US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (C) walks with United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan as they meet at ADNEC Centre Abu Dhabi in Abu Dhabi, on February 19, 2025. (Photo by Evelyn Hockstein / POOL / AFP)
The United Arab Emirates leader told the United States’ secretary of state on Wednesday that his country rejects a proposal to displace Palestinians from their land, the Emirati state news agency WAM reported.
President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s comments came after US President Donald Trump proposed a US takeover of Gaza and resettling its Palestinian inhabitants in Jordan and Egypt, prompting widespread opposition among Arab countries and Western allies.
Nahyan told US Secretary of State Marco Rubio during a meeting in Abu Dhabi that it was important to link the reconstruction of Gaza to a path leading to “a comprehensive and lasting peace based on the two-state solution” to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
The UAE’s stance on the conflict is important because it is one of four Arab countries that normalised ties with Israel during the first Trump administration and because it has played a role financing reconstruction work after previous conflicts.
Arab diplomacy on Gaza is aimed at developing an alternative to Trump’s plan for the territory, most of which lies in ruins after Israel’s 15-month military campaign in the devastated Palestinian territory, with nearly all the 2.3 million inhabitants now homeless.
The leaders of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE and Qatar are expected to discuss the plan in Riyadh this month before it can be presented to an Arab League summit in Cairo in March.
Rubio offered his thanks in the meeting to the UAE “for the strength and enduring nature of the relationship, one marked by strong economic ties, defense cooperation and mutual interests in regional stability,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement.
The meeting also included discussions on artificial intelligence, Syria, Lebanon and the Red Sea, which had been the site of attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels until the Gaza ceasefire, Bruce added.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with Sheikh Mohammed on Monday .
Both the UAE and Saudi Arabia have been discussed as possible sites for peace talks to end the war in Ukraine, which marks its third anniversary on Monday.
Saudi Arabia also has been mentioned as the possible venue for a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, providing a potential diplomatic boon to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman , the kingdom’s de facto ruler.
The leaders met Rubio at an Abu Dhabi convention center that’s hosting the biennial International Defense Exhibition and Conference this week, where both Ukraine and Russia have displayed weapons — even as Moscow faces Western sanctions over the war.
Russian money continues to flood into Dubai’s booming real estate market . Daily flights between the Emirates and Moscow provide a lifeline for both those fleeing conscription and the Russian elite.
Ukrainians as well have fled to the Emirates, an autocratically ruled federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula.
Rubio also visited Abu Dhabi’s Abrahamic Family House , which houses a Catholic church, a Jewish synagogue and an Islamic mosque.
