As an outside observer I've been following this thread and feel moved to ask
who has control of the traffic rights?
I understood Abu Dhabi. In which case the following claim
"I prefer to bank on the one with the deepest pockets and you can be assured that EK has very, very deep pockets. We are going to be here for a very...very long time."
is meaningless whether or not its true.
I'll be interested to know the facts.