Why Egypt is so important to Trump's Gaza peace plan

US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff alluded to Egypt's critical role in reaching an agreement on the first phase of President Donald Trump's plan for Gaza when he told President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi that the breakthrough would not have been possible without his support.

Egypt is apparently returning to the centre of light once again, after its relevance to regional issues frayed under the weight of its domestic economic and security problems for much of the past decade.

Cairo could now become a linchpin in propelling Trump’s plan - and regional peace efforts - forward. To do this, it will leverage its geographic proximity to Gaza and Israel, its past mediation expertise between the two sides, and its strategic interests.

Egypt's involvement in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has always been multifaceted, blending diplomacy, security guarantees, and humanitarian logistics to bridge gaps between reluctant parties while safeguarding its own borders and economy.

Even before recent talks started, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty had reportedly been influential in persuading Hamas to seriously engage, coordinating with Doha and Ankara to address the group's reservations, such as ensuring a permanent ceasefire and full Israeli withdrawal, while emphasising that "Hamas has no role in the day after" in Gaza.

The symbolism inherent in the selection of the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh as a venue for negotiations on Monday concerning the first phase of Trump's plan is quite clear: Egypt is repositioning itself as a regional political powerhouse.

But there will also now be scrutiny about Egypt's role in Gaza, especially in what it can do to advance the American president's plan in the coming weeks, months, and years.

Post-war stabilisation

Egypt will initially contribute a contingent of dozens of personnel to a larger force, which will also include 200 US troops, to monitor the ceasefire within the hostage/prisoner exchange agreement hammered out by Hamas and Israel in Sharm el-Sheikh on 9 October.

The same force will reportedly locate hostage remains and prevent arms smuggling into Gaza.

There is little information, however, about Egypt's role in the stabilisation force that will be formed in Gaza later to preserve order and security after the withdrawal of Israeli troops.

The force is due to be made up of troops from a host of countries, including key Arab and Islamic countries that backed Trump's plan for Gaza.

The Egyptian foreign minister had earlier said that his country would be ready to participate in a post-war force in Gaza, provided that it is mandated by the United Nations.

Nevertheless, security analysts in Cairo point to deep Egyptian concerns over overall security conditions in the Palestinian territory after Hamas is gone and Israeli troops withdraw.

Egypt's deepest fears, they added, are a post-withdrawal security vacuum inside Gaza, which will affect security conditions along its 13-kilometre border, something that drives its proactive stance at present.

"There is an urgent need for the presence of an international force in Gaza after Hamas abdicates power and Israel withdraws," retired Egyptian army general Nasr Salem told The New Arab.

"Egypt will be part of this force to ensure that there will not be a security vacuum in Gaza, one that threatens its borders," he added.

He and other analysts, meanwhile, say that Egypt will not want to shoulder the responsibility of policing Gaza alone. This was why Cairo sought to lock in US and Gulf commitments to share the burden.

In locking in these commitments, Egypt is keen to avoid a repeat of its administrative and security control of Gaza between 1948 and 1967, which overstretched its military capabilities and was believed to have ended disastrously with Israel's Sinai seizure.

Egypt has already rebuffed Israel's demand for a permanent presence on the Philadelphi Corridor (the Gaza-Egypt border axis), insisting on joint patrols instead.

This compromise, tied to Hamas's disarmament, addresses Cairo's concerns over possible Islamic State (IS) sleeper cells in Sinai, exploiting instability.

Egypt paid dearly in the past decade to eliminate the IS presence in Sinai, having sacrificed huge resources and lives to eradicate the group, which wanted to establish an Islamic caliphate there.

Such concerns partially drove additional Egyptian troop deployments in North Sinai in recent months, which angered the Israelis, who had asked the Americans to pressure Cairo to reverse these deployments.

Humanitarian aid and reconstruction

Egypt has been lobbying for an unlimited aid flow into Gaza since the beginning of the war, a demand that will finally be met within the first phase of the ceasefire that began on 10 October.

The agreement will reportedly raise the amount of aid entering Gaza to around 400 trucks daily, from dozens of trucks before its implementation. This is then supposed to be scaled up to 600 trucks, delivering food, medical supplies, and temporary housing like mobile homes.

The expected increase in the quantity of aid entering Gaza will be vital, given the enormous needs inside the war-shattered territory and arduous humanitarian conditions.

"Humanitarian needs inside Gaza are huge, given the deprivation the people of Gaza have been subjected to during the two years of the war," Osama Shaath, an advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, told TNA.

"Gaza's farmlands have all been destroyed and will be unable to produce food for many years to come," he added.

The increase in the quantity of aid entering Gaza will contribute to making the territory liveable after the massive devastation it sustained during the two years of the war.

This will build on the Gaza reconstruction plan formulated by Egypt and endorsed by Arab and Islamic states in March this year.

The plan, whose implementation will cost an estimated $53 billion and aimed to counter Trump's initial proposal to take over Gaza and build it into a "Riviera", prioritises in-situ reconstruction by 2030.

It will clear millions of tonnes of rubble, demine unexploded ordnance, and repurpose debris for infrastructure like solar-powered housing.

Trump's plan for ending the war in Gaza now incorporates Egyptian elements, with Cairo influencing the Board of Peace, a Trump-headed oversight body, including Tony Blair, for financing and technocratic governance until the Palestinian Authority (PA) assumes control.

Backed by Gulf donors and conditioned on political reforms within the PA, Egypt's blueprint for reconstructing Gaza ensures no Palestinian exodus, aligning with PA ambitions for post-war oversight, despite US and Israeli hesitance, analysts said.

"Egypt is pushing for PA control of Gaza because this is the only way to achieve the required administrative unity between Palestinian territories in Gaza and the West Bank," Shaath said.

"This unity is necessary for the founding of the aspired Palestinian state," he added.

An emergency Arab summit in March this year, aimed at securing Arab support for Egypt's Gaza reconstruction plan, positioned Egypt as the reconstruction architect of the war-devastated territory.

Egypt is now preparing to organise a donors' conference to raise the funds necessary for the reconstruction of Gaza.

The date of the conference has not been set yet, but some countries are already expressing enthusiasm about contributing funds.

Hamas's future role

Egypt's post-war involvement in Gaza prioritises security, aid delivery, and a stable transition away from Hamas's control in Gaza, aligning with Trump's vision of a technocratic Palestinian administration transitioning to PA control in a few months, most probably by mid-2026.

This suggests that Egypt will focus on dismantling Hamas's political and military influence, analysts say.

"Egypt insists on ending Hamas's rule of Gaza as a way of ending the conflict," Egyptian political analyst Ahmed Abdel Meguid told TNA.

"This group has offered the Palestinians in the past years, since it has taken over Gaza, nothing but wars and destruction," he added.

Egypt has pushed for Hamas's disarmament, with Cairo coordinating security measures to prevent arms smuggling and ensure stability.

Such a position is partly rooted, analysts say, in ideological differences between Egypt and Hamas, a group Cairo views as an ideological offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, the charity-educational organisation it has suppressed since outlawing it in 2013.

Saleh Salem is an Egyptian journalist