The assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh inside his room at the Al-Bustan Rotana Hotel in Dubai was supposed to look like an asphyxiation accident or a suicide. Then the door to the room would have been closed, with a “do not disturb” sign hanging, and the matter would have ended. But Dubai's government and security apparatus have proved that crimes and murders in this city are not allowed to go by unnoticed in such a way. Indeed, after less than a month since the crime was committed, the Dubai Police have been able to release to the whole world a complete recording, one that reminds of James Bond films, showing the sequence in which the operation was carried out, since the arrival of the group assigned to carry it out to the lobby of the hotel with the target they had come to Dubai to eliminate standing by their side, and until they went up to the second floor where Mabhouh had reserved his room. The only thing we do not see in the recording is the moment when Mabhouh was assassinated in his bed. The Dubai government has proved, through the exceptional security mobilization it showed after the assassination of the Hamas figure, that it knows that it cannot preserve its international reputation just by building tall towers and opening the door to broad international investments. Rather, this should develop alongside complete security vigilance that does not fear anyone or anything. And if the experience of Beirut in the 1970s can teach us anything, it is that consensual security – or overlooking security breaches with the hope of avoiding their being repeated in the future – does not guarantee security nor protect a country. Like the experience of Beirut, the experience of Dubai's success once again raises questions over the extent which these successful “islands” can reach, in a region raging with conflicts from every side, in which most countries witness failure piling up over failure. And can an economy, which in the first place requires for its success openness and facilitating the movement of transport from it and to it, fortify itself against attempts to take advantage of these prerequisites and to make use of them to serve other political and security aims that have nothing to do with the economic function this country aspires to. Before the assassination of Mabhouh, the murder of artist Suzanne Tamim had also been committed in Dubai. In the case of that murder as well, the relations of those accused of committing it could have driven the Dubai government not to get “implicated” in an investigation and not to collect the various evidence that would prove the charge. Yet the officials of the Dubai emirate chose to place the concern of security above that of political conciliation, in spite of all the attempts to convince them that took place back then. Also in the case of Mabhouh's assassination, the Dubai government could have saved itself the burden of opening such a security case abounding with obstacles. Indeed, Mabhouh had not informed security services in the emirate of his arrival in the first place, not to mention that he had entered the country under a different identity, as part of the security precautions he had taken. Dubai could also have avoided the embarrassment caused by revealing that the Mossad agency had forged European passports for those who carried out the assassination, whether in Israel or in the capitals of these countries, which found no alternative but to demand of Israeli diplomats present on their soil explanations for this dangerous security breach of the security institutions that issue these passports, which are considered among the most professional in the world. Nevertheless, the emirate's government courageously chose a different path, a path which any responsible government would take, investigating crimes and murders committed on its soil, using the available modern means and techniques to unmask the culprits, and then announcing the results. If it does this, it is to prove that the country's soil is not left to itself and open to every misuse. Dubai has raised the bar of accusation very high by calling for the arrest of the Director of the Mossad, whom Dubai's police chief has accused of being “99 percent” responsible for Mabhouh's assassination. Yet such an accusation does not conceal the fact that the eyes of the Dubai government will from this day forth be open in every direction, so as not to leave its use as a passageway for the region's conflicts, with all the implications these conflicts hold, available to anyone. It is the price of success which the Dubai government is paying, success which it now needs to preserve more than at any other time.
