Egypt is seeking guarantees that an international stabilisation force proposed for postwar Gaza will not turn into an occupying power remotely run by the US and Israel, sources told The National on Monday.
The fear in Cairo is one of several shared with fellow Gaza mediators over a draft resolution distributed by the US to UN Security Council members on the creation of the force for the war-devastated strip.
The US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey brokered a Gaza ceasefire that went into effect on October 10, pausing Israel's two-year war with Hamas. The truce, together with a hostages-for-prisoners swap, was the first phase of a peace plan put forward by the US President Donald Trump.
The second phase, which has yet to begin, involves the creation and deployment of the “Gaza Stabilisation Force”. The force is to be chiefly made up of troops from Arab and Muslim-majority nations and tasked with maintaining security in the coastal enclave. Egypt, which borders both Israel and Gaza, is widely expected to play a major role in the force.
The sources, who have first-hand knowledge of deliberations among the four Gaza mediators, said Egypt wanted to see language in the draft that guarantees the departure of the force when its mandate expires.
Egypt, a long-time ally of the US, also wants assurances that the postwar governing of Gaza, including non-partisan Palestinian technocrats who will run the territory's day-to-day affairs, will not result in the severance of the enclave's links to the occupied West Bank.
Together, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip are the land of a hoped-for independent Palestinian state envisaged to exist side by side with Israel, with East Jerusalem as its capital.
The two areas have for all practical purposes gone their separate ways since Hamas took over Gaza in 2007 after a brief civil war with Fatah, the mainstream Palestinian faction that is the backbone of the Western-supported Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
According to the sources, another of Egypt's fears is that the proposed Gaza force would not be allowed to operate in areas behind the “yellow line” that the Israeli military withdrew to as part of the ceasefire, thus enshrining the division of the enclave and leaving Israel controlling slightly more than 50 per cent of it.
Egypt's concerns are indicative of the difficulties that lie ahead for President Trump's plan, which has been stuck in the first phase for a month because Hamas has been unable or unwilling to hand over to Israel the remains of all the hostages who died in captivity.
Another obstacle to progress on the peace plan is the deadlock over what to do with an estimated 200 Hamas fighters trapped in underground tunnels in parts of Gaza under the control of the Israeli military.
The fighters are believed to have had no contact with their leadership for months. They are known to have refused to surrender to Israel and are suspected of being behind a pair of deadly attacks against Israeli troops last month that triggered retaliatory air strikes that killed scores of Palestinians.
“Egypt does not want the stabilisation force to turn into an occupation force remotely run by the United States and Israel, or both,” said one of the sources. “It is asking for a clear idea of how long it will stay in Gaza, its mandate, goals and the kind of weapons that will be available to its members.”
According to the draft resolution, which was seen by The National in New York, the proposed force would work in co-ordination with Israel and Egypt, without altering their existing agreements, and alongside a newly trained and vetted Palestinian police service.
The force’s mandate would include stabilising the “security environment in Gaza by ensuring the process of demilitarising the Gaza Strip, including the destruction and prevention of rebuilding of the military, terror and offensive infrastructure, as well as the permanent decommissioning of weapons from non-state armed groups”.
The sources, however, said Egypt was opposed to the forcible disarmament of Hamas, preferring instead to take charge of collecting, decommissioning and storing the group's heavy weapons.
Egypt and Israel are bound by a US-sponsored peace treaty signed in 1979 but their relations have significantly soured over the Gaza war, with Cairo accusing its former adversary of genocide in Gaza and starving its population.
The second phase of President Trump's plan provides for the disarmament of Hamas and reconstruction of the coastal territory. Much of its built-up areas have been destroyed after a relentless military campaign by Israel in response to the deadly, Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in October 2023.
