Looking back at history, what can Dubai bring to Web 3

The Middle East is likely to be the third largest crypto market after China and the United States, and this time, Dubai still wants to be at the forefront.

Written by Zuo Ye

Destruction and Construction: Nasser and Ottomans

The modern history of the Middle East is the dismantling of the Ottomans.

The Ottoman Empire is similar to the Qing Dynasty, in that both were barbarians outside the Great Wall ruling another major ethnic group. The Ottomans were Turks ruling the Abrahams and other small ethnic groups, such as Greece and the Balkans.

Ottoman

When Britain and France entered the first industrial revolution, the Ottoman Empire gradually declined from a chess player to a chessboard, and lost all its territories outside of today’s Turkey, the most important of which were the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina, the birthplace of Islam.

In this process, Britain gradually gained the support of most Arabs. The oppressed people hoped to regain their power with the help of the British Empire. Today’s Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates gradually formed allies with Britain in this process and became de facto protectorates and colonies.

Of course, the Jews also obtained promises from the British and began to pour into Jerusalem and the West Bank on a large scale. This is the promised land in the Bible, a fertile land “flowing with honey and milk” that God promised to the Jews.

But the course of World War II changed everything. The era of European powers came to an end. Both Jews and Arabs turned their attention to the two emerging powers - the new overlord of the West, the United States, and the Soviet Union in the East.

Given the religious and class composition of the Arabs, most monarchies turned to the arms of the United States, including Egypt and Libya at the time, as well as Jordan, Iraq and Iran, which were monarchies at the time and were still in the medieval stage of absolute monarchy.

But the creation of Israel after the war changed everything.

As the anti-Israel alliance did not contribute its manpower, hundreds of millions of Arabs were unable to defeat Israel, which made some countries believe that the United States was not so reliable. So they needed to turn their attention to the king as a token of their allegiance to the Soviet Union.

Thus, the Arab Lion, Nasser of Egypt, stepped into history and brought Arab nationalism.

Nasser the African Lion

In the Third World at that time, national liberation and socialism were basically two sides of the same coin. Nasser had many achievements, but they were mainly in two aspects. The first was to control religion rather than obey it, but this brought about the current military rule; the second was to promote the national liberation of various Arab countries. For example, Libya’s Gaddafi regarded Nasser as a lifelong idol, but the failure to fight against Israel also brought Arab nationalism to an end.

However, another legacy of Nasser is that soldiers from various countries followed suit and pointed their spearheads at their own kings, which triggered a strong backlash from monarchies such as Saudi Arabia, which made them more tied to and closer to the United States. After all, the Soviet Union was really trying to kill people, and the Americans just wanted your oil.

However, there are indeed some people who express their nostalgia for Britain, such as small Gulf countries such as Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. The UAE did not officially become independent until 1971 and maintains very good political and military relations with Britain, which can be regarded as the most decent way for Britain to exit since before Hong Kong.

Dubai Dream, a Middle Eastern student with a weak academic record

Since the independence of the UAE, a divided situation has been formed with each emirate in charge of its own business. The Emir of Abu Dhabi is an hereditary president, the Emir of Dubai is an hereditary vice president and prime minister, and most of the oil, industry and territory are in the hands of Abu Dhabi, while Dubai mainly focuses on service industries such as finance and tourism.

Dubai VS Singapore

In other words, Dubai is Singapore that has successfully stayed in Malaysia. Therefore, in terms of overall share, the UAE still accounts for nearly half of the industrial output value, but if it is Dubai itself, then basically only the financial industry is left.

By 2008, Dubai’s luxurious image had been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people around the world. Its excellent geographical location attracted wealthy people from the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Russia, and the whole of Africa. Even most of Iran’s foreign trade was conducted through Dubai, from watermelons to oil.

If you can deeply understand the survival status of Dubai, then the gameplay of Hong Kong, Singapore, Panama and Switzerland is the same, which is to keep the wealth of the rich in their respective regions and provide communication places and hidden fronts for political opponents who are not facing each other.

On the one hand, Dubai complied with European and American sanctions against Russia and closed a Russian bank, but it accepted all the safe-haven funds since the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which directly contributed to the Dubai real estate boom from the end of 2022 to the present.

On the other hand, Dubai has absorbed most of the various funds that have drifted in from northern Myanmar, Southeast Asia, India and South Asia, and at the same time has been attempting to bridge mutual recognition of the central bank’s digital currency DCEP with the People’s Bank of China and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority.

On the other hand, Dubai actively cooperates with European and American aerospace systems to send its own astronauts into the International Space Station. It is also not shy about carrying out a series of cooperation with the China Space Administration, and there are even rumors that it wants to purchase Chinese weapons.

Having no stance is a stance, and the same is true for Dubai’s Token2049. As long as it is money, it can find its own position, while maintaining political friendship with all extraterritorial powers and local powers.

With the de facto end of the Yemen conflict and the reconciliation between Iran and Saudi Arabia, Dubai’s position as a hub has become more secure. Both Iran and Israel use Jordan as a battleground, but neither will harm Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

A pure land in troubled times, a place of green hope

GCC Countries

In the current chaos in the Middle East, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) led by the UAE and Saudi Arabia is the last pure land. Apart from them, there are either conflicts or preparations for conflicts. Our impression of the chaotic situation in the Middle East is that to the north of the GCC are Iraq and Syria, to the right is the Persian Gulf, to the left is Israel and Africa, and below is the Houthi armed forces in Yemen.

The GCC member states are all monarchies without exception, and their rulers mainly believe in the Sunni sect of Islam. However, Iran across the way is the stronghold of Shiites, and the discord between the two sides will continue. To them, Israel is a pagan and Iran is a heretic, and heretics are often more hated than pagans.

Religious denominations in the Middle East

Not only that, the population structure of Dubai and GCC countries is also very strange. Basically, more than 80% of them are Indian and Pakistani workers, plus other populations, including locals and pagan populations from China, Japan, South Korea, Europe and the United States. Only the situation in Saudi Arabia is slightly better, with a much higher proportion of locals, but they still don’t work much and just want to enjoy state welfare.

A prominent feature here is the naturalization and immigration policy. If you are not a Muslim, then there is a 99% chance that you will not be able to obtain naturalization. At most, you can only get various visas, such as a ten-year golden visa for buying a house, but the vast majority of Indian and Pakistani workers cannot obtain various social welfare benefits.

In other words, Dubai only wants your money and labor, but will not be responsible for your future and your entire life. This is a clearly priced contract.

If we broaden our focus to the GCC and the entire Middle East, we will see that they have been channels of communication between the East and the West since ancient times, from Assyria to Babylon, from Persia to Alexander, from Rome to Mongolia, from the Arab Empire to the Ottoman Empire, and even to today’s popular transit point, where Europe, Asia and Africa meet.

But beyond the dawn of peace, there are countless wars, where religion and oil, secularism and warlords are all intertwined, such as the transnational Muslim Brotherhood and the Renaissance Party, as well as the Shiite Arc or the Arc of Resistance, which is now in the limelight. People don’t know how to stop fighting, but everyone must participate in the struggle.

• Impossible triangle, secularization, religiousization and military dictatorship. Drawing on the impossible triangle of Ethereum, there is also an impossible triangle in the Middle East, that is, no country can maintain secularization and avoid military dictatorship at the same time. For example, Egypt has only had one democratically elected government led by the Muslim Brotherhood since Nasser. If voting is organized according to democratic principles, then Lebanon and Iraq are clear evidence. Iran has realized a theocratic republic, with a religious system superimposed on the elected government, which is rare in the world.
• During the long preparation period, people focused their attention on Iran, Israel, Jordan, Syria, Iraq and other war zones. At the same time, the outcome of Libya in North Africa had not yet been decided, while Morocco and Algeria were already sharpening their knives towards Western Sahara. Both sides are major energy exporters and are among the top ten arms purchasers in the world. Their conventional military strength is already comparable to that of European powers.

Dubai, or the monarchies of the GCC, have maintained a certain degree of complexity and stability. Bahrain, Qatar and Dubai are all hubs of the financial and banking industries, and bear the lifeline of Middle Eastern and Islamic finance.

If there is a next financial market, it should not be the Middle East, which is too large to be defined, but the GCC countries. However, due to the huge gap between the rich and the poor and the scarcity of local people, the overall market is destined not to be very large.

Third Market, Crypto-Central Sales Front Desk

China and the United States are the two major markets for cryptocurrencies. In addition, Africa and Latin America have unstable political situations, Europe has strict regulations, Southeast Asia and South Asia are not very rich as a whole, and the Middle East is indeed a dreamland. For example, Turkey’s high inflation rate has led to dollarization, and cryptocurrencies have become a hot spot in Istanbul.

Since the year before last, Hong Kong, Singapore and Dubai have been competing for the world’s crypto capital, or the Asian crypto capital. Regardless of how the decentralized world connects to the center, at least Dubai has tolerated and accommodated everyone, from parks to Deira, from manors to villas, looking for their own shelter at the marked price.

Some people walked from here to Georgia and Ethiopia. They could no longer turn back. They traveled freely between heaven and earth, living freely and dying randomly.

Some people return from here to Singapore, Hong Kong, New York and Paris, and enter the mainstream. They are the upward force of cryptocurrency, and the West becomes the final temple and destination.

And more people become salesmen. They used to be flight attendants or sales attendants, but now they can be BDs. With the mainland behind them and facing Europe and the United States, they are all selling goods, so there is not much difference. More people are still selling houses. Perhaps everyone who comes to Dubai will be assimilated into an agent.

However, intermediaries and tolls are traditional skills in the Middle East. If the Ottomans had not cut off the trade routes, there would have been no adventures in the great voyages. If there had not been a global regulatory storm, Dubai would not have become a hotbed for Web3. Almost every exchange is flocking to Dubai, including the previous FTX, and of course supporting services such as compliance, identity, and visas.

The rain in Dubai this time has reduced many people’s impression of Dubai, but Dubai really has no sewers. Everything is laid out in the open, staring straight at you. Everything has a price, and it depends on whether you can afford it.

The Middle East is likely to be the third largest crypto market after China and the United States, and this time, Dubai still wants to be at the forefront.