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The UAE Is Cracking Down on Illicit Iranian Finance
(National Interest) Hussain Abdul-Hussain - After Iran unleashed more than 3,000 missiles and drones against the United Arab Emirates (UAE) over five weeks of the Iran war, in response, the UAE doubled its efforts against illicit Iranian money networks. By early April, Emirati authorities had detained dozens of Tehran-linked money changers, shuttered their exchange houses, and closed their offices. They especially targeted the Sarraf networks that once funneled billions to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The Emirati crackdown was a strategic pivot that now offers the U.S. a decisive new advantage in its maximum-pressure campaign against Iran's shadow banking system. Analysts estimate that a sustained crackdown could deprive Iran of tens of billions of dollars annually. The UAE's shift signals to other Gulf states that tolerance for Iranian financial networks is a national-security liability rather than a commercial convenience. As Anwar Gargash, the diplomatic advisor to the UAE's president, made clear, the region cannot return to the pre-war status quo of unchecked missile and drone programs financed by shadow banking. The writer, former managing editor of Beirut's Daily Star, is a research fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.