Will Arabic countries succeed in averting Trumps ethnic purification plan for Gaza? On Tuesday, the Arab League in the Egyptian capital Cairo will hold an emergency top about Gaza. With a joint plan for the reconstruction of Gaza, they hope to formulate an alternative where the Palestinians can stay on their country.
In response to the statements of US President Donald Trump last month-which he wants to convert Gaza into “Rivièra of the Middle East” after expulsion of the Palestinian population to surrounding countries-the leaders of, among others, Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, to remain standing behind the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Trump also threatened to withdraw American financial support for Egypt and Jordan – which they receive in exchange for peace treaties with Israel – if they do not include Palestinians from Gaza. It resulted in an uncomfortable visit of the Jordanian King Abdullah to the White House. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi will also have gotten stuffy. In fact, according to political analyst Maged Mandour, author of the recently published book Egypt Under El-Sisi. A Nation on the EdgeTrumps statements are the “most serious threat to the Egyptian regime since Sisi came to power in 2013”.
The top in Cairo fits into a historical pattern
But the top in Cairo is also an opportunity for Egypt to obtain political legitimacy by presenting himself as the champion of Egyptian sovereignty and Palestinian rights, “says Mandour by telephone from Zurich. “The regime does not want to be seen as an complicit in the oppression of the Palestinians. There is a very strong pro-Palestinian sentiment in Egypt, even if that is varied. ” At a press conference last weekend, Badr Abdelatty, the Egyptian Foreign Minister, said again that a Palestinian state is the only solution for the Palestinian case.
Although Egypt and other Arab countries officially set themselves up as defenders of the National Rights of the Palestinians, they have not been able to mean much to Gaza in practice, except for disapproving words about Israel’s genocidal warfare and sending relief supplies. In that respect, the top in Cairo fits into a historical pattern, where the Arabic involvement in the Palestinian case is mainly controlled by domestic and geopolitical considerations, over the heads of Palestinians.
The results of the top will stay with plans for the time being. Now that the file between Israel and Hamas is again in danger of imploding because of Israel’s refusal to transfer to phase two – in which it should completely withdraw from Gaza – the post -war planning of the reconstruction of Gaza from phase three is still out of sight.
Plan for reconstruction
Although the details are still unknown, it is certain that the Arab initiative consists of a plan for the reconstruction of Gaza. The independent Egyptian news website Mada Masr written This week, on the basis of conversations with, among others, Egyptian officials, that Egyptian and Turkish construction companies would have to carry out a reconstruction funded by the Gulf States, while the Palestinian population is delegated to ‘safe zones’.
The plan would also include that Hamas no longer controls Gaza and, like other militant Palestinian groups in Gaza, transfers the weapons to an Arab supervisory committee. Both Saudi Arabia, the VAE and Egypt see Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas as a threat. Instead, there would be a board of prominent Palestinian families and former members of the Palestinian authority, according to Mada Masr, who should, among other things, oversee the distribution of help and granting travel permits.
It is not known exactly how the reconstruction would be financed according to the Arab plan. An EU research group, the UN and the World Bank recently estimated that the reconstruction of Gaza will require almost 51 billion euros. There will be no money from Egypt, but from the Gulf States. Egypt is in a major economic crisis and has deep national debts. The country not only relies on US military support (around 1.3 billion dollars a year), but also depends on Loans from the IMF.
The Gulf States also maintain the Sisi regime. The United Arab Emirates, for example, invested more than 33 billion euros in construction projects on the Egyptian north coast last year. The question is whether they assist as Trump actually decides to block the financial support for Egypt.
Advantages for Egypt
According to Mandour, the plan for the reconstruction of Gaza for Egypt is therefore a way “to make money quickly”. The regime will benefit from this, because it is likely that (construction) companies are in the hands of the army – which has a large part of the Egyptian economy – be deployed for that. The past year earnings The Egyptian ‘travel agency’ Hala, which has close ties with the government, already millions on the flight of Palestinians from Gaza to Egypt.
Another reason to take care of Egypt is Israel’s permanent military presence in the Philadelphi corridor on the border of Gaza with Egypt, as Israel announced last week. But according to Mandour, control over the corridor of secondary importance is compared to the fear of Trumps proposals.
Those concerns about American support for ethnic purification by Israel are not new. In October 2023, shortly after the start of Israel’s attacks on Gaza, the then American Foreign Minister Antony tried to convince Arab countries, including Egypt, to record Palestinian refugees. Since then, President Sisi has always said that he would not want to contribute to the expulsion of Palestinians and a repetition of the Nakba from 1948.
According to Mandour, it is unlikely that Trump is now successful: the Egyptian government will risk further economic instability than a population that turns against them because of complicity in ethnic treatment. “The most important obsession of the regime in Egypt is the preservation of power. The entire repressive state apparatus is so structured to secure the regime towards its own people. ”