Improving Egypt-Hamas ties unsettle Palestinian politics
PLO slams Haley for leading ‘crusade’
A series of meetings between Hamas and senior officials in Cairo in recent weeks points to improving ties between Egypt and the Islamist Palestinian movement, with implications for Gaza, Palestinian politics and the wider region. Ismail Haniya, who has recently assumed the post of Hamas’s leader, said in a speech in Gaza yesterday that relations with the Gaza Strip’s neighbor to the southwest were warming. “We have launched a new chapter with Egypt and the relations have witnessed a big move,” he said.
For much of the last decade, Egypt has joined Israel in enforcing a land, sea and air blockade of the Gaza Strip, a move to punish Hamas and its armed wing, which seized the territory in 2007 and has controlled it since. The situation has worsened in the past month as Israel, at the request of the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA), has cut electricity to Gaza, leaving it with barely four hours of power a day. The sanctions are part of a years-long effort by the PA, led by the rival Fatah party, to force Hamas to relinquish power in Gaza and join a unified government. Power cuts have hit hospitals and water treatment plants, squeezing Gaza’s two million people amid a draining heatwave.
Sensing the need to act, and worried about losing popular support, Hamas has sought to mend ties with Egypt, which controls their one border crossing and has, under President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, been highly wary of ties between Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, which Sisi ousted from power after mass protests.
Hamas’s newly appointed leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, whose background is with the group’s militant wing, met Egyptian officials, including the intelligence chief, last month. The meetings in Cairo were believed to have been facilitated by Mohammad Dahlan, 55, a former senior Fatah official who is originally from Gaza and is now a staunch opponent of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Fatah’s leader.
Haniya said that Egypt has been helping improve Gazans’ living conditions and the talks have already led to alleviating some hardships caused by the blockade. “We have found complete readiness by Egypt and their authorities have issued orders to implement a package of measures that has began with allowing fuel into Gaza.” In his speech, Haniya also thanked Qatar and Saudi Arabia for financial support.
Dahlan, who spends much of his time in the United Arab Emirates and is close to Egypt, has emerged as a powerbroker in the region, determined to bridge differences between Hamas and Cairo and potentially challenge Abbas for leadership. In that respect, closer ties between Hamas and Cairo are a serious threat to Abbas, regional analysts said. Not only because they help to bolster Hamas’ credibility in the region, but because they empower Dahlan and undermine the ability of the Palestinian Authority to cast itself as the dominant political body for Palestinians, they said.
Israel, which signed a 1979 peace treaty with Egypt and coordinates closely with it on security, is maintaining a wary eye on discussions between Egypt and Hamas. Like the United States and the European Union, it regards Hamas as a terrorist group and wants to keep its influence contained. After the last round of meetings in Cairo, Hamas cleared land on its side of the border, creating a buffer zone with watchtowers, cameras and barbed-wire fences in a concession to security-conscious Egypt.
“These measures serve as a message of assurance to the Egyptian side,” Tawfiq Abu Naeem, the Hamas-appointed head of security services in Gaza, told reporters. Since then, Hamas officials have returned to Cairo for more talks. Sources say Hamas wants Egypt to open its Rafah crossing for longer and to increase energy supplies and imports. Egypt wants information on “radical elements” entering and leaving Gaza and help with tracking Islamic State-affiliated militants attacking Egyptian forces in northern Sinai.
In a sign that the talks are rattling Palestinian politics, Abbas, 82, will visit Egyptian President Sisi this week. “I believe relations between Egypt and Hamas have taken a big move,” said Akram Attallah, an independent analyst in Gaza. “For the first time we can say there is joint action between the two sides, a joint cooperation. That has never been official since the Hamas movement was founded 30 years ago.”
Attallah sees Dahlan’s mediation as critical. As Abbas has grown more frustrated with Hamas and tried to increase pressure on the group, it has strengthened Dahlan’s role as a broker. Abbas expelled Dahlan from Fatah in 2012 and Dahlan has been in self-imposed exile since. The last thing Abbas wants is for him to return to Gaza, with Egypt’s approval, as a hero. “Dahlan employed this moment to present himself as the most efficient party in the Palestinian arena and a savior for Hamas,” said Attallah, suggesting each side had gained: Dahlan in terms of leverage and Hamas as a political partner.
Regional analysts are closely watching what closer ties with Egypt may mean for Hamas’ relations with Qatar, which in recent years has spent more than $500 million improving infrastructure and building clinics in Gaza. Egypt and Saudi Arabia are now leading a Sunni-Arab drive against Qatar over its ties with Iran, accusing it of fomenting terrorism, a charge Doha denies. The analysts say if Egypt is forging better relations with Hamas, it may well insist on Hamas giving up its friendship with the emirate.
Meanwhile, a senior Palestinian official yesterday blasted US President Donald Trump’s United Nations envoy, accusing her of carrying out a “crusade” against the Palestinian people. Hanan Ashrawi, a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said Nikki Haley was leading a “one-woman crusade... against Palestine and the Palestinian people individually and collectively”. “Through an obsessive and targeted campaign of intimidation and threats, Miss Haley’s crusade does not miss an opportunity to put pressure on anyone that seeks to challenge Israeli impunity,” she added.
Ashrawi said Haley was echoing remarks by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon defended Haley’s work. “Small wonder Hanan Ashrawi is unhappy - @nikkihaley fights for a fair treatment of #Israel, exactly what the #Palestinians don’t want...,” he wrote on Twitter. Palestinian officials have privately expressed increasing alarm at the Trump administration’s pro-Israel stance as the US president seeks to restart peace negotiations. However until yesterday, they had publicly refrained from criticizing senior US officials. Haley visited Israel and the Palestinian territories in June.
Ashrawi said Haley was “compounding the victimization of the Palestinian people and browbeating the institutions that are meant to defend their rights”. The statement was distributed by the PLO. Since being nominated by Trump after his November victory, Haley has consistently accused the United Nations of systematic bias against Israel. The US vetoed the appointment of a former Palestinian prime minister as UN envoy to Libya, while Haley has called on UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres to intervene to block a forthcoming vote on the city of Hebron which declares the West Bank city under threat.
Trump came to office seeking to pursue what he has called the “ultimate deal” and has pledged to restart negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian leaders. But Arab media reports claim talks between the Palestinian leadership and Trump and his team - including his adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner - have been fractious, allegations denied by the Palestinians. Ashrawi said Haley was undermining the chances of peace by “pursuing her own agenda consistent with her anti-Palestinian obsession and as an apologist for Israel”.
Israel occupied the Palestinian territories in 1967 in a move never recognized by the international community. In December the United Nations Security Council adopted a landmark resolution condemning Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories. — Agencies