For most of us who live in this region and are familiar with the UAE, the brouhaha over the slated management of US ports by Dubai Ports World is nothing but an unhealthy mix of paranoia and bigotry.

The UAE is one of the greatest success stories of all time thanks to a succession of wise and visionary rulers, who have brought prosperity, excellence and security to their people. What the UAE has achieved in just 30 years is nothing short of miraculous. I know. I observed its mind-boggling transformation from a series of fishing villages and desert oasis almost from the beginning.

I first visited Dubai in 1975 shortly after the opening of its very first five-star hotel, the Intercontinental. Then life centered along the Creek and its dhows that shipped in goods from India and Africa. There were markets, a few tarmac roads, hospitals, schools and beautiful stretches of white sandy beaches but little else.

I returned to Dubai in 1983 and honestly thought I had deplaned at the wrong stop when I saw so many new villas, shops, hotels and restaurants. But still, few in the outside world had ever even heard of the place. I was selfishly glad that it remained a best-kept secret.

Some 23 years on and Dubai has become a great and thriving metropolis. People from all over the world can’t get there fast enough. Expatriates may groan about the rising rents, building sites and traffic jams but it is still one of the safest places to be, although few today would leave the doors to their homes and cars unlocked as we did in throughout the 1980s when serious crime was a rarity.

I miss the old men, who used to bake delicious round loaves, flavored with honey or sugar, on the Jumeirah Beach Road where arguably the world’s most luxurious hotel stands, the Borj Al Arab. I miss the camels and the donkeys that sometimes wandered the streets, and this spanking new Dubai isn’t really my Dubai, but this does not mean I am not in awe of what its government has achieved.

An article by Adam Nicolson published in the Guardian on Feb. 13 refers to Dubai as “the fastest growing city on earth”. Nicholson asks, “Given the scale of its ambition, could it become the most important place on the planet?” He then goes on to highlight the $100 billion worth of projects either under way or planned.

Nicolson quotes Hamza Mustafa, who runs Greenland for the Nakheel development company, as saying: “...Dubai is trying to set an example of how Arabs should be represented. After 9/11, Arabs suffered from a lot of bad publicity. Dubai is trying to come back with the right kind of publicity. It will be a fully modern state. It will be setting the standards. It will be a place that people will look up to.”

Nicolson’s article should be required reading for those senators, governors and mayors shrieking about the perceived threat to their nation’s security that a company owned by Dubai might pose.

Getting Dubai on the map as an example of excellence is something the “Father of Dubai” Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum and his sons have always wanted. So one can only imagine how disappointed the Dubai government and its people must be at the American reaction to its takeover of P&O. This is a country that has played by the rules. Its takeover of P&O and the approvals it sought from a relevant US committee were properly done.

Yet despite the aspersions on the emirates’ character, its officials have handled themselves graciously and with dignity. Dubai has gone far as to postpone its management of the ports in question and agreeing to an additional 45-day long Federal investigation, as a face-saving exercise for George W. Bush, who supports its bid.

Again, for those of us who know Dubai and its ethos of perfection in all that it sets out to do, the idea that its government would ruin its reputation so as to open the doors to terrorist infiltrators out to damage the US would be laughable if it wasn’t so contemptible.

And it is particularly contemptible because the views of Dubai’s detractors over the deal are tinged with bigotry. I’m certainly not alone in this view. According to the New York Times, Bush has said “he suspected anti-Arab sentiment was the subtext of some of the objections to the Dubai Company taking over management of the port terminals from the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, which is British.”

That view was reaffirmed by one of Bush’s domestic security advisers Frances Fragos Townsend, who said: “...and to the extent that we’re treating one company different than we would treat the British company, I think we have to be very honest, and ask ourselves ‘Why is that?’ Allies in the war on terror all need to be treated equally, no matter where they are from.”

In the event that Dubai Ports World is barred from its management of US ports, then I believe the UAE and its regional allies should stand back and assess whom their friends really are.

The Gulf is generally awash with US military bases and the US is awash with Arab money and investments. So what message would the US rejection of Dubai Ports world send?

Thanks for your cooperation in the war on terror and thanks for your cash but when it comes to reciprocating on hallowed US soil, then its thanks but no thanks.

Friendship cannot be a one-way street forever and it is surely about time that Arabs stood up for their own interests. Bigotry cannot be tolerated by decent people and if the US Senate is determined to show a bad example, then America should suffer the consequences where it hurts most: In its pockets.