WASHINGTON — Egyptian President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi expressed guarded optimism about peace between Arabs and Israel, but also warned of the threat posed by Islamists, in a meeting with U.S. foreign policy experts that included Jewish organizational officials. Sisi met Wednesday morning at the Four Seasons hotel in Washington, D.C., with an array of…
According to reports by the pan-Arabic daily newspaper Al-Hayat, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak received a phone call from the newly appointed Egyptian Defense minister Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, in order to discuss the ties between the two countries, which share borders and a peace treaty. This would be the first time the two ministers speak to each other ever since the current Egyptian government has been formed, following the toppling of Hosni Mubarak’s former Egyptian regime in the Arab Spring of 2011. The Egyptian minister apparently reassured his Israeli counterpart of Egypt’s commitment to the peace treaty between the two states. This conversation comes following the terrorist attack which took place a few weeks ago, in which extremists shot dead several Egyptian patrol guards and barged Egypt’s border with Israel. Since then, Egyptian authorities deployed forces into the Sinai Peninsula, potentially causing tension with Israel, seeing as according to the 1979 peace treaty, the region of Sinai must remain demilitarized. With political changes on the ground in Egypt, with the Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Morsi voted into government, many feared that the delicate peace between Israel and Egypt would not last for long. And for this exact reason, it was reported that the conversation between the two defense ministers took place. Additionally, three weeks after it was closed down due to the deliberate violence in the region, the Rafah Crossing between Egypt and the …