Mideast Visitors Scramble to Exit Region

Above, beach visitors Wednesday in the U.A.E. are contrasted against smoke from an intercepted drone. Below, a family was reunited in London.DUBAI-The first wave of Iranian drones and missiles arrived with no warning. So did the next several.Residents and tourists who were out shopping or tanning on the beach of this gleaming business hub of the United Arab Emirates watched with curiosity as missiles were intercepted above them like loud, daytime fireworks. No alerts arrived, and no sirens rang out, as falling debris and drone hits turned the mood to panic.Suddenly people were rushing to grocery stores to stock up and scouring their chat groups for scraps of information about what was happening. The chief goal for many was to find a way out after airspace closures had already slammed shut the exit door.Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto was among the trapped. He had been in the U.A.E. with his family when the fighting broke out. He made it out on a military flight but had to leave his family behind, he said Sunday in a social-media post.Embassies were behind the curve as well. It wasn't until Monday that the State Department said Americans should leave the U.A.E. as well as Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Yemen.It didn't say how to do it.With flights slowing to a trickle, Americans lambasted the State Department on social media and in interviews, expressing frustration that there appeared to be little planning to help citizens amid a U.S.-led war that had stranded them abroad.One American living in Dubai fled with his wife to India by leaning on a contact who had a private jet taking off from the city's secondary airport. The lack of support that made the hasty, informal exit necessary was mind-blowing, he said.