Israeli Strikes in Gaza May Hinder Egyptian-Qatari Efforts To Secure Release of Hostages
Since reestablishing ties in 2021, Qatar and Egypt have been drawing closer together and have converged on the issues of aid and a long-term solution for the Palestinians in Gaza, but analysts say Israeli "obstinacy" is hampering them
Security sources in Cairo and the Gulf say the Israeli airstrikes and ground incursions in the Gaza Strip are likely to complicate ongoing efforts by Egyptian and Qatari diplomats and intelligence officials to secure the release of additional hostages held by Hamas and other armed Palestinian groups inside Gaza.
Egyptian-Qatari meditation with the Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing, led to the release of Israeli citizens Yocheved Lifshitz, 85, and Nurit Cooper, 79, last Monday. Their release followed that of Israeli-American mother and daughter Judith and Natalie Raanan the previous Friday. Some 230 hostages, including young children and elderly people, are still being held in Gaza, to where they were abducted during the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7.
“It’s obvious that a last-minute stumble has occurred,” Khaled Okasha, general manager of the Egyptian Center for Strategic Studies and a member of Cairo’s National Council for Combating Terrorism, told The Media Line.
Egypt had reportedly been hoping that Israel would let in more humanitarian aid, medical supplies, and fuel, to stave off a rush of Gazan refugees into Egyptian territory.
Public progress in negotiations has halted since Thursday, when Egyptian General Intelligence Service Chief Abbas Kamel spoke with Ismail Haniyeh, leader of Hamas’ political bureau.
A Hamas official said Friday that the Palestinian terrorist group will not release the hostages until there is a cease-fire deal.
Musa Abu Marzouk, a Hamas politburo member, told Russian-owned RT Arabic TV news that Hamas welcomed the United Nations General Assembly resolution last week calling for a humanitarian truce, as well as Russia’s offer to negotiate a swap of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
The delays are not a surprise, largely because we see a great deal of Israeli obstinacy … the operation in the Gaza Envelope [shows] the Israeli side committed to a strategy of humanitarian exhaustion for the Palestinians
“But Israel refuses, and Washington insists it wants Qatar and Egypt to be the mediators [not Russia],” Okasha said.
“The delays are not a surprise, largely because we see a great deal of Israeli obstinacy. Negotiation requires an exchange of concessions and benefits to form a consensus that enables the mediators to achieve success. From the first moment when it became clear that Hamas changed the engagement on Oct. 7, the operation in the Gaza Envelope [shows] the Israeli side committed to a strategy of humanitarian exhaustion for the Palestinians.”
Meanwhile, a Qatari-Egyptian convergence on aid and a long-term political solution for the Palestinians, with Gazans to remain in the Hamas-run territory, has accelerated a rapprochement that started in 2021 when Cairo and Doha re-established full ties after a four-year break.
Doha, already tied in with the Hamas leadership through the bonds of the Muslim Brotherhood, stepped in to host the group’s offices in 2011 when its top brass decided not to take President Bashar al-Assad’s side in the Syrian civil war. In 2015, an Egyptian court sentenced ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi to life in prison on charges of spying for Hamas, Hizbullah, and Iran. In June 2015, an additional 25-year sentence was imposed on Morsi after he was convicted of “leading a group established against the law,” meaning the Muslim Brotherhood, along with a further 15 years for “facilitating the leaking of classified documents to Qatar.”
Inter-Arab tensions peaked in 2017, when Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain enacted a boycott against Qatar, charging it with “supporting terrorism,” a reference to Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas, which is often characterized as its Palestinian branch.
But over the past two years, changes in Egypt’s relations with both Qatar and Hamas have shifted the dynamic between the three Arab parties and with Israel.
Warming ties between Hamas and Egypt were first on public display in May 2021, when Hamas strung up banners of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and raised Egyptian flags in honor of the consultations held in the strip between GIS chief Kamel and Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’ Gaza chief.
Hamas’ salute to Kamel was a reward for the Egyptian-brokered cease-fire that followed a fierce wave of West Bank street protests and Al-Qassam Brigades rocket attacks launched over Israeli settlement activity in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
That truce also led Israel to agree with Qatar and the United Nations on an aid transfer mechanism from the Gulf state to Gaza.
Warming Qatari-Egyptian ties have been increasingly evidenced by massive investments by the Qatar Investment Authority, such as a deal to acquire Telecom Egypt’s stake in mobile and broadband provider Vodafone Egypt.
The Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics announced a 76.2% increase in the value of trade exchanges between Egypt and Qatar, surging to $80 million in the first 11 months of 2022 from $45.5 million in 2021.
The increasing pressure imposed by global public opinion, along with the demonstrations held in Egypt and Turkey in support of the Palestinians, could help Egyptian-Qatari mediators reach a truce and, hopefully, an agreement to end the ongoing war. But this scenario will never actualize unless Israel understands the impossibility of eliminating Hamas as part of the Palestinian resistance movement.
Now el-Sisi is more worried by Israel’s moves to displace Gaza residents to the Sinai, almost eclipsing his fear of the Muslim Brotherhood as the more significant risk to Egypt’s national security, say observers.
“The increasing pressure imposed by global public opinion, along with the demonstrations held in Egypt and Turkey in support of the Palestinians, could help Egyptian-Qatari mediators reach a truce and, hopefully, an agreement to end the ongoing war,” Middle East analyst Ashraf Rady told The Media Line.
“But this scenario will never actualize unless Israel understands the impossibility of eliminating Hamas as part of the Palestinian resistance movement.”
