Egyptian President’s Son Visits Israel To Mediate Conflict With Palestinians in Step Toward Strengthening Ties
Mahmoud el-Sisi is acquiring more important roles in his father’s government, but experts believe that President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi does not intend for his son to succeed him, for now
Mahmoud el-Sisi, deputy head of the Egyptian General Intelligence Directorate, and son of the country’s president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, together with two other senior Egyptian officials visited Israel to try to mediate to prevent an escalation between Israel and the Palestinian factions.
This follows clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinian worshipers who rioted in the Temple Mount/Al Aqsa Mosque compound on Friday, which resulted in the detention of 476 Palestinians, though the majority of them already have been released.
According to the Egyptian newspaper Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, the Egyptian president’s son arrived in Israel on Sunday with the intent to reach an agreement with Israeli officials to release the detainees and avoid further escalation.
Egypt, which signed a peace agreement with Israel in 1979, has long acted as a mediator between Israel and Palestinian factions. This time, however, the envoy is the eldest son of the country’s president.
Dr. Eran Lerman, former deputy director for foreign policy and international affairs at the National Security Council and vice president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, told The Media Line that this visit represents another indication that Egypt is moving closer to Israel.
“The change that happened regarding the ties between Egypt and Israel in the last months is very impressive,” he said.
Cairo wants to make sure the Abraham Accords don’t upstage the Camp David Accords
Lerman, who is also editor in chief of the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, explained that this development began with the participation of Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukri in the Negev Summit, and moved on to agreements in the energy sector, the visit to Cairo of Israel’s Economy Minister Orna Barbivai, and now the visit of the Egyptian president’s son.
Haisam Hassanein, an associate fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told The Media Line that there are several reasons of this shift.
The first reason is economic, he said.
Lerman says that this is related to cooperation on energy including natural gas and to the issue of food security against the backdrop of the Ukrainian situation.
“Surely the direct flights from Tel Aviv to Sharm el-Sheikh will compensate the Egyptian tourism sector a bit from the loss of Russian and Ukrainian tourism,” Hassanein said.
Hassanein added that: “Since the signing of the Abraham Accords, Cairo saw the tremendous economic potential of it and doesn’t want to miss out, especially with its current dire economic needs because of increased inflation and the Russia-Ukraine war.”
From a political point of view, Hassanein believes that Egypt wants to conserve its status as Israel’s most important Arab partner.
“Cairo wants to make sure the Abraham Accords don’t upstage the Camp David Accords,” he said.
Hassanein explained that the publicity surrounding the Abraham Accords shook Cairo’s long-standing prestige as the main Arab interlocutor with Jerusalem. “Now with other Arab leaders open to Israel publicly, Cairo wants to be in the spotlight as well,” he said.
A politics, strategy and intelligence analyst in Egypt who declined to be named told The Media Line that Egypt’s work to strengthen ties with Israel is also related to the presumed renewal of the Iran nuclear deal.
“Israel is paving the way to deal with Iran, speed up normalization with Gulf states, update security and defense cooperation with Egypt in different ways, all that also requires that Egypt become more active,” he said.
The fact that it was el-Sisi’s son who made the visit to Israel as Egypt moves to strengthen its relations with Israel raises some question marks about the possibility of the Egyptian president trying to hand the presidency down to his eldest son.
Hassanein said that, given the history of Gamal Mubarak, the son of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak who was being groomed to succeed his father before Hosni Mubarak was removed from office in the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, there will always be speculation.
“There are no signs of actual succession deliberations yet at any level, though I wouldn’t expect them until 2028 or so; though, of course, Sisi will likely try to find a way to continue extending his presidency,” he said.
Lerman agrees. “It could be that he wants his son to fill important roles, but I don’t think that we are speaking here about an inheritance game,” he said.
“Sisi is wise enough to understand and remember the resistance that existed toward the ‘jamlaka’ matter, which is a combination of two words in Arabic: ‘jumhuria’ which means republic, and ‘mamlaka’ which means kingdom. This is basically a republic that is passed through inheritance,” he said.
It could be that he wants his son to fill important roles, but I don’t think that we are speaking here about an inheritance game
The anonymous Egyptian analyst says Sisi is not a Mubarak clone.
“I think President Sisi is smarter than to follow president Mubarak’s path. Sisi understands that there is a risk in such a move, but he trusts his son to make such an important visit, and deal with many important files, Israel is one of them of course,” he said.
He also believes that Sisi sent his son as a trusted envoy. “It is a serious visit which needs a private and trusted messenger,” he said.
As opposed to this move being a sign of Sisi’s desire pass power to his son, this is rather a sign of Egypt’s effort to strengthen its ties with Israel.
“I want to stress that this is one step in a long series of signs that shows how important the ties with Israel became for Egypt in a period of time where the country is changing its identity, it is showing as a less Arab, less Islamic, and a more Mediterranean, and more Pharaonic Egypt,” said Lerman.
