Free Article for Non-Members | STRATFOREgypt
Egypt is, in essence, the Nile River Delta — the country’s entire culture and population is limited to a narrow valley surrounded by a mass of desert. Even at the height of Egypt’s power during the Pharaonic Age, it only very rarely projected power beyond its core in the Nile region. Content to live on the Nile, Egypt never felt the pressure of other impinging cultures — until those others developed technologies that allowed them to overcome the desert barriers that made the Egyptians feel so safe. This explains why for nearly 2,500 years Egypt remained under the control of various dominions — Persian, Greek, Roman, Arab, and Turkic — and why, even since the 1952 founding of the Egyptian republic at the hands of pan-Arab nationalists under the leadership of Gamal Abdel-Nasser, Cairo has been unable to achieve its goal of being the leader of the Arab world.
Like Israel and Saudi Arabia, modern Egypt also has heavily relied on alignment with great powers. During the days of the monarchy, Cairo was closely tied with the British. Under the Nasserite regime, Egypt spent 20 years in alignment with the Soviet Union. In the 1970s, the Egyptians joined the Western camp and made peace with Israel, which has enabled Cairo to further its regional ambitions as the main mediator in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since then, Egypt has been the main ally through which Washington has managed Arab-Israeli affairs.
But the 9/11 attacks forced the United States to move beyond Egypt and work with other regional players as well, a process that will only accelerate under the Obama administration. Between Washington’s willingness to pursue relations with Iran and a potential rehabilitation of Syria, Egypt’s favored position is fast deteriorating. As it is, Cairo has to live with the fact that Saudi Arabia is the real leader of the Arab world (due to its oil resources). Ironically, the one thing that could raise Egypt’s profile in the eyes of the United States is potential instability at home amid the eventual leadership transition away from 80-year-old President Hosni Mubarak. The United States would have an interest in making sure that Islamist forces did not take advantage of the transition.
The Limits of Public Opinion: Arabs, Israelis and the Strategic Balance | STRATFOREgypt, for example, is directly hostile to Hamas, a religious movement amid a sea of essentially secular Arab states. Hamas’ roots are in Egypt’s largest Islamist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, which the Egyptian state has historically considered its main domestic threat. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s regime has moved aggressively against Egyptian Islamists and sees Hamas’ ideology as a threat, as it could spread back to Egypt. For this and other reasons, Egypt has maintained its own blockade of Gaza. Egypt is much closer to Fatah, whose ideology derives from Egyptian secularism, and for this reason, Hamas deeply distrusts Cairo.
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The most important change for Israel would not be unity among the Palestinians, but a shift in Egyptian policy back toward the position it held prior to Camp David. Egypt is the center of gravity of the Arab world, the largest country and formerly the driving force behind Arab unity. It was the power Israel feared above all others. But Egypt under Mubarak has shifted its stance versus the Palestinians, and far more important, allowed Egypt’s military capability to atrophy.
Should Mubarak’s successor choose to align with these forces and move to rebuild Egypt’s military capability, however, Israel would face a very different regional equation.
The Geopolitics of the Palestinians | STRATFORThe single most important neighbor Israel has is Egypt. When energized, it is the center of gravity of the Arab world. Under former President Gamal Abdul Nasser, Egypt drove Arab hostility to Israel. Once Anwar Sadat reversed Nasser’s strategy on Israel, the Jewish state was basically secure. Other Arab nations could not threaten it unless Egypt was part of the equation. And for nearly 30 years, Egypt has not been part of the equation. But if Egypt were to reverse its position, Israel would, over time, find itself much less comfortable. Though Saudi Arabia has recently overshadowed Egypt’s role in the Arab world, the Egyptians can always opt back into a strong leadership position and use their strength to threaten Israel. This becomes especially important as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s health fails and questions are raised about whether his successors will be able to maintain control of the country while the Muslim Brotherhood spearheads a campaign to demand political reform.
As we have said, Gaza is part of the Mediterranean coastal system. Egypt controlled Gaza until 1967 and retained influence there afterward, but not in the West Bank. Hamas also was influenced by Egypt, but not by Mubarak’s government. Hamas was an outgrowth of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, which the Mubarak regime has done a fairly good job of containing, primarily through force.
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Hamas’ long-term strategy — indeed, the only hope of the Palestinians who not prepared to accept a compromise with Israel — is for Egypt to change its tune toward Israel, which could very well involve energizing Islamist forces in Egypt and bringing about the fall of the Mubarak regime. That is the key to any solution for Hamas.
Israeli-Palestinian Peace Talks, Again | STRATFORHamas is a religious movement, with roots in Egypt and support from Saudi Arabia. Unlike Fatah, Hamas says it is unwilling to recognize the existence of Israel as a legitimate state, and it appears to be quite serious about this. While there seem to be some elements in Hamas that could consider a shift, this is not the consensus view. Iran also provides support, but the Sunni-Shiite split is real and Iran is mostly fishing in troubled waters. Hamas will take help where it can get it, but Hamas is, to a significant degree, funded by the Arab states of the Persian Gulf, so getting too close to Iran would create political problems for Hamas’ leadership. In addition, though Cairo has to deal with Hamas because of the Egypt-Gaza border, Cairo is at best deeply suspicions of the group. Egypt sees Hamas as deriving from the same bedrock of forces that gave birth to the Muslim Brotherhood and those who killed Anwar Sadat, forces which pose the greatest future challenge to Egyptian stability. As a result, Egypt continues to be Israel’s silent partner in the blockade of Gaza.