Amid war in Gaza, is Cairo attempting a comeback in Lebanon?

Since the start of the war in Gaza, the newly appointed Egyptian ambassador to Beirut, Alaa Moussa, has made countless visits and held talks on the situation in Lebanon.

This dynamic may be surprising because although Egypt is part of the quintet involved in the Lebanese dossier (alongside France, the United States, Saudi Arabia and Qatar), it has until now been the most discreet member of this group.

But the regional crisis, in which Hezbollah is a main player, seems to have sharpened Cairo’s interest in Lebanon. Historically, Egypt often exerted a great deal of influence in the country. Are they seeking to reclaim this power?

“Egypt has always played an important role in Lebanon, albeit discreetly,” Mohanad Hage Ali, an analyst at the Carnegie Middle East Center, told L’Orient-Le Jour. “It is particularly present in Sunni circles.”

This was the case during the very first years of Lebanon’s existence. “When Greater Lebanon was declared by the French, an inter-Lebanese debate emerged on the sectarian distribution of seats in Parliament,” recounted historian Mohammed Ali El Kouzi. “It was Egyptian Prime Minister Mustafa Nahas Pacha who intervened, at the request of the Sunnis in Beirut, to ensure that Muslims were represented more equally: six Christians for every five Muslims.”

With Gamal Abdel Nasser’s accession to power in 1956, Egypt’s influence grew in Lebanon, particularly in the (predominantly Muslim) left-wing circles that were attracted by its Arab nationalist discourse.

In 1958, Egypt and Syria formed the United Arab Republic, a federation — under its domination — that many Lebanese wanted to join. That year, in Lebanon, clashes broke out between supporters of the pro-Western president Camille Chamoun and the pro-Nasser opposition.

To restore calm, a consensus was reached, with an Egyptian and US green light, to elect Army Chief Fouad Chehab as president. Chehab pursued a policy of appeasement towards Abdel Nasser.

“Cairo’s influence in Lebanon climaxed in those years,” added Kouzi.

“This was also the case in the cultural sphere, with Egypt opening the Arab University of Beirut, which ended the monopoly of Western universities on higher education in Lebanon. But after the death of Abdel Nasser and the arrival of Anwar Sadat to power in 1970, Egypt gradually lost its role in Lebanon to other regional powers, led by Saudi Arabia.” But it has not completely disappeared.

The Quartet becomes a quintet

“Egypt played a key role in several episodes in our modern history,” said Hage Ali. “For instance, when Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his resignation while he was in Riyadh in 2017, the Egyptians played an important role in enabling him to return to Lebanon. They are also close to Dar al-Fatwa and some Sunni figures, including former Interior Minister Nohad Machnouk.”

Moreover, since the start of the economic crisis in Lebanon in 2019, the Egyptian embassy has maintained a field hospital in Beirut’s Sunni Tariq al-Jdideh neighborhood.

“When Hezbollah carried out a military offensive against Beirut’s Sunni neighborhoods in May 2008, then Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak considered the prospect of an intervention by his army, which is the most powerful in the Arab world,” a Sunni political figure told L’Orient-Le Jour.

More recently, at a time when it was becoming increasingly clear (for those who still doubted it) that the Lebanese presidential election could not take place without the international community’s intervention, a meeting of influential countries on the local scene was held in Paris on Feb. 6, 2023.

Initially, the meeting was to be attended only by representatives of France, the US, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. “The Egyptians then expressed to the French their interest in taking part [in the meeting], and were convened,” an Arab diplomatic source told L’Orient-Le Jour.

The quartet became the quintet, even if Egypt did not play a proactive role in the negotiations. That is, until Oct. 7.

Since Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood and the subsequent war, Cairo has been at the forefront of de-escalation efforts. First, because of its geographical position. President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi fears a massive displacement of Gazans to Sinai, which borders the Palestinian enclave, as some in Israel hope. He therefore wants a ceasefire as soon as possible and is using all his influence to achieve it.

“Before the war, Egypt led reconciliation efforts between Hamas, which governs Gaza, and the Palestinian Authority (PA) which is based in the West Bank,” said Hage Ali. “As a result, it now holds a key position in the negotiations, since there is near-consensus on the fact that the PA will have to play a role in Gaza after the war.”

“But whoever wants to influence the Palestinian issue knows that they cannot bypass Beirut, where Palestinian policy generally takes shape,” he added.

Moreover, the possibility that the Oct.7 attack was, at least in part, orchestrated from Beirut’s southern suburbs, Hezbollah’s stronghold, cannot be ruled out. An ally of Hamas and a heavyweight in the Iran-aligned axis, Hezbollah established itself (along with Teheran) as a key player since the start of hostilities, having turned south Lebanon into a “support front” for the Palestinian group.

Hezbollah has also enabled Hamas and even Islamic Jihad to consolidate their political and military presence in the many Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, as well as on the Lebanese-Israeli border.

Faced with this reality, the quintet has had to broaden its mission beyond the presidential election and is now focusing on brokering an agreement to halt hostilities in south Lebanon and restore long-term stability to the border area, in particular by pushing away Hezbollah (or at least its heavy weapons) and its allies.

‘They talk to everyone’

Instability in the Red Sea is also one of Egypt’s concerns, as it has a major impact on the country’s economy. In support of Hamas, the Yemeni Houthis are attempting to prevent ships from reaching Israeli ports, thereby hampering the flow of shipping around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which shipping companies are increasingly fleeing for fear of their safety.

As a result, according to the authorities in Cairo, the Suez Canal lost more than 46 percent of its revenues in January, depriving the Egyptian Treasury of more than $400 million.

Hezbollah, which has served as commander of the “resistance axis,” wields considerable influence over the Houthis.

“Contacts between the Egyptians and Haret Hreik [a neighborhood within Beirut’s southern suburbs] are ongoing, and the Red Sea is one of the issues discussed,” said the Arab diplomatic source.

“The Egyptians are also worried about the rise in power of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya,” a Lebanese branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, the source added.

Since the start of the war in Gaza, this Sunni Islamist party has been taking part in the fighting in south Lebanon alongside Hezbollah and seems to be growing in popularity, at a time when the Sunni public opinion has been without a leader following Hariri’s withdrawal from politics.

Historically, Egypt has pursued a policy of repression against the Muslim Brotherhood, especially under the rule of Sisi, who became president after ousting Brotherhood President Mohammed Morsi.

“The Egyptians want to contain the al-Jamaa al-Islamiya’s rise to power, and that is why they are working with several Sunni figures so as to encourage them to move forward with the political reform process in Lebanon,” said the Sunni political figure.

“They have the advantage of being able to talk to everyone, but that doesn’t mean that they will be able to take over from their [Sunni] partners in the quintet, especially Riyadh, which remains unavoidable and no longer sees Cairo as a rival.”

What is Egypt lacking? “To be influential in Lebanon today, one needs petrodollars,” said Kouzi.

This article was originally published in French in L'Orient-Le Jour. Translation by Joelle El Khoury.