thing we were all afraid of, and now it is.”
Elsewhere in the Gulf, once considered an oasis of stability in the Middle East, similar scenes have played out.
Hours after the first American and Israeli bombs were launched, Iran responded with a large-scale attack targeting more than six countries, hitting places hitherto untouched by the escalating crisis.
In BahrainAn Iranian drone slammed into a high-rise building in what appeared to be a targeted attack, exploding and engulfing the skyscraper in flames. Previously, the country's national security agency was also hit by an Iranian missile.
Images posted on social media also appear to show a missile hitting the huge US naval base in Bahrain. In Kuwait, a drone crashed at the country's main airport, injuring several employees and damaging facilities.
As Iran responded to US and Israeli strikes by bombing the Gulf and Israel, its proxies joined the fray. Bases belonging to the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq were struck by the United States or Israel, killing at least two members of the Iraqi Kataib armed group. Hezbollah.
Iran-backed groups responded by coming to its aid, along with Kataib Hezbollah and Yemen. Houthis both warning that they would join strikes against US military bases in the region.
Just hours after the start of what Washington called Operation Epic Fury, the fighting had already expanded far beyond the geographic scope of the previous war in 1947. Iran in June 2025, which was almost entirely confined to Israel and Iran.
For citizens of the Middle East, the escalation of the war has caused anxiety and concern.
In Lebanongas stations across the country had lines 10 cars deep within an hour of the strikes. Residents at Beirut airport saw commercial flights canceled and grocery stores stocked with essentials, the memory of the 2024 war with Israel still fresh in their minds.
All eyes were on Hezbollah, the Iran-backed group that had previously declared the assassination of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei a red line.
A statement from the group Saturday afternoon did not mention whether it would help its main patron, Iran, but instead condemned what it described as a violation of the U.N. charter by the United States and Israel.
Many Lebanese feared Hezbollah's entry into the ongoing conflict, fearing it would trigger a response from Israel, which has signaled through diplomatic channels that it would launch a full-scale attack on Lebanon if Hezbollah were involved.
Explosions rocked the rest of the Middle East as Israel intercepted Iranian ballistic missiles over other countries. In Jordan, fires broke out in the northern city of Irbid as missile shards fell from the sky and caught fire.
The attacks were condemned by Arab states in the region for what they called Iran's violation of their sovereignty. Qatar called Iranian strikes on its territory a “direct attack on national security,” while it and other Gulf states warned they had the right to respond.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in an interview with NBC that he had told the Gulf states: “we do not intend to attack them but we are in fact attacking American bases in an act of self-defense.”
Attacking Gulf states was a line Iran did not cross in previous conflicts, with rare attacks on oil infrastructure remaining unclaimed.
Gulf states had already tried to stop the Trump administration from attacking Iran, fearing blowback and unintended consequences destabilizing the country of 93 million people.
Imposing material costs on the Gulf states, stable kingdoms unaccustomed to wars in their backyards, could be intended to get the monarchies to pressure Trump to end the bombing campaign.
Some ruling families, such as Qatar's al-Thani family and Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, have close relationships with Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law, who plays an important role in shaping the president's Middle East policy.
Conversely, some analysts have warned that targeting Gulf kingdoms could backfire, alienating voices that previously pressured the United States to reconsider its military campaign against Iran.
