Egypt army on high alert on border with Gaza, fearing Palestinian exodus

Egyptian armed forces have been on full alert at the border with Gaza since the start of latest Israeli offensive in Gaza City, anticipating a mass influx of Palestinian refugees to the enclave’s south.

Since the start of the Gaza war nearly two years ago, Cairo has repeatedly warned Israel against displacing the territory’s 2.3 million Palestinian inhabitants.

It has outright rejected any proposals to move these Palestinians to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

Israel’s recent ground and air offensive in Gaza City has already forcibly displaced around 400,000 people, who have moved to the southern part of the Strip close to the Egyptian border.

Egypt fears that it could be faced with a fait accompli if these displaced people are forced out of the Gaza Strip by Israel and pushed into northern Sinai.

Despite the severity of this crisis, Egypt will not suspend existing security agreements or protocols with Israel, two informed sources told The New Arab’s sister site, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed.

Egypt and Israel have shared diplomatic ties since 1979, but their relations have deteriorated since the start of the war in October 2023.

Egypt is also one of the mediators in the Gaza war, alongside Qatar – where Israel attacked Hamas leaders last week – and the United States, Israel’s main ally.

The unprecedented strike on Doha earlier this month has further complicated ceasefire talks, although Hamas said it would not pull out of negotiations.

The two sources said that the US and Israel do not want Egypt to play an active role in the upcoming ceasefire negotiations at this stage, as more Palestinians move towards the Egyptian border.

According to Egyptian officials, the most dangerous scenario would be thousands of Palestinians in Gaza swimming a short distance of 100 to 150 meters to escape the bombardment there, and crossing into Egyptian territory, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed quoted the sources as saying.

The official discourse in Cairo does not see these developments as something random, but rather as a deliberate plan aimed at creating a catastrophic scenario that places Egypt in direct confrontation with waves of survivors seeking safety.

This scenario is designed to portray Egypt as a "bad actor" preventing desperate Palestinians fleeing death from entering, while the truly responsible party – Israel – avoids accountability.

Such a scenario could constitute the beginning of a plan to target Egypt’s national security and the entire region, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed added.

Earlier this month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Egypt of "imprisoning" Palestinians in Gaza after Cairo made clear the mass forced displacement was a red line.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who has described the Israeli war in Gaza as "systematic genocide", has said his country would not become a gateway for the displacement of the territory's population.

Jordan, which also shares ties with Israel and borders it and the occupied West Bank to the east, has said displacing Palestinians would be considered by Amman an act of war.

Israel’s war in Gaza is increasingly being labelled a genocide worldwide

More than 65,000 people have been killed in the besieged enclave since the war began nearly two years ago, most of them women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.

Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.