The War on Gaza... Weakening Egypt

It is no longer debatable that the genocidal war on the Gaza Strip goes beyond its goals and dimensions of direct military action or responding to the attack on October 7, 2023, as it essentially reveals a broader strategic transformation aimed at reshaping the entire Palestinian and regional scene.

The war can only be understood in the context of the deep American role in directing its political and military course, alongside ongoing Israeli efforts to establish a new reality that serves its long-term settlement project. In this sense, the war has become more than mere fighting; it has turned into a tool for re-engineering the geopolitical structure of the region and redistributing centers of influence within it, including marginalizing Egypt's historical role in managing the Palestinian file.

Within the general framework of the Trump plan, which includes new security arrangements and tightening control over border crossings, Israel is trying to effectively separate the Gaza Strip from the Egyptian geographical depth, transforming it into an isolated entity that connects to the outside world only through its gates. This action cannot be viewed merely as a security measure, but as part of a comprehensive strategic project aimed at stripping Cairo of its power cards and reducing its traditional role in managing the Palestinian conflict and potential future negotiations. This also explains Israel's anger over the United States' decision to allow the entry of Egyptian equipment into the Gaza Strip to participate in the search for the bodies of the deceased.

Thus, the genocidal war on Gaza is no longer merely a reaction to the events of October 7, but has transformed into a pivotal moment in an American-Israeli project aimed at redrawing the political and regional map and establishing a new system that ensures Israel's security and demographic superiority under direct American oversight.

In this context, the Israeli control over the city of Rafah during the genocide war is a pivotal moment that cannot be read as just a military step, but as the actual implementation of an American orientation aimed at redrawing control, crossing, and communication lines in the border region. The United States, which manages the details of the Palestinian-Israeli scene with a high degree of intervention, pushed the Israeli army toward this step to secure a geographical separation between Gaza and Egypt, effectively weakening Cairo politically and strategically and limiting its ability to influence post-war arrangements. Thus, the Gaza Strip becomes a closed area under complete Israeli security and administrative supervision, while its structure is reshaped in line with the American vision for rearranging the region.

Cairo is aware of the seriousness of this, as it sees in Gaza the direct geographical and security cover for its eastern borders. Complete Israeli control over the sector practically means the establishment of a direct buffer zone between Egypt and Israel, a field reality that carries the potential for creating a buffer zone within Egyptian territory under the pretext of security, which is a blatant infringement on Egyptian sovereignty and a long-term strategic threat. Therefore, Egypt insists on the need for a Palestinian administration to remain within the sector—whether through the National Authority or a consensual Palestinian formula—considering it a political and security line of defense that protects its borders and prevents the extension of Israeli control to the Rafah crossing. The management of the sector by Palestinians represents for Egypt an existential necessity that guarantees its continued regional role in the Palestinian file and preserves its national security from the geographical transformation that could make Gaza an extension of Israeli influence on the borders of Sinai.

Amidst this scene, there are field indications that there is a plan to create a new model for dividing the sector into two clear areas: the first is known as the yellow zone, an area where support and reconstruction projects are expected to begin under international and possibly Arab oversight. The second is left under Hamas's influence, presented to the Arabs as the area that requires humanitarian or security management. This division does not seem to be final, but rather represents a trial phase in the project to restructure the sector that goes beyond any comprehensive political solution, aiming essentially to drain the issue of its national dimension and transform it into an administrative file managed by external parties.

In essence, the United States is not seeking a genuine political settlement but aims to formulate a new engineering of the region that preserves Israel's stability and rearranges populations and geography according to its interests. The goal is not to establish a Palestinian state that is independent and sovereign, but to transform Palestinians into a human group without a defined geographical or political identity, connected to the world through Jordan in the West Bank, and through Egypt—or other alternatives—in Gaza, while Israel retains full control over the space extending between the river and the sea.

This vision does not reproduce the experience of 2007 in the West Bank, but establishes a new model based on selective regional partnership with some Arab countries, where these countries take on logistical or humanitarian roles in managing the sector, while Israel maintains its absolute security and political control.

Washington hopes that this arrangement will achieve internal stability for Israel and reduce the Palestinian political presence to its minimum limits. In this context, the war becomes a means to redistribute populations and redefine entities, not to end the confrontation or reach a settlement.

What is happening is therefore not just a war, but a new chapter in a colonial settlement project being reproduced with soft tools and veiled rhetoric. While the war reveals the naked face of the Israeli project, it simultaneously places Palestinians and Arabs in front of a new reality that consists of confronting the United States itself as the real decision-maker overseeing the rearrangement of the region. If the American-Israeli plan aims to liquidate the geopolitical dimension of the Palestinian issue, today’s challenge lies in the ability of Egypt and the Arab world to break this course and regain the initiative through an alternative political initiative that reintroduces the positive Arab and regional dimension into shaping the Palestinian scene according to Palestinian interests.