DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The wars of the wider Middle East that long surrounded the United Arab Emirates now have encroached into daily life in this U.S.-allied nation, threatening to draw America further into a region inflamed by tensions with Iran.
Yemen's Houthi rebels have launched missile and drone attacks since January targeting the Emirates, a federation of seven sheikhdoms home to oil-rich Abu Dhabi and the skyscrapers and beaches of Dubai. American forces at Al-Dhafra Air Base in Abu Dhabi, home to some 2,000 U.S. troops, twice have opened fire with their own Patriot missiles to help intercept the air assaults by the Iranian-backed Houthis.
The two incidents represent the first time since 2003 that the U.S. has fired the Patriot in combat — a nearly 20-year span. It also comes after the Biden administration's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and its declared end to the American combat mission in Iraq.
Though overshadowed by the Ukraine crisis, the U.S. now says it is committing more advanced fighter jets to the Emirates, as well as sending the USS Cole on a mission there. This spillover of Yemen's yearslong war into the UAE puts American troops in the crosshairs of the Houthi attacks — and raises the risk of a regional escalation at a crucial moment of talks in Vienna to potentially restore Iran's nuclear deal with world powers.
The Emirates since its founding in 1971 has been an otherwise safe corner…
