The Very Very Good News and the Very Very Bad News
Peloni
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Below is the link to the Israel Hayom report on the Isreali-Egyptian gas deal, which contains the best reporting and details of the reports I have read on this subject thus far.
The truth is that the gas deal could have been an important victory for Israel, for Egypt and for the US, but the reality which came to be paints a far less rosy picture than what could have been achieved.
Trump has dreams of economics stability and advancement overcoming demands of victory over infidels while also ignoring long standing stains of national defeat in a region where shame, not profit, is the basis distinguishing national stability from regime collapse. This focus and misconception forms the basis of both sides of the gas deal, ie the good and the bad.
The gas deal will make Israel and her gas partners in Cyprus and Greece into a geopolitical lynch-pin thru which gas will be first sold to Egypt which can next be exported to Europe. This will make both Egypt and Europe dependent upon Israel’s gas market, while also making Israel enormously wealthy. This wealth can be used in many ways, most importantly it can be used to potentially extricate Israel from its dependency on US aid, but it could also be used to finance many other things including upgrading or financing Israel’s economic infrastructure. Meanwhile, Egypt will have access to gas which it needs, Israel will be able to maintain enough gas to keep its domestic gas prices low, and everyone will become extraordinarily wealthy as they help wean Europe off of its dependence on Russian gas (now projected to be completed by 2027), which of course has been a long long held goal of the US. It also certifies Israel and her gas partners as major players in the geopolitical gas deals, which aids Israel at Turkey’s expense, recalling that the latter is explicitly focused on all energy being controlled thru Turkey one way or another. All of this is the good part of the deal.
The bad part of the deal began with Egypt breaking the Camp David Accords during the Gaza war by bringing armed forces into the Sinai and then multiplying these forces, digging tunnels in which to hide massive ordinances, and extending airfields which can be used for heavy cargo deliveries into the Sinai, all while describing Israel as ‘the enemy’. Egypt has never accepted that it lost the ’73 war, not publicly and not privately. In fact, it has been training and arming itself over the past five decades to try to turn that fantasy into reality, and, importantly, over this past year, the war rhetoric in Egypt has greatly intensified. Despite the import of the gas deal to Israel, Bibi was determined to not sign the deal unless Egypt returned to compliance with the terms of the Camp David Accords. Sisi, however, refused to do so unless Israel simultaneously agreed to evacuate Gaza and to gives up control over the Rafah crossing, something which Bibi can’t and won’t do. So this led to a stalemate of the consequential gas deal between Israel and Egypt over the past several months.
Trump attempted to diffuse the impasse by offering to hold a summit between Bibi and Sisi towards the hopes of a negotiated solution, but Sisi refused to accept Trump’s offer. Having failed to pressure Sisi to accept Trump’s offer, and recalling that the 4yr clock on Trump’s term in office was ticking away, Trump turned to pressure Bibi into surrendering his security demands instead. Consequently, Bibi complied and signed the deal without gaining anything but a promise by the US to try to intervene and resolve the matter at some point in the future, but with no guarantee of any positive outcome.
Hence, Sisi broke the terms of the Peace Treaty and was successful in manipulating the Americans into forcing Israel to accept this fact. This victory by Sisi over Israel is the bad news, and it is very bad news indeed. Egypt’s army now sits feet away from the Israeli border and they have been trained and itching for war with Israel for decades while having acquired a significant military capacity which includes both American and Chinese war systems and an enormous army. The training and purpose of this military buildup has but one target in mind, making their forward push into the Sinai an existential threat to Israel.
The Egyptians have been looking to turn their decades-long dreams of victory over Israel into reality, something which has been emboldened by Sisi’s recent diplomatic victory over both the Americans and Israel. All of this bodes very badly for future stability despite the economic ties which Trump is convinced will supersede the concepts of honor and victory in a shame based society.
Hence, while Bibi is claiming victory in this deal, and notably the victories are quite real and quite significant for Israel, the truth is that Israel now has a secured threat which sits on its immediate Western border for the first time in forty years.
Click Link to Read Israel Hayom Article
https://www.israelhayom.com/2025/12/17/the-real-purpose-of-israels-gas-deal-with-egypt/
We urgently need to figure out what Trump has really gained from this newly signed deal which gives away Israel’s defensive depth for no return on investment. Sure, Israel can now sell gas to Europe and become a little richer, but there are facts we cannot forget, for example:
US companies are partners to the Leviathan field,
Europe can be happy buying gas from Egypt without bowing towards Israel,
Egypt can become rich a little like with the Suez Canal,
it can all go up in smoke if Turkey decides that it is not getting its due,
if anything goes awry, it’s Israel’s fault,
if the next president of the USA takes a different path, it may all go up in smoke. On the plus side, Israel may become a little less dependent on US arms deliveries, but the US stands to lose too, or do they think Israel will continue to share all they have with nothing in return?
In short, there are too many factors on the wrong side of the scale, not to speak of Turkey’s aggressiveness, Egypt’s saber rattling and the Saudis and Europe calling for a two state solution all the time. And then there is the ICC/ICJ calling indirectly for Israel’s demise by insisting on imprisoning anyone they feel could be involved in any way with the defensive war in Gaza. I actually forgot all the countries recognizing the State of Palestine…
You’re right… Mostly bad.
Nobody seems to get it: We’re not going down without a major fight. “Love thine enemy” doesn’t imply not to kill him…
Big mistake for the US and China to have supplied Egypt with arms…
@keelie:
Remember that the Russians got a black eye when their air defenses in Syria and Iran didn’t defend those countries.
US and China might become unhappy like the Iranians if Egypt and Saudi Arabia find they are quite defenseless too.
Sure, talk is cheap and the Egyptians have been screaming for a while now, but they still cannot accept their loss in 1973. Of course, the “peace treaty” is probably considered to be a Hudna too, at least, that is what the article describes without mentioning it.