Soon I’ll be transferring in Abu Dhabi because of a long-haul flight – on paper, that’s all there is to it. Yet whenever I mention it, almost everyone asks the same (seemingly unusual) question: Am I afraid? A few years ago, this sentence didn’t exist in connection with the Emirates: Dubai and Abu Dhabi were, in our minds, the embodiment of sterile luxury and “everything works.” Now, the perception and the sense of proximity to conflict have shifted in a single turn. At the same time, as absurd as it may sound, the war in Ukraine is increasingly pushed into the background noise of everyday life in Central Europe, becoming almost insignificant to our sense of security.
Distances have shortened in our minds
Recently, while riding the tram in Budapest, I overheard the girls' complaining voices. High school students, 14-15 years old, were sobbing as they discussed that “there’s no way back, World War III is here.” At first, I thought the Ukraine- and Zelensky-themed posters placed during the final stretch of the election campaign had taken their toll – but I was quickly proven wrong. The girls’ strong emotions were triggered by the rockets that had fallen in Dubai.
On the map, the United Arab Emirates is far away, yet we feel it is close. Not only because of the news cycle, but also because, in our globalized lives, the Middle East is not “a region” but a hub: according to the WTTC (World Travel & Tourism Council), the region accounts for 5% of global international arrivals and 14% of international transit traffic. In other words, many people are not vacationing there – they are simply transferring in Dubai, Doha, or Abu Dhabi between Europe, Asia, and Africa. And what is close in network terms is also close psychologically: we tend to “short-circuit” risk even when the real danger is geographically farther away – as American psychology professor Paul Slovic argues.
“The safest place in the world” as a brand – and what happened to it almost overnight
The basic premise of Gulf tourism has been that here, you are buying stability. According to TIME, Gulf countries – including the United Arab Emirates – have consciously built a “carefully curated” image of themselves as havens of stability and prosperity in an often turbulent Middle East. This image was not sold only through buildings and event calendars, but also through influencers: Visit Dubai has been running organized influencer programs for years, explicitly designed to shape public “perception.”
Moreover, “safety” has become a measurable brand name. Gulf News, for example, citing the Numbeo Safety Index, described the UAE in 2025 as the world's safest country. From this perspective, it is understandable why it was shocking when, in the first days of the war, social media was flooded with footage of airports, hotels, and flames. According to TIME, these viral images made visible a fragility that had previously been hidden.
When airspace closes, tourism does not “slow down” – it stops
Tourism is an industry, but it lives in the air: if there is no route, there is no product. According to WTTC estimates, the escalation of the Iranian war is already wiping out at least $600 million per day in international tourist spending in the Middle East due to airspace chaos, loss of trust, and the disruption of regional connectivity. The same statement highlights that the Dubai-Abu Dhabi-Doha-Bahrain axis normally handles around 526,000 passengers daily.
From this perspective, Dubai is not “a city,” but infrastructure: according to Dubai Airports, DXB (Dubai International Airport) handled 95.2 million passengers in 2025, reaching a historic peak and record annual international traffic. After the outbreak of the war, Condé Nast Traveller reported mass cancellations, rerouted journeys, longer travel times, and technical fuel stops – while flights are only gradually resuming.
The collapse of bookings: trust costs more than kerosene
In tourism, statistics are essentially a measure of sentiment. Euronews, citing the Tourism Economics (Oxford Economics) model, writes that in 2026, the number of international visitors to the Middle East could fall by 11-27%; this would mean 23-38 million fewer travelers and a loss of $34-56 billion in spending, with the loss of trust potentially lingering even after the conflict.
This aligns with UN Tourism’s rapid assessment, which, under a multi-country airspace closure scenario, projects a 20-23% decline in regional arrivals in 2026 and roughly $35 billion in losses.
Free Malaysia Today, citing Reuters, reminds us that Middle Eastern tourism represents roughly $367 billion annually for the region, yet now risks precisely the “safe, high-end” image that has been built through billions of dollars in investment from Abu Dhabi to Dubai.
You shoot a video – and it’s not just the rocket that gets into the frame
In the battle of perception, the most ironic twist is that the protection of “safety” has now often become a matter of law enforcement. According to Sky News, a British human rights organization is aware of up to 70 British nationals being detained in the UAE after taking photos or videos of Iranian attacks. The Evening Standard, citing data from Detained in Dubai, reported that at least 21 people have been charged and could face up to two years in prison and a £40,000 fine simply for sharing, commenting on, or recording footage. CBS News also highlighted that tourists and influencers have been targeted, and that the distribution of images showing arrests or impacts has been explicitly banned.
Meanwhile, TikTok has been working in the opposite direction. The online presence of the Emirates’ tourism agency on the controversial platform has always been significant. Self-proclaimed, muscular, almost exclusively male “nomad entrepreneur” lifestyle advisors have been repeating the same sentence for years: “the United Arab Emirates is the safest country in the world.” (The question naturally arises: for whom? Because if we are Bangladeshi guest workers or members of the LGBTQ community, we might not have the same experience – but as Michael Ende would say: “but that is another story and shall be told another time.”) According to LadBible, after the first wave of the war, videos praising the Emirates began to spread, repeating messages like “I’m not afraid because the leadership will protect me” – while in the same environment, strict sanctions were also emphasized: up to two years in prison and significant fines for “misinformation.” The effect is paradoxical: the more they try to control the image, the more visible it becomes that the narrative of safety has been shaken.
Qatar Airways: flight rescues to Egypt, storage airports, temporary routes
According to Qatar Airways’ official statement, due to the closure of Doha’s airspace, some flights to and from Doha have been temporarily suspended, with full restoration promised only after the airspace reopens safely.
Meanwhile, the “rescue operation” is often about planes rather than passengers. According to Flightradar24, Qatar Airways has begun moving wide-body aircraft en masse to storage airports: 22 Qatar aircraft have appeared at Teruel Airport (Spain) for long-term parking, and the list includes ferry flights originating from Cairo. Al-Ahram (citing AFP) reported as early as March that, amid the paralysis of the Dubai, Doha, and Abu Dhabi hubs, Cairo was receiving diverted flights as a “safe haven.” In such cases, Egypt is not a destination, but a forced backyard.
What comes next: rebound or lasting damage?
Tourism is surprisingly resilient: according to the WTTC, after security-related shocks – with proper crisis management – recovery can begin within as little as two months. The real question is how the Gulf states will rebuild the trust on which their entire model is based.
As for me, I return to my own layover story: Abu Dhabi used to be logistics, not geopolitics. Now it is suddenly both. The duty-free shops may be bustling again in a few months, but the question will remain: “Aren’t you afraid?” And sometimes that question signals the crisis of tourism more precisely than any graph ever could.