Is Egypt violating the 1979 peace treaty with Israel? It appears so.
In 1979, Egypt made history by becoming the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with Israel, based on two founding documents known as the Camp David Accords. For decades, peace between the two countries was cold. Anti-Israeli rhetoric remained alarming in Egypt, while people-to-people relations were extremely weak. Still, the peace held.
But recently, the war in Gaza has tested that peace. Revelations of dozens of Hamas tunnels, some of them quite extensive, have raised questions about Egypt’s compliance with the deal that has brought Cairo billions of dollars in U.S. tax dollars. The tunnels, which stretch from Gaza to the Sinai Peninsula, are believed to have served as military supply routes for the terrorist group. In addition to facilitating the import of hard currency to pay Hamas fighters, the tunnels have played a role in allowing the group’s leaders and fighters to enter and exit the enclave to receive training and guidance from its patrons.
The 1979 peace treaty included a series of obligations for both countries, aimed at avoiding conflict and ensuring mutual security. The pact was “intended to constitute a basis for peace not only between Egypt and Israel, but also between Israel and any of its other Arab neighbors willing to negotiate peace with it on that basis.”
Article III, paragraph 2, of the preamble to the peace agreement explicitly requires both parties to “ensure that acts or threats of belligerence, hostility or violence do not originate in or are committed from their territories.” This clause also requires both parties to hold accountable the perpetrators of such acts.
So much for that. Recent Israeli operations along the Philadelphia Corridor, the narrow strip of land that borders Egypt and Gaza, have uncovered numerous tunnels and access points used by Hamas, some in plain sight of Egyptian watchtowers. If it can be argued that Egypt lacks the capacity to address this problem, it is equally plausible that it lacks the will.
Either way, it’s a serious problem.
Noam Galai/Getty Images
According to the Israeli military’s chief spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, the Philadelphia Corridor served as a “Hamas oxygen line,” allowing the regular smuggling of weapons into Gaza. After Israel took control of the corridor, Israeli forces reported discovering at least 20 tunnels. On August 4, an unusually wide tunnel, three meters high, was discovered. Unconfirmed reports suggest that a tunnel may extend beneath Egypt’s Rafah airport, to allow the direct supply of weapons to Hamas from regional flights landing in the Sinai Peninsula.
The tunnel problem is not new. Hamas tunnels have been crisscrossing the Egypt-Gaza border since the early 2000s. In 2006, Yuval Diskin, then director of the Shin Bet, said that “the Egyptians know who the smugglers are and they do not deal with them… They received intelligence about this from us and did not use it.” In 2007, The New York Times Israeli officials were reported to have sent videotapes to U.S. officials showing Egyptian border guards assisting in the smuggling.
After the Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi regime took control of Egypt in 2014, the Egyptians destroyed many of the tunnels, a policy that stemmed from the new regime’s belief that Hamas was inextricably linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, which Cairo viewed as an existential threat. But in 2018, the tunnels began operating again.
It is not clear why the Israelis did not sound the alarm. The Israeli government must explain itself. But so must Egypt, because it allowed Hamas to operate the tunnels in violation of its obligations under the treaty.
Was Egypt motivated by money, amid rapid and prolonged economic decline in recent years? Was Cairo paid off by Hamas or its wealthy patron Qatar? Did the Iranians play a role? Was Egypt threatened with violence and unrest by the Sinai Bedouin Tribes Union, the main profiteers from smuggling, if it did not allow the tunnels to operate? Or did the Sisi regime take part in this operation out of ideological hatred of Israel?
It is important to answer these questions, but Cairo’s guilt is now clear.
These remarks are likely to have broader implications than just bilateral relations between Egypt and Israel. Egypt appears to have directly damaged American diplomatic and strategic interests in the Middle East.
There is a debate raging in Israel about the Philadelphia Corridor. Some argue that Israel should give up control of the border to secure the release of the hostages and a ceasefire. Others argue that Israel can never leave the corridor to permanently disrupt Hamas smuggling. This is a false binary. Instead, Israel must work with Washington to ensure that Egypt installs an Israeli-designed underground security system that would prevent Hamas from exploiting the border in the future.
This is a directive that only Washington can issue.
For reasons that are unclear, the Biden administration has failed to engage Egypt, much less demand answers.
No one wants this important peace to be broken. But that does not mean we should ignore the problem. The U.S. Congress should consider conditioning aid to Egypt until it meets its obligations.
In the meantime, Cairo must begin to acknowledge the security problems that have only worsened over the years, contributing to the October 7 attacks and the regional war that followed.
Jonathan Schanzer is senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow him on X @JSchanzerMariam Wahba is a research analyst at FDD. Follow her on X @themariamwahba.
