The United Arab Emirates (UAE) said on the 20th (local time) that it dismantled a "terror network" supported by Iran and Hezbollah and arrested its members.
According to the UAE state news agency Emirates News Agency (WAM), the network was reportedly involved in "money laundering, terror financing, and threats to national security." Photos released on social media (SNS) indicate that at least five members were arrested.
Citing the UAE State Security Department, WAM said, "The network had been operating under the guise of conducting commercial activities within the UAE and sought to carry out the plots of external forces infiltrating the national economy and threatening the country's financial stability."
After Israel and the United States struck Iran on the 28th of last month and war broke out in the Middle East, Iran launched large-scale missile and drone attacks across the Persian Gulf. In the process, the UAE was also reportedly a primary target.
With Hezbollah joining the war by launching attacks toward Israel from its Lebanon base on the 2nd of this month, the UAE, which has long taken a hard line against political Islamist groups, is seen as having further ratcheted up its response.