Qatar crisis caused by UAE hacking, according to US
MIDDLE EAST: The United Arab Emirates orchestrated the hacking of Qatari government news and social media sites in order to post incendiary false quotes attributed to Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad al-Thani, in late May that sparked the ongoing upheaval between Qatar and its neighbours, according to United States intelligence officials.
Officials became aware last week that newly analysed information gathered by US intelligence agencies confirmed that on May 23, senior members of the UAE government discussed the plan and its implementation.
The officials said it remains unclear whether the UAE carried out the hacks itself or contracted to have them done. The false reports said the emir, among other things, had called Iran an ‘‘Islamic power’’ and praised Hamas.
The hacks and posting took place on May 24, shortly after President Donald Trump completed a lengthy counterterrorism meeting with Persian Gulf leaders in neighbouring Saudi Arabia and declared them unified.
Citing the emir’s reported comments, the Saudis, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt immediately banned all Qatari media. They then broke relations with Qatar and declared a trade and diplomatic boycott, sending the region into a political and diplomatic tailspin that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has warned could undermine US counterterrorism efforts against the Islamic State.
In a statement released in Washington by its ambassador, Yousef al-Otaiba, the UAE said the story was ‘‘false’’.
‘‘The UAE had no role whatsoever in the alleged hacking described in the article,’’ the statement said.
‘‘What is true is Qatar’s behav- iour. Funding, supporting, and enabling extremists from the Taliban to Hamas and Qadafi. Inciting violence, encouraging radicalisation, and undermining the stability of its neighbours.’’
The revelations come as emails purportedly hacked from Otaiba’s private account have circulated to journalists over recent months. That hack has been claimed by an apparently pro-Qatari organisation calling itself GlobalLeaks.
Many of the emails highlight the UAE’s determination over the years to rally US thinkers and policymakers to its side on the issues at the centre of its dispute with Qatar.
All of the Persian Gulf nations are members of the US-led counterIslamic State coalition. More than 10,000 US troops are based at Qatar’s al-Udeid Air Base, the US Central Command’s regional headquarters, and Bahrain is the home of the US Navy’s 5th Fleet. All are purchasers of US defence equipment and tied to American foreign policy priorities in numerous ways.
The conflict has also exposed sharp differences between Trump – who has clearly taken the Saudi and UAE side in a series of tweets and statements – and Tillerson, who has urged compromise and spent most of last week in so far unsuccessful shuttle diplomacy among the regional capitals.
‘‘We don’t expect any near-term resolution,’’ Tillerson aide R C Hammond said yesterday.
He said the secretary had left behind proposals with the ‘‘Saudi bloc’’ and with Qatar including ‘‘a common set of principles that all countries can agree to so that we start from ... a common place’’.
Qatar has repeatedly charged that its sites were hacked, but it has not yet released the results of its own investigation.
Intelligence officials said their working theory since the Qatar hacks has been that Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, or some combination of those countries were involved. It remains unclear whether the others also participated in the plan.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment, as did the CIA. The FBI, which Qatar has said was helping in its investigation, also declined to comment.
A spokesman for the Qatari Embassy in Washington responded by drawing attention to a statement by that government’s attorney general, Ali Bin Fetais alMarri, who said late last month that ‘‘Qatar has evidence that certain iPhones originating from countries laying siege to Qatar were used in the hack’’.
Hammond said he did not know of the newly analysed US intelligence on the UAE or whether Tillerson was aware of it.
The hacking incident reopened a bitter feud among the gulf monarchies that has simmered for years.
It last erupted in 2013, when Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain accused Qatar of providing safe haven for their political dissidents and supporting the panArab Muslim Brotherhood; funding terrorists, including USdesignated terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah; and using its state-funded media outlets to destabilise its neighbours.
Qatar – an energy-rich country ruled by its own unelected monarchy – saw the Saudi-led accusations as an attempt by neighbouring autocrats to stifle its more liberal tendencies.
Separately, the US warned Qatar to keep a tighter rein on wealthy individuals who surreptitiously funded Islamist terror groups – a charge that Washington has also made in the past against the Saudis and other gulf countries.
While Qatar promised some steps in response to the charges in a 2014 agreement with the others, it took little action.
During his two-day visit to Riyadh, Trump met with the sixmember Gulf Co-operation Council - Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Qatar - and held individual closed-door meetings with several GCC leaders, including the Qatar emir.
The day before his departure, Trump delivered a speech, focused on the need for religious tolerance and unity against terrorism, to more than 50 Muslim leaders.
But he devoted most of his attention to Saudi King Salman, praising as a wise leader the man who controls his country’s vast oil reserves. In what the administration hailed as a high point of the visit, the Saudis agreed to purchase $110 billion in U.S. arms and signed letters of intent to invest hundreds of billions in deals with U.S. companies.
He had told the Saudis in advance, Trump said that the agreements and purchases were a prerequisite for his presence. ‘‘I said, you have to do that, otherwise I’m not going,’’ Trump recounted. – Washington Post