Anxiety for Middle East after Iran-Israel attacks and Trump ceasefire
A view of missiles over Doha, Qatar after Iran has launched an operation targeting a U.S. base in Qatar on June 23, 2025.
Stringer | Anadolu | Getty Images
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Escalating regional war, or a bunch of choreographed theatre?
Millions across the Middle East were told to shelter in place Monday night as the airspace closed above them and Iran fired a barrage of missiles over Al-Udeid air base in Qatar, the U.S.’ largest and most fortified military base in the region. Videos of interceptors lighting up the night sky over Doha went viral on social media, while flight tracking platforms showed passenger jets on their way to Dubai and Abu Dhabi abruptly reversing course.
The Iranian strike, which U.S. President Donald Trump later described as “weak” and which the White House says was telegraphed before it was carried out in order to minimize casualties, came in response to unprecedented U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities last week, which were carried out with the largest non-nuclear bombs on earth.
Trump has declared a cease-fire and called for peace. It remains to be seen whether Israel and Iran will both accept and stick to a ceasefire, and still more questions remain: what happened to Iran’s enriched uranium supplies? How much damage was done in all the strikes? Does it end here? Will Iran’s government survive? Will airspace reopen and flights resume all over the region?
People around the region expressed their feelings, fears and hopes in conversations with CNBC. Several of those individuals chose to do so on the condition of anonymity, due to the sensitive nature of their comments, and over concerns of repercussions from the state or from their employers.
‘Just seemed like a big show’
“In my opinion, this war had one winner — and that was the United States. Because it also showed Israel that without the United States, it cannot win — or even end —a war. And the second loser was the Islamic Republic, which realized it had no military capability to counter U.S. airstrikes, and that the U.S. could access every part of Iran whenever it wished. And the biggest losers were the people of Iran, whose national wealth was spent on nuclear enrichment — only for it all to be destroyed in a matter of nights.” — H., oil and gas business director in Tehran, Iran
“I’m so ‘ehhh’ about this. It just seemed like a big show. I guess everyone was waiting on how Iran will respond. This is probably the best case scenario to calm things down. I hope the focus goes back to Gaza now. Many people are still getting killed there everyday.” — Saed Elayan, Palestinian entrepreneur living in Dubai
“People are laughing at the very limited scope of Iran’s operation against Al-Udeid. Yet Tehran actually managed to deliver a potent geostrategic message to the Gulf states: Instead of being a wellspring of protection, hosting American forces on their soil could — and indeed would — only invite devastating attacks.” — Mo, Egyptian-American living in Cairo
“We’re completely fed up. We’re angry, frustrated, sad, and scared. We feel helpless and we feel a massive amount of injustice. We’re tired of being attacked and destabilized by the U.S. and Israel under the guise of ‘freeing us from tyranny’. It’s laughable and we all see through it — we just want to live in peace and not watch our cousins get slaughtered for simply wanting to exist.” — Kareem, Egyptian entrepreneur living in Dubai
“Honestly I am not all that bothered about Iran. They caused more deaths in Iraq in the last 70 years than Israel did in Palestine. And if they decide to bomb each other, who am I to object. My only hope is that they keep it to themselves without dragging the rest of the region into it.” — A., Iraqi expat living in Dubai
Emergency workers check the damage caused to a building from an Iranian missile strike in Beersheba in southern Israel on June 24, 2025.
John Wessels | Afp | Getty Images
“Just like all the other little interactions between Iran and Israel this has been very, very short lived, and they basically just kind of had a little skirmish and then called it a day. I knew this was going to be nothing different. And the real telltale sign was the fact that … the Islamic Republic has never officially entered a state of war. Because a war inherently needs a winner and a loser. But this wasn’t a war. This was just kind of like a little, I don’t know, slap fight, little like a b—- slap fight every now and then, and either way, both parties could walk away and save face and say both of them won, and they technically did, because there was no war, so there is technically no loser.” — Amir, video editor, Isfahan, Iran
“As a Lebanese with a business in Saudi and UAE I want this to be over as soon as possible. We stand…
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