“The gas belongs to Palestine!” This slogan, amongst others, was shouted on 13 August by dozens of activists and journalists gathered in Cairo on the steps of the Egyptian journalists’ union. They had arranged to meet following the targeted assassination by Israel, three days earlier, of journalist Anas Al-Sharif and five other Gazan colleagues. They were also protesting against the announcement on 7 August by Israeli company NewMed Energy of an amendment to its gas export contract to Egypt, valued at $35 billion (£29 billion) for 130 billion cubic metres over fifteen years.

In 2008, Egypt was the main gas exporter to Israel. But the situation gradually reversed with Tel Aviv’s discovery of the Leviathan and Tamar 2 gas fields in the Levantine Basin [1]. It was also transformed by the questioning of export agreements after the fall of President Hosni Mubarak [2] in 2011, as well as by the sharp increase in Egyptian domestic demand. Although Italian company ENI discovered the gigantic Zohr gas field off Egypt in 2015 — the largest in the Eastern Mediterranean — this trend has only intensified. And the war in Gaza for nearly two years now has changed nothing. Already in February 2024, an agreement was signed to increase gas production and export from Tamar 2 to Egypt. Terrestrial export infrastructures are currently being developed. As NewMed Energy specifies, a pipeline project between the two states at the Nitzana crossing point in the Negev Desert [3] remains planned for 2029, despite delays.

This does not only concern energy dependence. As revealed by an investigation by investigative media outlet Zawia3, commercial exchanges between Egypt and Israel have also increased since 7 October 2023. Cairo mainly exports construction materials, food raw materials and chemical products [4]. Generally speaking, Egyptian ports continue to welcome Israeli goods — exchanges are almost daily, as demonstrated by real-time monitoring of maritime traffic. Borders are not closed to Israeli tourists — proof being the influx of Israelis to Sinai in mid-June, in the midst of conflict with Iran. The Israeli embassy located in the upmarket Ma’adi district in southern Cairo also remains open, despite Egyptian refusal to accredit Ori Rothman as new ambassador.

Maintenance of the Camp David Accords

Despite certain rhetorical threats in case of an attack on Rafah [5] and occupation of the Philadelphi Corridor [6], the 1979 Camp David peace accords have not been called into question. Furthermore, an Egyptian jurist’s request to submit them to referendum has fallen on deaf ears [7]. At the beginning of 2025, Egypt firmly rejected the forced displacement plan for Gazans on its territory proposed by US President Donald Trump. And this for several pragmatic security reasons. First, to avoid exposing itself to more Israeli strikes, even though bombings in Sinai are already proven. Then, for fear of feeding the irredentist and jihadist rebellion in Sinai [8]. Finally, out of concern to limit any strengthening of Muslim Brotherhood [9] influence on its territory. At the same time, Israel has launched a diplomatic and media campaign against Egypt. It accuses it of violating peace agreements due to increased militarisation of Sinai. The objective is to put Cairo under pressure and get it to accept the deportation plan. In vain.

On 25 July, the day of his release after 41 years in prison in France, activist Georges Abdallah [10], upon his arrival in Beirut, saluted the collective actions and solidarity that enabled his release from prison. He also called for continued resistance in Palestine and accused “millions of sitting Arabs who watch” whilst children die of hunger. Before adding: “If two million Egyptians took to the streets, the massacre would no longer continue, there would be no more genocide.”

Multiplication of actions

Since summer 2025, faced with the intensification of organised famine by Israel in Gaza — and particularly its deliberate targeting of food distribution centres of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) — protest actions against Egypt have increased and diversified, some accusing it of complicity.

In mid-June, more than a thousand people came to Cairo for the Global March to Gaza. This initiative came from an international coalition of associations and aimed to reach the border. According to its own terms, it was about “negotiating the opening of the Rafah terminal with Egyptian authorities, in collaboration with NGOs, diplomats and humanitarian organisations”. Hundreds of participants were however detained by the regime — some are still today —, others were mistreated in Ismailia [11], in the north-east of the country. Karim* arrived by plane in Egypt with about ten other Tunisians. He had prepared for interrogations by intelligence agents at the airport. He considers himself lucky that his mobile phone was not searched. With his delegation, they split up into different hotels, to escape omnipresent surveillance. He describes a climate of “generalised suspicion”, stating that with his group they sought to go to Ismailia, but were dissuaded due to the threat of arrest. The march remains, for him, a success given that it “strengthened international solidarity networks” and that it highlighted “the complicity of Egyptian authorities in the ongoing genocide”.

On 25 July, the Al-Maasara police station, south of Cairo, was occupied for several hours by a group of young people. Outraged by the situation in the Palestinian enclave and repression in Egypt, they asked police officers to “lift the siege of Gaza”. The action was filmed and widely shared on social networks. Two men, Mohsen Mustafa and Ahmed Wahab, suspected of participating, have since been victims of enforced disappearance [12]. This type of action, with the obvious risks it carries, remains very rare since the 2013 military coup [13].

It was also at the end of July that a young Egyptian, Anas Habib, filmed himself attaching a bicycle lock to the door of the Egyptian embassy in The Hague. He then scattered flour on the ground, to denounce the “border closure”. The video was also widely shared. It has since inspired a myriad of similar actions against Egyptian diplomatic premises worldwide, such as in London, Copenhagen, Baghdad, New York, Istanbul, Dublin, Helsinki, Tunis, Beirut, Vienna, Damascus and even... Tel Aviv. On 21 August, whilst they were trying to chain the door of the Egyptian consulate in New York, two young men were forcibly taken inside and beaten by consular agents, before police intervened. In an audio recording leaked a few days earlier, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty had warned that “whoever attacks the embassy, we will make them pay” (literally: “We will gouge out their father’s eye”). Words and methods that also testify to current tension.

These initiatives aim to expose the consequences of normalisation between Cairo and Tel Aviv. However, they are far from unanimous in public opinion, which believes they should focus against Israel and its Western supporters.

The activists gathered in front of the Egyptian journalists’ union in mid-August also denounced this normalisation: “We repeat it generation after generation, we will never recognise Israel.” Ahmed*, a militant journalist, was among them: “The regime claims to condemn the genocide whilst it arrests anyone who shows solidarity, this makes no sense. We can no longer tolerate this hypocrisy, it’s time to change paradigm.” At the head of this union, Khaled Al-Bashy, an independent journalist re-elected for a second term last May, has enabled this structure to accentuate solidarity with Palestine. Although he builds links with other unions in the region, this one appears relatively isolated in the most populous of Arab countries.

Risky solidarity

The majority of Egyptian society is in solidarity with Palestine, conscious of this historical injustice and ashamed of normalisation with Israel. This even translated into demonstrations in Cairo’s streets, up to Tahrir Square [14], at the end of 2023 — a sufficiently unprecedented fact to be highlighted, even if they were under security control. Palestinian symbols (keffiyeh [15], flags) remain valued in public space, and different economic boycott campaigns have been launched in Egypt [16]. Dina*, an Egyptian journalist who has worked on the subject, confirms this to us:

The economic boycott continues continuously, especially from popular classes, against fast foods, drinks — fizzy and mineral water — and even hygiene and care products for women. Branches of international companies have had to close and a plethora of local alternatives have emerged, despite sometimes price increases.

But this solidarity is not exempt from risks. For having expressed it publicly, certain demonstrators are still in detention alongside 60,000 other political prisoners, as estimated by several human rights associations [17]. Other personalities continue to be harassed by Egyptian authorities even today. This is the case of Ahmed Douma, poet and figure of the Revolution [18]. He was charged on 29 July by the state security prosecutor for “spreading false information” due to publishing messages of solidarity with Gaza on the social mefia platform X. He had notably called for citizen coordination to deliver food to the Palestinian enclave by all possible means. Ahmed Douma has already spent ten years in detention, including seven and a half in isolation, before being released in August 2023. He has for now been released on bail.

At the beginning of August, journalist Lina Attalah, co-founder and editor-in-chief of one of the rare independent voices in Egypt, Mada Masr [19], was also summoned by this same prosecutor. She is accused of running a media without licence and “spreading false news for destabilisation purposes”. Mada Masr had particularly revealed, at the beginning of 2024, in a very thorough investigation, the business of passages to and from Gaza, in the hands of tycoon Ibrahim Al-Argany, close to the Egyptian security apparatus. The costs, exorbitant, could reach up to $11,000 per Palestinian (approximately £9,000) [20].

A narrative battle

Beyond repression, and testifying to a certain nervousness, Egyptian authorities quickly entered the narrative battle. They notably accused the Muslim Brotherhood of being behind these denigration campaigns. President Sisi [21] has intervened personally several times in recent weeks, addressing “all Egyptians” and denounced a “systematic genocide” in Gaza. A press conference was also orchestrated in Rafah at the beginning of August to testify to the resumption of humanitarian convoys. Even the armed forces broadcast a video listing all aid provided to “Palestinian brothers”: 45,125 trucks, for 500,000 tonnes of food and medical aid (70% of Egyptian origin), 209 ambulances, 168 parachute operations and the reception of 18,560 wounded Palestinians. They also castigated the destruction and blocking of crossing points by Israel.

These official interventions focus on the humanitarian aspect of the situation in Gaza, obscuring any responsibility and refraining from proposing other political horizons. They only fit within the conceptual framework of the Camp David peace accords and the military aid of $1.3 billion (£1.1 billion) transferred each year by Washington [22].

The threat of regional destabilisation constitutes the credo of authoritarian counter-revolution throughout the region. It relies on conflicts in Libya to the west, Sudan and Yemen to the south, as well as Syria further east [23]. This discourse finds all the more echo as most Egyptians remain primarily concerned with their daily survival in a country marked by strong currency depreciation [24], inflation around 30% in 2024, and a poverty rate that has doubled in twenty years [25]. It is perhaps in this that Palestine no longer resonates as a universal cause for everyone. A sin of indifference universally shared.

Literary pen and critic under all regimes of modern Egypt, Sonallah Ibrahim [26] died on 13 August. In 2003, he had apologised for having to refuse a prize from the Mubarak government, which “oppresses its people, maintains corruption and tolerates the presence of an Israeli ambassador whilst Israel kills and violates”. More than two decades later, his words continue sadly to resonate.

(*First names have been changed to preserve anonymity)

Adel Kamel is an independent researcher.