WATCH: UAE Foreign Minister Presses for Hamas Exit and Hostage Deal as Key to Gaza Resolution

The United Arab Emirates’ top diplomat told Fox News that the immediate release of hostages held by Hamas is a prerequisite for any meaningful progress toward stability in the region.

“First, getting the hostages out,” said Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan. “We need calm in Gaza, and we need an authority that’s not Hamas that controls Gaza.”

His remarks — a rare and pointed public articulation of the U.A.E.’s position on the conflict — place the Gulf nation squarely in alignment with a growing international chorus calling for Hamas to relinquish control of the besieged enclave as a condition for rebuilding and long-term peace.

Since the outbreak of the war following Hamas’s October 7 attacks on Israel, the U.A.E. has emerged as one of the largest donors of humanitarian aid to Gaza. According to bin Zayed, 42 percent of all aid that has entered the territory since the war began has been funded by the Emirates.

He credited the 2020 Abraham Accords — the U.S.-brokered normalization agreement between Israel and several Arab states, including the U.A.E. — with enabling that scale of assistance. Without it, he suggested, Abu Dhabi’s ability to funnel aid into Gaza would have been far more limited.

The Abraham Accords, controversial in parts of the Arab world, opened diplomatic and commercial channels between Israel and its new regional partners, including the U.A.E. While the war in Gaza has tested those ties, Emirati officials have sought to leverage the relationship to push for de-escalation and greater humanitarian access.

Still, bin Zayed’s call for a post-Hamas governing authority in Gaza underscores a growing consensus among Arab leaders — including Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia — that any durable solution must involve a political transformation inside the territory.

Though he did not specify what form such an alternative authority should take, bin Zayed’s comments suggest the U.A.E. envisions a Gaza Strip administered either by a reformed Palestinian Authority or a transitional body backed by Arab states and international actors.