Iran-US war: Navigating the diasporic newsfeed

When missiles impact the Gulf region, the common narrative is that of conflict between countries. Yet, for the 30 million expatriates currently living in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), the war is experienced more as a digital narrative than a geographical event, writes SOAS alumna Jethu Abraham.

On 28 February 2026, when the US began its airstrikes on Iran, residents across the GCC region were quietly preparing for a new work and school week, finishing grocery runs and homework assignments. But soon, together with the rest of the region, they were thrust into a war they never imagined or asked for. While the initial hours or days went into rearranging schedules and cancelling appointments, life soon echoed that of the COVID-19 era, with countries being on a partial lockdown mode and schools and work being navigated once again, from home.

Today, in the background of the ongoing Iran-US strikes, half of the region’s population who are miles away from their homeland, begin their day with the duality of daily life and the relentless news headlines and looping social media videos translated across languages. This makes them remote witnesses to a new kind of war scenario - one where war is less about proximity and more about navigation.

Expatriates as narrative interpreters

In its second week now, the GCC war continues to remind residents through the sirens and missile impact booms - a constant, punctuating presence in the background. Key strategic sites and US bases in the region’s six countries - UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, KSA, Qatar and Oman - have been struck so far. While residents have not been direct targets, injuries and deaths have been reported from falling debris. Though away or evacuated from strike points, residents are constantly aware of the war in their background through interceptor sounds and sirens.

Half of the region’s population, who are miles away from their homeland, begin their day with the duality of daily life and the relentless news headlines.

For the expatriate communities in the region, there is a parallel universe as well - the digital world, connected through their work hours, family moments and late-night doom scrolling. Far from the front lines, it is the steady updates from news channels and the Instagram war videos that inform them of the world just outside their windows. These online war narratives are often experienced in waves - short, unexpected bursts of news, followed by a more intense discussion in personal chats, ending with a more predictable return to daily life. 

Here, the algorithms shorten the distance and residents absorb news with the quiet emotional intensity that is often amplified by the repetitive engagement of content under pressure. In its content, news often presents itself in the form of a barrage of headlines, in different languages, tone shifts and repeated analysis reports on the same events. A resident listening to a breaking news piece from the BBC, for example, would also read analysis threads on X and view videos of the same event being circulated on Instagram.

Simply put, this means that expatriates in the GCC rarely absorb a single coherent narrative of the ongoing war but fragmented pieces across different platforms. For the diaspora who often exist in a metaphorical space between different cultures, these observations help them to function as interpreters of geopolitical narratives. As observed online, multiple national perspectives often coexist and interact with each other, even for those expat employees currently working from home. Across cultures, this is also translated to link regional events to future discourses - a hit on a desalination plant in Bahrain is taken as a sign for residents in Kuwait to stock up on water supplies.

For the diaspora who often exist in a metaphorical space between different cultures, these observations help them to function as interpreters of geopolitical narratives.

Expatriates in the region are also navigating shared vulnerability situations. For example, residents in the UAE check in on their relatives in Bahrain or Kuwait, often just after a news alert of attacks in a particular country. While the current war is based on an Iran Vs US scenario, affecting the GCC states, the reality is that civilians of many nationalities staying in the same region are exposed to the same risk. For Iranian residents, in particular, this creates a paradox - they are citizens of the attacking country but are among those attacked as well. In academic terms, this creates what scholars often refer to as diasporic liminality - the state of having to exist between two national narratives at the same time.

An online war - the emotional toll

Perhaps the dominant narrative among residents currently experiencing the war is their constant exposure to a stimulating digital environment. This should be read in the contextual sense as well, as residents in the region live and function in an emotionally contained environment—observing developments online and initiating private discussions, which can never be made public. This kind of emotional containment, expressed even while volatile news pieces are being absorbed, leads to a type of controlled engagement.

Residents in the region often make quiet observations or share experiences of how they begin their day with war news updates, affected areas and what the larger outlook of the war may look like.

Residents in the region often make quiet observations or share experiences of how they begin their day with war news updates, affected areas and what the larger outlook of the war may look like. Some have shared that they often try to locate affected areas based on late-night or early-morning missile impact sounds, trying to decode patterns of attack - using push notifications, live blogs and social media threads. 

This sense of being actively cognizant online for prolonged hours, trying to deduce patterns and frame possibilities, creates a sense of permanent alertness, marked by uncertainty, even while real life continues normally. While the media discourse functions on the premise of an informational setting and report on the battleground news, expatriates in the GCC region continue to navigate two simultaneous realities - the stability of daily life and the uncertainty of the crisis online.

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