On March 26, Israel and Egypt celebrated the 46th anniversary of their peace treaty, which upended the nature of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Egypt remains pivotal in the search for Israeli-Palestinian peace, especially now.
It is hard to exaggerate the late Egyptian president Anwar al-Sadat’s courage when he journeyed to Israel with an olive branch in November 1977. Only a decade earlier, Egypt’s first president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, rejected Israel’s existence, stating, “We will not accept any… coexistence with Israel.”
Ending the 1973 Yom Kippur War with the return of the Sinai to Egypt and no significant concession to Israel made it possible for Sadat “to claim victory,” which strengthened his standing and allowed him to later travel to Israel as a “victor.” He was received as a great statesman, with an honor guard, creating an indelible impression in the minds of Israelis and Egyptians alike.
Sadat’s visionary leadership, matched by prime minister Menachem Begin’s, together with US president Jimmy Carter’s determination to seize the hour and mediate between them, paved the way for the historic Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty.. The treaty has endured because it has served the long- and short-term geostrategic interests and mutual economic and security benefits of both countries.
Although Egyptian and Israeli governments have changed hands several times over the past 46 years, both sides continue to fully adhere to the treaty’s terms. Thus, it has withstood the test of time despite regional instability.
The treaty fundamentally changed the psychological and political dimensions of the Arab-Israeli conflict as it began to resonate among the Arab states after nearly a decade of chastising and sanctioning Egypt for breaking the Arab world’s bloc of enmity against Israel.
How the Israeli-Egyptian peace shapes the Arab-Israeli conflict
WITH THE signing of the treaty, it became clear that Israeli-Egyptian peace would prevent any possibility of an all-out Arab-Israeli war. Egypt has been and continues to be the strongest Arab country militarily, and without it, the Arab states would not start a war against Israel that would surely end in utter defeat.
Without the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, it would have been inconceivable that any of these peace agreements would be established. In 1993, Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) established a framework for peace and mutual recognition. In 1994, Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty. Then, in 2002, Saudi Arabia introduced the Arab Peace Initiative (API), adopted by the Council of Arab States, which de facto recognized Israel’s right to exist, albeit conditional upon the establishment of a Palestinian state. And in late 2020 and early 2021, the Abraham Accords were signed between Israel and, individually, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan.
That is, the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty changed the trajectory of the Arab-Israeli conflict in that it psychologically adjusted the Arab states’ mindset toward Israel’s irrevocable existence and opened the door for an eventual political solution, despite ongoing conflict with the Palestinians.
Although Saudi Arabia has gained greater prominence in Arab affairs over the past decade, Egypt remains central in the search for Israeli-Palestinian peace regardless of its ultimate contour, especially now in the wake of the Israel-Hamas War. Without Egypt’s direct involvement and consent about Gaza’s future in the context of Israeli-Palestinian peace, no solution can be achieved.
Egypt has traditionally been involved in Gaza both directly and indirectly. It was in control of Gaza until Israel conquered the enclave during the 1967 Six Day War and has been engaged time and again in mediating the repeating conflagrations between Israel and Hamas.
At no time, however, has Egypt been more directly involved in the Israel-Hamas conflict than it has since Hamas’s October 2023 attack and Israel’s war of retaliation. Regardless of the eventual outcome of this conflict, Egypt will be affected directly, and hence, it has every right to play a direct role in shaping the ultimate solution.
TODAY, THE question is whether Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi will show the same courage as Sadat to take the lead and use the 46th anniversary as a turning point, beginning by insisting on a framework for the future of Gaza in the context of ending the Israel-Hamas War and ultimately the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Arab Summit in Cairo, held on March 4, which included Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE, endorsed Egypt’s comprehensive plan for Gaza’s reconstruction, which aims to rebuild the territory over five years at a cost of $53 billion, without displacing its residents.
The plan excludes Hamas from future governance, proposing instead a technocratic Palestinian committee under the Palestinian Authority’s oversight. It emphasizes the need for security, training Palestinian forces, and international support, including potential UN peacekeeping forces. The plan also categorically rejected US President Donald Trump’s idea to relocate Palestinians.
Given that Israel will be affected by any plans regarding the future of Gaza, Sisi should begin to conduct bilateral discussions with Israel to establish exit plans for the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza in several stages. Egypt is in a position to disabuse Israel from ever entertaining the idea of exiling the Palestinians from Gaza, threatening that this would jeopardize the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty.
Following the Arab Summit, Sisi said, “The time has come to adopt a serious and effective political pathway that leads to a fair and lasting solution for the Palestinian cause, in accordance to the resolutions of international legitimacy. I have faith that President Trump is capable of doing this.”
The summit has not ruled out some role for Hamas in implementing the Egyptian initiative.
Battered after 17 months of war that devastated much of its armed forces and laid two-thirds of Gaza to ruin, Hamas began in recent weeks to send mixed signals about its future in Gaza. Hamas official Husam Badran said that the group was willing to step aside from governing, stating, “Our only condition is for this to be an internal Palestinian matter… As long as there is a national consensus, Hamas will not be involved in the governance.”
No one is in a better place than Sisi, who can use Egypt’s indispensable role to advance the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, starting with the establishment of an end-game to the war in Gaza.
There is no time better than now to move aggressively toward that end as Egypt and Israel celebrate the 46th anniversary of their peace agreement. Can Sisi rise to the occasion and match Sadat’s vision and courage?
The writer is a retired professor of international relations, most recently at the Center for Global Affairs at NYU. He taught courses on international negotiation and Middle Eastern studies. alonben-meir.com, alon@alonben-meir.com