“There is no impact on our daily lives”: this invisible crisis in Qatar, suspended from the unblocking of the Strait of Hormuz

Lola (*) opens her foldable smartphone and starts a video. Bay of Doha, Qatar. Missiles streak the sky in the night, like a shower of meteorites. Intercepted, the fireballs explode like fireworks. The young woman shrugs her shoulders. “Obviously, it’s always something to see from your balcony,” she concedes, her blue eyes fixed on the screen, sipping her passion fruit lemonade. “But we always felt safe, we knew it wasn’t going to last. Very quickly, we got used to the alerts and we didn’t change our habits,” continues this Spanish expatriate with her husband and their children. The little gelatinous pulps swirl in his glass. This October morning, in this sunny café, on the marina of the artificial island The Pearl, in the capital of the Emirate, life is sweet. A table of young girls laugh while sharing breakfast.

In Doha, the war in Iran, which has dominated world news since…