CAIRO — Egypt is formulating plans for a regional solution to the aftermath of the devastating war in Gaza that counter President Donald Trump’s idea of permanently displacing Palestinians from the territory to neighboring Arab states.
Egypt, which borders both Gaza and Israel, views any mass displacement of Palestinians into its territory as a red line.
Leaders from Arab League states are meeting in Cairo on Tuesday to jointly reject calls for displacement and to discuss counter-proposals spearheaded by Egypt in close coordination with powerhouse Saudi Arabia and others in the region.
The meeting, however, comes as the ceasefire in Gaza between Israel and Hamas is at risk of unraveling, threatening Egypt’s plans for the reconstruction of Gaza after the war.
Israel is currently blocking all humanitarian aid and goods from entering Gaza as its far-right government seeks to pressure Hamas into a new ceasefire deal to release more Israeli hostages, but without committing to permanently ending the war as Hamas is demanding.
As Egyptian mediators work to maintain the ceasefire, Egypt will be simultaneously hosting Arab leaders at the summit to secure region-wide support for its vision for Gaza’s future.
“We are builders. Egyptians are builders from the pyramids until now,” says Abdel-Moneim Said Aly, head of the advisory board of the Regional Center for Security Studies in Cairo.
“We need to have a plan of our own, not waiting for Mr. Trump to do it,” he says.
NPR has spoken with diplomats, intelligence officials and policy advisers in Egypt involved in these plans. NPR has also obtained a copy of one of the plans under review for a sustainable recovery in Gaza. These plans are rooted around Palestinians remaining on the land and lay the ground for what could be a lasting peace.
Egypt’s role in drafting a regional response to the U.S. and Israel
The plans drafted by Egypt are an attempt at tackling Gaza’s moonscape of rubble and debris, the result of some 16 months of war and sustained Israeli airstrikes. At least 48,000 Palestinians were killed and more than 110,000 wounded by Israeli fire in the war, according to Gaza’s health ministry. The war was sparked when an attack by Hamas-led militants on Israel killed around 1,200 people. Another 250 were taken hostage from Israel.
The United Nations says more than 90% of homes have been damaged or destroyed, overwhelmingly by Israeli airstrikes, along with most hospitals, schools and basic infrastructure like water, sewage and electricity networks.
Diplomats and security officials in Egypt tell NPR that Arab League states will be presented with a time-bound, multi-phased plan that includes bringing into Gaza thousands of mobile homes for Palestinians to live in while reconstruction of roads, housing and basic infrastructure is taking place.
Egypt also has ideas around what kinds of companies would be involved in the reconstruction, how to utilize solar panels for electricity and how to repurpose the huge amounts of rubble after it’s cleared of unexploded ordnance and thousands of bodies Gaza’s health ministry says are trapped under the debris.
Parallel Egyptian plans are being conceived to address political reforms, which will be key to securing international donor support for Gaza’s reconstruction, including from countries like Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. that are opposed to Hamas.
The creation of a temporary Palestinian administration of 15 to 20 people is being discussed, including with Israel. It would exclude figures from Hamas and the deeply unpopular Palestinian Authority, which currently runs areas of the occupied West Bank. It would be made up of technocrats unaffiliated to any Palestinian faction, according to the Egyptian plans shared with NPR.
The idea is this would eventually pave a path for a transformed Palestinian Authority to return to govern Gaza and exercise sovereignty over it and the West Bank. Gaza’s police force, which saw 1,400 officers killed in mostly targeted Israeli airstrikes in the war, would be revamped and given security training.
One of the plans seen by NPR also looks into questions around what kind of body would oversee the tens of billions of dollars needed to rebuild Gaza after the war and what kinds of levers of accountability will be in place to address donor concerns over corruption.
This plan also lays out various scenarios and looks at what role international bodies like the U.N. could play, as well as countries like the United States and those in the BRICS alliance, like Russia and China.
It lays out a range of costs for rebuilding Gaza, estimating an overall reconstruction price tag between $50 billion and $80 billion, dependent on whether hostilities fully cease or not.
The plan draws from Europe’s U.S.-led recovery after World War II, and more recent examples, like Bosnia.
Ayman Ismail, a Harvard-educated real estate developer in Egypt and strategist involved in conceiving Cairo’s New Administrative Capital, tells NPR the solutions being formulated have a chance to succeed.
“The world has managed to solve problems similar like that,” Ismail said. “I mean the U.S. itself led the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe, so we could actually do the same.”
Egyptian experts whom NPR spoke with say the primary focus in Egypt’s reconstruction plans is the immediate humanitarian crisis in Gaza, but these also need to be linked to a wider peace process.
U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, who will be attending the March 4 Arab League summit in Cairo, says the most urgent task now is maintaining the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel and ensuring aid reaches people in Gaza.
He says there must be a clear political framework for Gaza that addresses Israel’s legitimate security concerns and ensures no reductions in Gaza’s territory or the forced transfer of its population.
“Palestinians deserve lasting stability and a just and principled peace. And the people of Israel deserve to live in peace and security,” Guterres said.
Aly, of the Regional Center for Security Studies in Cairo, has been reaching out to Egyptian thinkers, architects and business leaders to solicit ideas for a way out of the current crisis.
He says any solutions today require a comprehensive and lasting peace between Arabs and Israel, which can only happen when Palestinians have a state.
“Everything is destroyed and everybody is pessimistic, but that is the point in which certain people, thinkers, start to talk that it is possible,” Said says about peace.
Trump’s plans lack regional supportÂ
Trump has floated his ideas for Mideast peace repeatedly since taking office. His plan centers on permanently displacing Gaza’s roughly 2 million Palestinians into countries like Egypt and Jordan before taking over the strip of land and turning it into a seaside real estate project. Trump, an ardent supporter of Israel, calls the war-ridden landscape of Gaza, uninhabitable. He has described Gaza as a “hell hole” and “demolition site,” and says Palestinians will have better lives elsewhere.
He recently posted an apparently AI-generated video to his social media accounts, showing Gaza as a playground for the rich, dotted with golden statues of himself, as he lounges on its shores with Israel’s prime minister. The creator of the video was not identified, but it drew strong criticism from Palestinians in Gaza, as well as Arab and Muslim Americans appalled that Trump shared it.
Egypt’s former foreign minister and former ambassador to the United States, Nabil Fahmy, says Egypt will not participate in a policy that expels Palestinians and erases their aspirations for an independent state.
“You cannot by use of force simply erase the Palestinians. We won’t accept that because then you’re applying that standard throughout,” he says. “We will not participate in that.”
Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi has stated since the beginning of the war in October 2023 that the expulsion of Palestinians, whether voluntary or forced, would threaten regional security because it risks drawing Egypt and Israel into direct conflict. This would unravel the peace treaty between the two countries and upend what’s been the lynchpin of U.S. foreign policy in the region for the past 45 years.
Ahmed Abuhamda contributed reporting from Cairo.
Transcript:
SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Israel has stopped the entry of all goods and supplies into the Gaza Strip. The move comes amid fragile negotiations after the first of a planned three-phase ceasefire expired Saturday. Earlier today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there will be, quote, “additional consequences” if Hamas does not agree to a temporary extension by releasing more hostages. But in a statement today, Hamas accused Israel of evading the initial framework of the ceasefire plan. At the center of this back and forth is Egypt where mediators met this past week to hammer out this new phase. And with us to explain what is going on behind the scenes is NPR’s Aya Batrawy. Hello.
AYA BATRAWY, BYLINE: Hi.
DETROW: So you spent time in Cairo this past week talking to officials. Tell us what you have learned about Egypt’s role in all of this.
BATRAWY: Well, Egypt is in a unique position. It was the first Arab country to make peace with Israel nearly 46 years ago, and that was after it had fought wars with Israel. So Egypt has decades of experience talking to, mediating, negotiating with Israel, and it also talks directly with Hamas and other Palestinian factions. Second, Egypt directly borders Gaza and Israel, so it has a stake in what happens there, and it’s impacted by the instability around it. Another key factor here, Scott, is that Egypt has the knowledge, the manpower, the experience and the minds to come up with ideas and strategies that the Arab states can get behind. And Egypt has traditionally done this, and it’s doing so now even, as we’re seeing with its mediation in the ceasefire in Gaza.
DETROW: One of the biggest developments since this initial deal went to place is President Trump coming into office and then saying that he wants to see Gaza’s 2 million Palestinians permanently relocated to countries like Egypt and Jordan. He wants to turn Gaza into a beachfront real estate project. How concerned are Egyptians about all of that?
BATRAWY: Everyone I spoke to in Egypt says this would be deeply destabilizing. They say it’s a bad idea, basically. Any displacement of Palestinians, whether forced or voluntary, into Egypt is a red line for Egypt. It’s a national security breach. I spoke with Nabil Fahmy. He was Egypt’s ambassador to the U.S., and he served as foreign minister of Egypt. He tells me about another concern Egypt has.
NABIL FAHMY: The idea that, well, Israel is strong enough today with Western support, and so they can push them into Jordan or push them into Egypt is a nonstarter for us. It would also, frankly, very seriously impinge on our peace agreement.
BATRAWY: So basically what Fahmy is saying here is that if Israel believes it’s strong enough to push people off the land, what’s to stop them from doing so into the Sinai Peninsula or Egypt? So that’s why Egypt is also building up its defenses in this territory now as a precaution. So again, the view here is that Trump’s plan could draw Egypt into a direct conflict with Israel, upending the peace accords and security in the region.
DETROW: So has Egypt offered an alternative plan, though?
BATRAWY: Yeah. I mean, it has actually several plans along several tracks. The first is basic reconstruction. You have tens of thousands of Palestinians killed in Gaza, more than 90% of homes damaged or destroyed. Basic infrastructure there needs to be rebuilt. So this plan looks at – how do you repurpose the rubble? How do you bring in temporary homes for Palestinians to live in and other technical details? And a copy obtained by NPR for one of Egypt’s plans under reviews estimates that construction could cost 50- to $80 billion. Now, this multiphased (ph) plan that Egypt is drafting will be presented to leaders of Arab League states converging in Cairo on Tuesday, and I’m told by diplomats in the meeting that Arab states will unite around Egypt’s reconstruction plans for Gaza with Palestinians staying on the land. That part is key.
Now, other plans Egypt is drafting look at broader issues of governance, like a temporary Palestinian authority to administer Gaza that does not include Hamas. Police in Gaza would be retrained to provide security, and a reformed Palestinian Authority, which governs parts of the West Bank at the moment, could come in and then also govern Gaza at some point down the line.
DETROW: You would need so much international cooperation, though, the Gulf Arab states, the U.S., Israel. How does Egypt get these plans off the ground?
BATRAWY: Exactly. This is really difficult stuff. But Egypt says it has to keep doing this. It has to keep working and formulating these ideas because there’s no alternative to peace, and they say that peace can only be achieved if you establish a Palestinian state. So all the plans now being drafted in Cairo are seen as a starting point for what could be eventually, down the line, an actual Palestinian-Israeli peace process. And I met with Abdel Monem Said Aly. He heads the advisory board of the Regional Center for Security Studies in Cairo, and he says Egypt is taking the lead in formulating these ideas for a way out of the crisis.
ABDEL MONEM SAID ALY: We are builders. I mean, Egyptians are builders from the pyramids until now. We need to have a plan of our own, not waiting for Mr. Trump to do it.
BATRAWY: So in other words, he says it’s like this – there’s a fire in Egypt’s neighborhood, and Egyptians have to work to try to put it out, so it doesn’t spread. And so Egypt’s working with other Arab states like Saudi Arabia. And this Arab League summit in Cairo on Tuesday is basically the Arab states saying that they can come up with solutions and – on their own and maybe even a pathway for peace.
DETROW: That is NPR’s Aya Batrawy with a reporting from Cairo. Thanks for bringing it to us.
BATRAWY: Thanks, Scott.
