Sisi Snubs Netanyahu Amid Deepening Rift Over Gaza, Rafah, and U.S. Mediation Efforts
In a stark rebuke that underscores the fragility of one of the Middle East’s most strategically vital alliances, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has firmly declined to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, despite repeated overtures from Tel Aviv and quiet encouragement from Washington. According to a well-informed Egyptian government source, the refusal is not a temporary diplomatic pause, but a deliberate stance rooted in months of unresolved grievances and profound mistrust.
“Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is not currently planning to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu,” the source confirmed, dismissing earlier media speculation about a potential summit in Cairo. The statement carries weight: it signals that Egypt, long seen as Israel’s most reliable Arab partner since the 1979 peace treaty, is no longer willing to lend its legitimacy to Netanyahu’s agenda, especially during an Israeli election year.
At the heart of this diplomatic freeze lies a tangle of strategic anxieties. Foremost among them is Egypt’s deep suspicion that Israel is quietly advancing a plan to push displaced Palestinians from the Gaza Strip into the Sinai Peninsula under the guise of “humanitarian relief” or “early reconstruction” in southern Gaza, particularly around Rafah. The source explicitly warned that Cairo views any such move as an existential threat, not only to regional stability, but to Egypt’s national sovereignty. “Cairo fears Israel’s willingness to push the Palestinians back to the Sinai Peninsula,” the official said, adding that Egypt “will not allow it.”
This concern is not hypothetical. The Rafah border crossing, the sole entry-exit point between Gaza and the outside world not controlled by Israel, remains open only for Palestinians seeking to flee—raising alarms in Cairo that Israel is facilitating a de facto population transfer. Egyptian intelligence and military circles see this as a dangerous precedent: the thinning of Gaza’s population could pave the way for permanent Israeli annexation or the creation of a buffer zone, effectively erasing any realistic prospect of a future Palestinian state contiguous with Egypt.
Compounding tensions is a diplomatic slight from last October, when Israel’s Energy Minister, Eli Cohen, abruptly withdrew from signing a gas agreement with Egypt, a deal that had been brokered with U.S. backing. The move, perceived in Cairo as both disrespectful and strategically self-serving, infuriated not only Egyptian officials but also American diplomats who had invested political capital in the arrangement. “The withdrawal… provoked the anger of Cairo and Washington,” the source noted, emphasizing that Washington itself deemed the revised terms “unfair to Israel” a rare admission that even U.S. allies found Tel Aviv’s renegotiation tactics excessive.
The breakdown goes beyond policy disputes. Personal dynamics matter deeply in Middle Eastern diplomacy, and the relationship between Sisi and Netanyahu has long been strained, marked by mutual suspicion and divergent priorities. Notably, the two leaders had not spoken even before the current Gaza war erupted, a telling indicator of how frayed the channel had become. While Netanyahu has recently made overtures to ease tensions, likely motivated by both military necessity and domestic political calculations, Sisi appears unmoved.
The Egyptian president’s position is clear: “Sisi refuses to communicate with Netanyahu until a fundamental change in Israel’s policy towards Cairo has taken place,” the source affirmed. Moreover, Sisi is determined not to be “instrumentalized” during Israel’s election cycle, a veiled but unmistakable reference to Netanyahu’s history of leveraging high-profile diplomatic gestures for political gain at home.
For Washington, this rift is deeply concerning. The U.S. has long relied on the Egypt-Israel partnership as a cornerstone of regional stability, counterterrorism cooperation, and efforts to contain Iranian influence. With Gaza in ruins and reconstruction plans stalled, American officials had hoped a Sisi-Netanyahu summit might unlock humanitarian access, coordinate border management, and build momentum toward a postwar framework. But Egypt’s stance reveals a hard truth: Cairo is no longer a passive partner in Israeli-American strategic designs.
Instead, Egypt is asserting its own red lines, sovereignty, demographic integrity, and regional dignity. In doing so, Sisi is sending a message not just to Tel Aviv, but to the entire international community: Egypt will not be used as a staging ground for solutions that undermine its national interests, no matter how dire the human toll in Gaza.
As the war grinds on and displacement soars, the silence between Cairo and Jerusalem speaks volumes. It is no longer merely a cooling of relations—it is a recalibration of power. And in this new calculus, Egypt is choosing sovereignty over symbolism, principle over photo ops, and its own future over Netanyahu’s political calendar.
