Israeli PM Netanyahu Makes Unannounced UAE Visit, Meets Sheikh Mohamed
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ABU DHABI (Terror Monitor) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made an unannounced one-day visit to the United Arab Emirates on Sunday and met with UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, according to a senior Israeli official cited by Reuters.
Israeli television channels 12 and KAN, along with Haaretz and The Jerusalem Post, also reported that Netanyahu travelled to Abu Dhabi for the meeting. Israeli media reported that he travelled aboard a private aircraft and returned to Israel after spending several hours in the UAE.
Neither Netanyahu’s office nor the UAE Foreign Ministry initially issued a public statement confirming the meeting. However, Israeli media later reported additional details about the visit, including the presence of senior Israeli security officials in Netanyahu’s delegation.
The visit comes amid renewed attention to a report published by Haaretz earlier this month, which said Sheikh Mohamed had warned Netanyahu roughly a week and a half before Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack that the group was preparing a major operation against Israel.
According to the Haaretz report, the warning was not passed on to Israeli intelligence agencies or the military. Netanyahu has denied the report and threatened legal action against the newspaper. The UAE has not directly commented on the reported warning, but has said that the UAE and Israel have maintained “open and direct lines of communication” since establishing diplomatic relations in 2020.
Israeli media have subsequently reported that Netanyahu asked Sheikh Mohamed during Sunday’s meeting to deny the Haaretz report about the alleged warning before the October 7 attack. These details have been attributed to Israeli media reports and have not been publicly confirmed by the UAE.
Israel and the UAE formally established diplomatic relations in 2020 under the US-brokered Abraham Accords. The latest meeting comes amid heightened regional tensions and renewed security concerns across the Middle East.
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