Former Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar and his wife were urgently evacuated from the United Arab Emirates after Israeli officials received a security alert tied to an Iranian threat against him, according to Israeli media reports.

Bar, who led Israel’s internal security agency through the October 7 Massacre and the war that followed, was reportedly in the UAE for a private security conference attended by senior intelligence, defense and decision-making figures from multiple countries. His wife, Dafna Bar-Agassi, was with him.

The reported trip was not public. According to Channel 13, while Bar was in the Emirates, an unusual warning was received about a threat to his safety. The reported concern was serious enough that a decision was made to remove the couple from the country immediately and fly them back to Israel. Details of the threat and the evacuation were kept under heavy secrecy until the story surfaced in Israeli media. Bar declined to comment.

A source close to the UAE strongly denied that Emirati Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed hosted such a conference, denied that Bar had been invited to such an event, and rejected claims that any evacuation connected to the former Shin Bet chief took place on Emirati soil.

Iran has repeatedly treated Israel’s presence in the Gulf as a direct challenge. Iranian officials have openly described Israeli activity in the UAE as a security threat, and Tehran recently warned that cooperation with Israel was “unforgivable” after reports of Israeli-Emirati wartime coordination.

Since the Abraham Accords, Israel and the Emirates have built open diplomatic and economic ties, with a growing security dimension driven largely by the shared threat from Iran. That relationship has survived the Hamas war, regional pressure and repeated Iranian attempts to intimidate Gulf states away from Israel.

The danger is not theoretical. The murder of Chabad Rabbi Zvi Kogan in the UAE shocked Israeli and Jewish communities in the Gulf and triggered renewed Israeli travel warnings. Israeli officials described that killing as an antisemitic terrorist act, while suspicions of Iranian involvement hung over the case. Tehran denied involvement.