Egypt has publicly welcomed US President Donald Trump’s comprehensive plan to end the two-year Israel-Hamas war. The plan was initially discussed by Trump and a host of Arab and Muslim leaders during a meeting in New York on 23 September and then approved by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on 29 September.
The plan calls for a temporary governing board led by Trump for Gaza and including former British prime minister Tony Blair. It would not force residents to leave Gaza and declares the war would end immediately if both sides agreed.
President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi declared his support for Trump’s plan on Monday during a meeting with his Emirati counterpart Mohamed bin Zayed in Cairo, describing it as a step on the way to securing permanent and comprehensive peace in the region.
Six days earlier, Al-Sisi issued a statement expressing his appreciation of Trump’s efforts to stop the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip in particular and to achieve peace in the Middle East in general.
He added that the plan Trump first presented during his meeting with Arab and Muslim leaders in New York represents “an important foundation” upon which a lasting peace in the region could be built.
Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty, along with his counterparts in Jordan, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, Pakistan, and Indonesia, also welcomed Trump’s “sincere efforts” to end the war in Gaza, expressing their confidence in his ability to find a path to peace.
Abdelatty, in a speech at the UN on 27 September, said Egypt is fully committed to building on the vision of the US president to restore stability in the region.
Egyptian political observers consider Trump’s plan, which still has to be approved by Hamas, a victory for Cairo’s firm rejection of earlier Israeli and American proposals to displace the Palestinians in Gaza into the Sinai Peninsula.
Trump proposed in February that the US should take administrative control of Gaza and deport the Palestinians there to Egypt and Jordan. Egypt strongly rejected the proposal, calling it “an act of injustice”.
According to Ahmed Abaza, head of parliament’s Arab Affairs Committee, Trump’s plan is a win for Egypt, fulfilling a number of strategic and ideological objectives and deflecting national threats posed by Israel’s war on Gaza.
Abaza cited the plan as clearly stating that no one will be forced to leave Gaza, that those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return, and that Gazans will be encouraged to stay and offered the opportunity to build a better Gaza in future.
The plan says that “if both sides — Israel and Hamas — agree to it, the war will immediately end and Israeli forces will withdraw,” he said.
“This means that Trump and Netanyahu have backtracked from their earlier call for displacing the Palestinians due to strong opposition from Egypt and other Arab nations,” Abaza said, explaining that “when the plan stipulates that Israeli forces withdraw, this also means that threats to Egypt’s national security will subside or almost come to an end.”
The plan states that a temporary International Stabilisation Force (ISF) will be created to deploy in Gaza and that this will work with Egypt and Israel to help secure border areas, along with newly trained Palestinian police forces.
Trump’s plan also states that upon the agreement of the plan more aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip. “This is another win for Egypt as it has repeatedly criticised Israel for obstructing essential humanitarian relief supplies coming through the Rafah Crossing into Gaza,” Abaza said.
In a meeting with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in New York on Sunday, Abdelatty welcomed Trump’s commitment to working with regional leaders to end the war in Gaza.
“Once this plan goes into effect, Egypt will immediately move to organise an international conference for the early recovery and reconstruction of Gaza in coordination with the UN, the Palestinian Authority, and international partners,” Abdelatty said, noting that “Egypt is currently providing training to Palestinian security forces in order to be able to take control of Gaza once the war ends.”
Egypt has already formulated a plan for Gaza’s rebuilding, one that was endorsed by the Arab and Islamic nations in March this year.
The $53 billion plan will reconstruct the territory, most of which has been intentionally devastated by the Israeli army, in a phased manner, ensure the delivery of basic needs for Gaza’s close to two million people, and also offer them temporary shelters.
Prominent political analyst Tarek Fahmy believes that the Gaza reconstruction plan was Egypt’s answer to Trump’s plan to take over Gaza and build a “Middle East Riviera” there, which he unveiled for the first time in February.
“The reconstruction plan stresses rebuilding Gaza without the displacement of its people, an issue that was extremely concerning for Cairo, especially in the light of the demands by Trump for Egypt to receive Gaza refugees,” Fahmy said.
“This is why Egypt considers Trump’s new plan for Gaza, particularly its calling for reconstructing the Palestinian territory for the benefit of its people, a strategic win and a far cry from the earlier plan to take over Gaza.”
The reconstruction of Gaza for the benefit of its people allays Egypt’s fears about the possible displacement of its people and the dangerous impact of this on its national security.
Fahmy recalled that Trump’s earlier displacement plans for Gaza had prompted Egypt to take a wide range of military and security measures in Sinai, a move which some in Israel saw as a violation of the security protocol of the 1979 Peace Treaty between the two countries.
During a visit to the Egyptian Military Academy on 26 September, President Al-Sisi said that Egypt is committed to preserving the Peace Treaty with Israel. He also stressed that “no one should ask me to gamble with the lives of Egyptians and enter into a conflict with Israel to deliver aid to Gaza by force.”
Al-Sisi warned that the conflict in Gaza could expand into a wider war, with disastrous consequences for all the peoples in the region, if peace is not achieved.
The Trump plan is in harmony with another objective Egypt has tried to achieve in the past — approving the Palestinian Authority to take control of Gaza.
According to the plan, there will be a phased Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the institution of a post-war governance system that does not include either Hamas or Israel, with the objective of a secure Gaza that no longer poses a threat to Egypt, Israel, or its citizens.
The plan states that the Palestinian Authority can securely and effectively take back control of Gaza after it completes a reform programme.
In general, Fahmy said, Egypt’s approval of the Trump plan marks a pragmatic shift from Cairo’s earlier opposition to the US president’s more controversial February proposal for the US administrative takeover of Gaza and potential Palestinian displacement.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 2 October, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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