Intelligence and wisdom are not equivalent.
Hawking is smart, but not wise.
If the aliens are so much more advanced than we, and have evil intent toward us, there is nothing that we can do to defend ourselves.
Hawking is an atheist (boy is he in for a surprise - as are all atheists), and of course does not see God’s purpose in creating this planet and man uniquely for His own glory....and he’d laugh at such a thought.
That’s ok.
Life on other planets? Perhaps. C.S. Lewis saw it as a possibility (his Space Trilogy). But if so, man is still the only thing in all creation created in God’s image.
Read Dark Forrest.