Can Egypt be a hub for global grain trading?

Despite the absence of the Egyptian president, El-Sisi, from the United Nations General Assembly meeting (UNGA) for the second year in a row, the Egyptian state had a strong presence in New York City last week. The Egyptian delegation discussed pressing issues on the regional and world stages and offered practical solutions for global crises, wherein Egypt can play a central role.

The Egyptian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sameh Shoukry, proposed to the UNGA attendees, among other issues, the potential of Egypt to establish a center for international storage and trading of grain. In his speech before the UNGA’s 77th meeting in late September, Shoukry reiterated Egypt’s call for designing a comprehensive and complementary strategy to address the global food crisis and its dire consequences on developing countries, especially after witnessing the consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the global food security. 

“We need to develop farming and food systems to meet the urgency of food importing in developing countries. We have to ensure the transfer of agricultural technologies to support the early warning systems related to food insecurity,” Shoukry told world leaders. 

“It is also important to develop a stable international mechanism for grain storage and trading. In this context, Egypt, thanks to its unique geographical location, is ready to act as an international hub for the supplying, storage, and trading of grain;” Shoukry suggested, adding that “This shall effectively contribute to guaranteeing international food security.”

If accomplished, the global hub for grain storage and trading could turn Egypt into the new world center of food and energy supplies. Egypt has already experienced relative success, during the past few years, in becoming a regional hub for liquified natural gas. The global energy crisis resulting from the war in Ukraine has enhanced Egypt’s role as a center for gas production and exportation to Europe and other geographies. A few days ago, the Egyptian Minister of Finance said that Egypt’s revenues from natural gas exports have increased to 500 million dollars per month due to the increase in demand. 

However, the Egyptian proposal to act as a hub for grain trading seems too ambitious, at the moment, given Egypt’s limited technical and logistical capacities regarding preserving agricultural products. Egypt has an advantageous geographic location between three continents and the perfect weather to store grain. But these natural factors are not enough. Major structural and policy reforms in the agricultural sector should be applied to prepare Egypt for becoming a hub for world grain trading. In addition, several changes in Egypt’s regional policy, especially in the Mediterranean, should change for such a project to succeed.

Until recently, about 15% of the annual local harvest of wheat, which is mainly used for making subsidized bread, used to be wasted because of inappropriate storage conditions. Egypt barely had only nine silos nationwide to store the harvested and imported wheat and other grain products. Yet, in 2016, the Egyptian president assigned the Egyptian Holding Company for Silos and Storage to work on a national project to build 50 new silos in 17 governorates. The project has, so far, completed building 33 new silos in 2021. 

If Egypt wants to act as a hub for the grain trade, it has to, at least, double the number of silos it currently owns. It is also important for the Egyptian government to invest in integrating advanced technologies into its agriculture and harvest preservation systems, to assure global suppliers that their harvest will be appropriately preserved inside Egypt. That is plenty of work that will take a lot of effort and funding to be accomplished, but it is definitely worth the sweat. 

Lesson Learnt from Qatar-Egypt Successful Reconciliation

There is a remarkable shift in Qatar’s regional policy that is worthy of praise and admiration. For the first time since the 1980s, the Qatari leadership dusts off the hindering strategy of supporting rabble-rousing political Islamist groups against the interests of neighboring Arab governments. Instead, Qatar has become keen on rebuilding healthy relationships with Arab neighbor states. 

That new approach promises the restoration of political stability in the region and prepares Qatar to be one of the regional agenda-setters. By winning back the trust of its sister Arab countries, Qatar is reintroducing itself as the powerful hub that can effectively connect Arab and non-Arab countries of the Middle East region. Qatar is the only Arab country that enjoys deep and solid relationships with Turkey and Iran, in addition to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Qatar’s Prince, Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani, told Le Point Magazine, last week, that his country has no relationship with the political Islamists. Also, he emphasized that no active members of the Muslim Brotherhood are allowed to live in Qatar.

“This relationship [with political Islamists] does not exist, and there are no active members of the Muslim Brotherhood or any related groups on Qatari soil;” asserted Prince Tamim. “We are an open country, and a large number of people with different opinions and ideas pass through it. But we are a state and not a party, and we deal with states and their legitimate governments, not with political organizations.”

Prince Tamim’s impressive statements coincided with Egypt’s President, Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, first visit to Doha, as part of the mutual effort to improve ties, after four years of diplomatic boycott and media wars that set the entire region on fire. Since the signing of Al-Ula Declaration, under the Saudi-led Arab reconciliation initiative, the relationship between Egypt and Qatar has been steadily progressing on all levels. 

The economic sector is one of the arenas where that improvement is evident. In the past year alone, Qatar invested tens of billions of dollars in Egypt’s tourism and petroleum sectors. Moreover, Qatar promised, in May, to participate in elevating the struggling Egyptian economy by scheduling grander investments over the coming four years. 

The political rivalry between Egypt and Qatar dates back to the 1980s. It is perhaps older than the age of Prince Tamim himself. In the past seven years, this rivalry hit the peak point when El-Sisi and Tamim adopted opposing positions about the legitimacy of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, the recent awakening of the Qatari Prince to the fact that state-to-state relationships are more viable and durable is momentous. 

The early signs of Prince Tamim’s abandonment of the Muslim Brotherhood appeared during his visit to Cairo in June. The Qatari Prince congratulated his Egyptian counterpart on the June 30th anniversary. Prince Tamim’s recognition of the June 30th anniversary was almost an announcement of this new strategy, as this anniversary celebrates the fall of the Muslim Brotherhood from power in 2013 and the ascendence of president El-Sisi to power in 2014. 

The successful case of Egypt-Qatar reunion, and its massive impact on weakening the Muslim Brotherhood group, should encourage Egypt to consider taking loftier steps towards reconciliation with Turkey. Similar to Qatar, Turkey had been a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood group against El-Sisi’s leadership. However, in the past two years, Turkey has drastically changed its policy in the Middle East. The Turkish leadership withdrew support to the Muslim Brotherhood to focus on rebuilding healthy relationships with Arab states and Israel. 

To close the circle of Middle East solidarity that would ensure long-term regional political stability, the time has come for Egypt to respond to Turkey’s extending hand of peace the same way it did with Qatar.

درس مستفاد من المصالحة بين مصر وقطر

إن التحول الكبير في سياسة قطر الإقليمية هو أمر يستحق الترحيب والإعجاب. لأول مرة منذ الثمانينيات، تنفض القيادة القطرية عن نفسها غبار الاستراتيجية المعيقة المتمثلة في دعم جماعات الإسلام السياسي ضد مصالح الحكومات العربية. بدلاً من ذلك، أصبحت قطر حريصة على إعادة بناء علاقات صحية مع جميع الدول العربية الشقيقة بلا استثناء.

يبشر النهج الجديد في سياسة قطر باستعادة الاستقرار السياسي في المنطقة، بل أكثر من ذلك فهو يُعد قطر لتكون واحدة من أكبر المؤثرين في أجندة الشرق الأوسط السياسية والاقتصادية، حيث أن بإمكان قطر بعد استعادة ثقة الدول العربية الشقيقة، أن تعيد تقديم نفسها كمحور لربط الدول العربية وغير العربية في المنطقة بشكل حقيقي وفعال، نظراً لحقيقة أن قطر هي الدولة العربية الوحيدة التي تتمتع بعلاقات عميقة ومتينة مع تركيا وإيران، بالإضافة إلى أهم دولتين في جوار الشرق الأوسط – أفغانستان وباكستان. 

صرّح أمير قطر، تميم بن حمد آل ثاني، لمجلة "لو بوينت" الفرنسية، الأسبوع الماضي، أن بلاده لا علاقة لها بالإسلام السياسي، وأكد أنه لا يُسمح لأي عضو نشط في جماعة الإخوان بالعيش في قطر، احتراماً لعلاقتها مع الدول العربية الأخرى التي تصنف جماعة الإخوان كتنظيم إرهابي. 

حيث قال الأمير تميم نصاً: "هذه العلاقة [مع جماعات الإسلام السياسي] غير موجودة، ولا يوجد أعضاء نشطون في جماعة الإخوان المسلمين أو أي جماعات مرتبطة بها على الأراضي القطرية. نحن دولة منفتحة، يمر عبرها عدد كبير من الأشخاص ذوي الآراء والأفكار المختلفة. لكننا دولة ولسنا حزباً، وبالتالي نحن نتعامل مع الدول وحكوماتها الشرعية، ليس مع منظمات سياسية". 

تزامنت تصريحات الأمير تميم المثيرة للإعجاب مع زيارة الرئيس المصري عبد الفتاح السيسي للدوحة، في إطار الجهود المتبادلة لتحسين العلاقات، بعد أربع سنوات من المقاطعة الدبلوماسية والحروب الإعلامية التي أشعلت النار في المنطقة بأكملها. منذ توقيع بيان العلا، في إطار مبادرة المصالحة العربية التي قادتها السعودية العام الماضي، تتقدم العلاقة بين مصر وقطر باطراد على جميع المستويات.

القطاع الاقتصادي هو أحد المجالات التي يتضح فيها هذا التحسن. في العام الماضي وحده، استثمرت قطر عشرات المليارات من الدولارات في قطاعي السياحة والبترول في مصر. علاوة على ذلك، وعدت قطر الحكومة المصرية، في شهر مايو، بالمشاركة في النهوض بالاقتصاد المصري المتعثر من خلال جدولة استثمارات أكبر على مدى السنوات الأربع المقبلة. وأثناء الزيارة الأخيرة للرئيس السيسي إلى الدوحة، تم توقيع عدة اتفاقيات لتعزيز التعاون بيم البلدين على المدى الطويل. 

يعود التنافس السياسي بين مصر وقطر إلى حقبة الثمانينيات، أي أنها ربما تكون أقدم من عمر الأمير تميم نفسه. لكن، في السنوات السبع الماضية، وصل هذا التنافس إلى ذروته عندما تبنى السيسي وتميم مواقف متعارضة حول شرعية الإخوان المسلمين. مع ذلك، فإن صحوة الأمير القطري مؤخرًا على حقيقة أن العلاقات بين الدول أكثر استمرارية هو أمر بالغ الأهمية، لأنه يشير إلى أن منطقة الشرق الأوسط المشتعلة بالصراعات قد بدأت تدخل في حالة نضوج سياسي. 

ظهرت بوادر تخلي الأمير تميم عن جماعة الإخوان المسلمين خلال زيارته للقاهرة في شهر يونيو، حيث حرص الأمير القطري على تهنئة نظيره المصري بذكرى الثلاثين من يونيو، فيما بدى على أنه إعلان من الأمير تميم للاستراتيجية الجديدة، عبر الإقرار بشرعية الدولة المصرية الحالية وسقوط شرعية الإخوان، حيث تمثل الثلاثين من يونيو ذكرى سقوط الإخوان المسلمين من السلطة في عام ٢٠١٣ وصعود الرئيس السيسي إلى السلطة في عام ٢٠١٤.

إن نجاح قضية لم الشمل بين مصر وقطر، وتأثيرها الهائل على إضعاف جماعة الإخوان المسلمين، ينبغي أن يشجع مصر على التفكير في اتخاذ خطوات أكبر نحو المصالحة مع تركيا. فقد كانت تركيا، على غرار قطر، داعمة لجماعة الإخوان المسلمين ضد قيادة السيسي في الماضي. لكن في العامين الماضيين، غيرت تركيا بشكل جذري سياستها في الشرق الأوسط، حيث سحبت القيادة التركية دعمها للإخوان المسلمين ضد الدولة المصرية، من أجل التركيز على إعادة بناء علاقات صحية مع الدول العربية وإسرائيل. 

لإغلاق دائرة التضامن الإقليمي في الشرق الأوسط التي من شأنها ضمان الاستقرار السياسي الإقليمي على المدى الطويل، حان الوقت لكي تستجيب مصر ليد تركيا الممدودة بالسلام، مثلما فعلت مع قطر. فمن يدري، ربما يقود ذلك إلى نتائج سياسية لصالح المنطقة أفضل بكثير من حالة الشقاق الحالية بين البلدين.

The Suez Canal Between Ambitions and Inflation

The Egyptian state is working on magnifying the Suez Canal revenues as part of a larger plan to increase the inflow of foreign currency and control inflation. However, the policies adopted to achieve these goals may easily backfire if they are not paralleled with drastic changes in Egypt’s foreign trade policy. 

Egypt is one of the countries that suffered the most from the economic consequences of the global standoff around the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In the financial year 2022/2023, the Egyptian state has to flex its tight budget to contain an increase of 19.7% in spending, which will create a budget deficit of 6.1%, to cover the shortage in food supplies. 

Meanwhile, the Egyptian government has been battling dollar scarcity by devaluing the Egyptian pound and accepting generous dollar deposits from Arab Gulf countries. The official statistics of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) tell that, in July, the inflation rate hit 14.5%, and the foreign currency reserves fell to 33.14 billion dollars.

The Egyptian state decided to walk on two parallel wires to deal with this situation. The first route is to restrict imports to prevent the quick drain of the dollar reserves. The second trail is to maximize the revenues of the Suez Canal, the highest foreign currency resource after the remittances sent by the Egyptians abroad, which reached 31.9 billion dollars for the first time, this year.

Admiral Osama Rabie, Chairperson of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA), declared that the canal’s monthly revenues hit a record of 704 million dollars in August. That is 60% more than the revenues earned at a similar time last year. He explained that most of these revenues came from the high traffic of petroleum cargo ships traveling from Arab Gulf countries to Europe to compensate for the boycott of Russian oil.

Earlier this week, SCA stated an increase of 15% on transit fees for all vessels and 10% for dry bulk cargos and tourist transporters. The authority justified the fee raise by the necessity of matching the upsurge in the costs of maritime operations and services resulting from global inflation. Ironically, the increase in transit fees will magnify inflation in the world market, which will eventually echo in hiking inflation in the Egyptian domestic market because Egypt imports at least 70% more than it exports. 

The SCA is working on a plan to upgrade the capacities of the canal, either through offering new technological services or by widening and deepening waterways to handle traffic growth. The Egyptian state is also marketing the Suez Canal’s potential as a global industrial hub to interested states. Last week, a group of military and economic attachés from 35 countries was invited to visit the SCA’s industrial zone to explore ways of economic cooperation. The week before, the Commander of the United States Central Command (CENTCOM) got invited to visit the canal and the industrial zone for the same purpose.

Moreover, Admiral Rabie mentioned in a televised interview that “the Egyptian state intends to list 15% of the SCA’s Mooring and Lighting Company on the Egyptian stock exchange market (EGX) at the beginning of next year.” This step will allow international stakeholders to invest in the SCA and thus increase its revenues.  

Nevertheless, all these procedures can only succeed in getting Egypt out of the economic crisis when accompanied by increasing the volume of exports versus imports. Egypt’s balance of trade has always been negative. For example, in June 2022, Egypt’s balance of trade was (-3.209) billion dollars, with total imports amounting to 6.96 billion dollars and total exports totaling 3.748 billion dollars.

The government is already taking steps to decrease the volume of imports by applying legal restrictions on most imported goods. But in the process, it paralyzed local manufacturers, who depend on exported raw materials to create their final products. This will not only affect the domestic market but will also affect the volume of their exports to other countries.  

In that sense, Egypt’s efforts concerning upgrading and marketing the Suez Canal should be complemented by easing the government’s grip on foreign trade. Otherwise, the Egyptian market will remain in the inflation loop forever.  

New Trends in Arab Defense Policy

For almost a century, security turmoil, civil wars, terrorism, and cross-border conflicts have been some of the stable features of the Middle East region. However, in the past decade, the individual and collective strategic responses of the regional leaders of chief states have radically changed to influence the outcomes of the conflicts happening inside their region or in the neighboring countries of the eastern Mediterranean and sub-Saharan Africa. Arab interventions in political and armed conflicts in Libya, Yemen, the Mediterranean, and Ethiopia, in the past three years, have noticeably contributed to shaping their outcomes.

One major characteristic of the new response strategy adopted by Middle East defense policymakers is the substantial investment in upgrading their national military apparatuses with state-of-art combat technologies and advanced artillery. In addition, some of the Middle East countries started to invest in improving their indigenous defense industries, either through establishing production lines of their own or by convening industrial partnerships with proficient arms manufacturers from different places in the world. The changing trends in Middle East countries’ regional and individual defense policies are implicitly altering the priorities of defense industry giants.

Incentives for Change

The evolving trends of the defense policy of Middle East countries are the natural result of the security and political chaos that overwhelmed the region in the aftermath of the Arab Spring. The angry waves of popular revolutions that swept the Middle East region from Tunisia to Syria, in 2010-2011, created a security vacuum that got swiftly and cunningly exploited by Iran to infiltrate into the security structures of countries with critical geo-strategic locations around the Arabian Peninsula. 

In a matter of three years, Iran re-empowered its sponsored militia in Yemen and equipped them with drones to attack civilian homes and economically critical facilities in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries, which had to shoulder the burden of leading the trembling region during the forced absence of Egypt and Syria, at that time. This marked a shift in the type of security threats facing the Arab countries, from traditional state-controlled militaries of enemy states to irregular uncontrollable state-sponsored militia. 

In parallel, drastic changes in the political leadership of key Middle East countries with established military cultures had to happen. Some of these changes were forced by the popular revolutions, as was the case in Egypt, while other leadership changes happened voluntarily, as was the case in several Gulf countries. Interestingly, most of the new regional leaders, who ascended to the top of the political power in the post-Arab-Spring era, had a military background, either as serving personnel or commanders. The most prominent names include Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, UAE’s President Mohammed Bin Zayed, and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, Mohammed Bin Salman. Unlike their predecessors, they adopted fresh visions for domestic and regional defense policies that were appropriately translated into modernizing their militaries and exploring new opportunities for military cooperation on both regional and international stages.

One manifestation of this new vision was forming the Arab Military Coalition Forces (ACF) under the leadership of Saudi Arabia, in 2015, to deal with the growing threat of the Iran-sponsored Houthis militia in northern Yemen. Ten Arab countries from North Africa and the Gulf joined ACF as soon as the Arab League approved it. The news was celebrated in the region as the beginning of a new era of Arab solidarity. The White House, under the leadership of former President Obama, congratulated and endorsed the ACF by publicly offering to provide logistical and intelligence support to facilitate the Saudi-led military mission in Yemen. However, in the following years, the ACF lost momentum as regional diplomatic disputes led to the withdrawal or exclusion of some of its member states. 

The Arab Coalition Forces (ACF) is not the first form of pan-Arab military cooperation. In 1962, Egypt’s then-President Gamal Abdel Nasser called for forming the Unified Arab Military Command (UAC) to fight against Israel. Jordan and Syria were the only two countries that joined the military command under Egypt’s leadership before it had gotten painfully defeated by Israel and its western allies in the six-day war of 1967. Then, in 1990, Saudi Prince Khaled Bin Sultan formed a joint Arab military command between Egypt and Gulf countries to fight alongside the American forces in Kuwait against Saddam Hussein's aggression. However, one year later, the Arab forces coalition disassembled after successfully liberating Kuwait.

Recently, King Abdullah II of Jordan proposed the establishment of an Arab military coalition, similar to NATO, in the sense that it is not tied to a specific goal or time-bound agenda. Several Arab leaders applauded the idea, although it seems realistically undoable, in the foreseen future, due to the existing gap between the military capabilities of Arab countries, in terms of the number and skills of trained personnel and the level of armament, in addition to unresolved or recurring diplomatic rivalry and disagreements.

Arms Procurement

Feasibly, the best outcome of Arabs joining forces in the Arab Military Coalition Forces (ACF) is that it gave the new regional leaders an insight into the weak points in the performance of their national militaries. Most of the personnel, who participated in the ACF’s Operation Decisive Storm in Yemen, in 2015, had not engaged in actual field combat for decades. Some of them were fighting their first war. Besides, the heavy arms and outdated equipment used by the Arab forces were shocking, especially compared to the modern Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) that Iran gave to the Houthis. 

That was an awakening alarm to the new regional leaders. They realized the necessity of upgrading their military systems from defensive services to offensive armies capable of deterring traditional and non-traditional enemies. The upgrade process did not only focus on equipment renovation but also had to deal with personnel training. 

As a result, the period between 2014-2020 marked a spike in military spending by most Arab states, especially Egypt and Gulf countries, on personnel capacity-building and arms procurement. According to the World Bank database, the military expenditure by Arab countries from 2009 to 2020 totaled 1.42 trillion dollars. The year 2014 marked the highest ever military spending in Middle East history with a total of 182.79 billion dollars, compared, for example, to 61.16 billion in 2004 and 141.42 billion in 2020. 

According to the Military Balance report, published by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in 2016, the member states of the Arab Coalition Forces (AFC) hit the highest military spending between 2011-2015. During that period, Saudi Arabia’s arms imports increased by 27%, UAE imports by 18%, and Egypt’s imports by 37%.

At least since the 1960s, the Middle East region has been the biggest and most lucrative market for arms exporters on both ends of the bipolar world system. Yet, the emerging trend of Arab intense arms trading is also used, as a form of military diplomacy, to enhance ties with old allies and create new bonds with new friends. Arab Gulf militaries' participation in joint military exercises with Mediterranean and European countries, in the past two years, is a demonstrative case of that trend.  

Diversifying Sources of Armament

Another attention-grabbing trend in Arab countries’ refreshed defense policy is the persistence of regional militaries in diversifying their sources of armament. Part of that has to do with the emergence of new exporters, such as China, Japan, and Turkey, which offer arms trade deals that are more convenient to Arab importers, in terms of price and delivery, compared to the political and diplomatic hassle that usually accompanies the process of purchasing from Russia or the United States. 

The most interesting case, in that regard, is the case of Egypt. For the past four decades, Egypt depended, almost exclusively, on the United States for armament. Egypt receives an annual military aid package of 1.3 billion dollars from the United States, since 1979, per the provisions of the Egypt-Israel Peace Accord. A few months after the removal of the Muslim Brotherhood regime from power, in 2013, the Obama Administration decided to freeze the military aid to Egypt and thus put on hold its military procurement efforts. The freeze on the aid got partially lifted in 2015, then enforced again in 2016, then cleared in 2018 by former U.S. President Donald Trump. 

But before he left office in 2020, Trump had decided to cut part of the aid provided to Egypt, claiming that Egypt used the U.S. aid money to buy fighter jets from Russia. When the current U.S. President Biden took office in 2021, his administration threatened to cut 130 million dollars from the annual military aid to Egypt until the Egyptian state improves its performance on human rights issues.    

This pattern has been repeated since the Mubarak era. However, Egypt’s current political leadership of President El-Sisi decided not to tolerate it anymore and focused on actively diversifying sources of armament for the Egyptian military. Today, Egypt’s military exporters and allies include Russia, China, Japan, Germany, France, and Italy. According to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Egypt occupied the third position among the world’s 25 top arms importers in 2019. 

Thanks to this diversification, Egypt has become the owner of the second largest air force in the Middle East, equipped with American F-16 fighters, French Mirage-2000 and Rafale jets, Chinese J-7s fighters, and Chengdu Wing Loong UAVs. In addition, Egypt signed contracts worth two billion dollars, in 2018, to buy the Russian Su-35 fighter jets that compete against the American F-35 fighters in the international market. 

Nevertheless, Egypt was not the only Arab victim of U.S. use of arms trade to apply political pressures. Saudi Arabia and the UAE fell into the same trap, but their reactions were even more surprising than Egypt’s. In his first week in office, U.S. President Biden decided to freeze the arms sales due to Saudi Arabia and UAE, per agreements worth tens of billions of dollars signed with the Trump administration. After long months of patience, the UAE decided to halt negotiations with the U.S. to focus on closing an alternative deal with France. 

In December 2021, UAE and France signed a historic contract to purchase a record number of 80 Rafale fighter jets costing 19 billion dollars. This was the first time the UAE, or any Arab Gulf country, to do such a deal with an arms exporter other than the United States. Only last month, the U.S. State Department finally decided to unfreeze the arms sales due to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. That was too late. 

Indigenous Defense Industries

Localization of defense industries to achieve self-sufficiency of armament needs has been a sought-after goal by militarily active countries in the Middle East. However, most of the individual states and collective pan-Arab attempts in that regard have barely sustained for long enough, just like all the similar attempts to build an Arab unified military force. 

The first joint Arab action to localize military industries was in 1994, when Egypt, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Qatar jointly established the Arab Organization for Industrialization (AOI) in Cairo. At that time, ambitions rose to the sky about this organization becoming a hub for Arab arms production. But, in five years, all the Arab shareholders withdrew and left the organization for the Egyptian Ministry of Defense to manage.

In 1949, under the leadership of King Abdul Aziz bin Abdul Rahman Al-Saud, Saudi Arabia was the first Arab country to host a military-industrial base. In the 1980s, the Kingdom established the Armored Vehicles and Heavy Equipment Factory to produce trucks and military vehicles for local consumers. However, the Saudi defense industry only started to leap in 2017, when Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman introduced his fresh vision to modernize his country’s military capabilities. In that year, the Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI) company was established with funding from Saudi’s sovereign fund – the Public Investment Fund (PIF) – to localize 50% of Saudi military spending by 2030.

In parallel, the Saudi leadership applied the Industrial Participation Policy (IPP) to military industries. The purpose of that effort was to accelerate the transfer of knowledge and skills from western allies to domestic workers at local military factories. In 2020, Saudi’s General Authority for Military Industries (GAMI) signed the first industrial participation agreement with Raytheon Saudi Arabia – a local branch of the American Raytheon – to localize the Deep Maintenance and Refurbishment (DMR) procedure of the American Patriot surface-to-air missile system. 

Earlier this month, SAMI announced the success of the launching of its new production line at SAMI Composites company. SAMI composites is a Saudi project in partnership with the American Lockheed Martin, which is famous for manufacturing the F-35 fighter jets, that works on locally manufacturing aircraft structures from compound composites. This partnership may qualify Saudi Arabia to build its aerospace factory in the future.

Egypt is the second country in the line of top Arab countries aspiring to level up their indigenous military industries. Egypt took longer strides toward achieving that goal compared to other Arab countries. However, the progress achieved after the ascendance of President El-Sisi to power in 2014 is impressive. 

In the mid-1950s, Egypt started manufacturing light weapons, such as the half-automatic rifles Hakim and Rasheed, respectively designed and licensed by Sweden and Russia. Due to Egypt’s engagement in several wars, during the 1960s and 1970s, against Israel and its backing superpowers, the local defense industry project took a back seat. Meanwhile, the Egyptian military had to reach out to Russia for arms procurement and soldiers training. 

With the beginning of the flow of U.S. military aid to Egypt in the 1980s, after signing the Peace Accord with Israel, the military institution started to enjoy economic independence and, thus, increased its spending on building factories for arms production. Over the years, Egypt produced armored vehicles and rifles and refurbished imported equipment, ranging from fighter jets to warships and submarines, through three main entities: the Arab Organization for Industrialization (AOI), Marine Industry & Services Organization, and the Ministry of Military Production. 

In 2015, the new Egyptian leadership convened agreements with European manufacturers in Italy, Germany, and France to localize the building of their shipyards imported to Egypt at local facilities. This participated in re-introducing Egypt to the world as a proficient trustworthy defense equipment manufacturer and enhanced the military capabilities of the Egyptian navy. In five years, between 2015 to 2020, the Egyptian naval forces miraculously from barely surviving on worn-out equipment to thriving as one of the top ten navy fleets in the world, according to the Global Firepower 2021 ranking.

In parallel, the Egyptian state decided to exert greater effort in marketing its locally manufactured equipment to Arab and African militaries. In the past five years, Egypt started to export its benchmark armored vehicles Temsah, ST-100, and ST-500 to several Arab and African countries. In 2017, The Egyptian state dedicated an annual budget of 7.3 billion EGP to renovate military factories supervised by the aforementioned three entities. 

The Turkish Potential

Earlier this month, the UAE signed a contract worth 10 billion dollars to purchase 120 pieces of the Turkish Byraktar drones, plus other Turkish-made ammunition worth two billion dollars.

The non-Arab countries of the Middle East, such as Turkey, seem to be more determined and successful in achieving the goal of localizing their military industries. There are many geopolitical reasons to explain their persistence and success, but the most obvious reason is their demolishing trust in the United States as an arms exporter. 

Turkey and the United States are NATO allies. The Turkish military is the second largest in NATO after the U.S. Army, in terms of personnel, spending, and deployment. Despite that, in 2020, the U.S. imposed the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) on Turkey for “knowingly engaging in a significant transaction with Rosoboronexport, Russia’s main arms export entity, by procuring the S-400 surface-to-air missile system.” One year before that, and for the same reason, the U.S. kicked Turkey out of the international program of manufacturing the F-35 fighter jets, in which Turkey has been a partner since its beginning in 1999.

A few months ago, the Turkish Minister of Defense announced that his country succeeded in satisfying 80% of its military needs through indigenous manufacturing. Turkey has been relentlessly working on localizing its military industry since the 1980s. Today, Turkey exports its benchmark T-129 ATAK helicopters and Bayraktar TB2 and TB3 UAVs to several countries in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. In addition to the recent deal with UAE, Turkey has been selling weapons to North African countries – Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya – for years.   

Turkey’s recent diplomatic efforts to fix broken ties with strategic countries in the Middle East, especially Arab Gulf countries and Israel, may make it the favorite armament resource for most countries in the region, in near future. Turkey’s geographic proximity and cultural resemblance to Arab countries are two added advantages that enhance this potential. 

Note for the Future

The obvious leverage in the military capabilities of most Arab countries, in the past few years, is the manifestation of the personal visions of the current regional leaders. However, it is rarely shared or appropriately understood by ordinary citizens. To guarantee the sustainability of these defense policies, which have proven successful so far, the chief states of the region need to work with local experts and foreign allies on framing complementary individual and collective visions for the future of arms procurement, defense industrialization, and personnel capacity building, within the context of countering existing and prospected security threats. 

On the collective level, the gap in manpower and investment capabilities between the Arab militaries should not be seen as a barrier hindering their cooperation, especially in the defense industry sector. Instead, Arab leaders should look for ways to utilize this diversity to complement each other’s points of weakness. Although former pan-Arab military cooperation endeavors, in that regard, did not stand for long enough, there is a realistic hope that they may work this time. That is mainly because most of the current leaders have hands-on military expertise and share almost identical visions for upgrading their national military systems.

The Financial Power of Egyptians Abroad

The Egyptian government is looking forward to capitalizing on the growing financial power of the Egyptian diaspora. 

A new initiative by the Ministry of Immigration is seducing Egyptian immigrants and citizens living and working abroad to invest in the Egyptian market. Unlike former programs, in that regard, the new government plan offers unprecedented incentives to Egyptian investors abroad, whether they decide to invest in state-owned national projects or private sector enterprises.   

In their meeting last week, the Minister of Immigration and the President of Investment Authority discussed putting this ambitious plan into action. The two officials agreed to establish a shareholding company for Egyptians abroad to practice myriad economic activities, extending from initiating startup companies to purchasing stocks in national projects. 

Meanwhile, a specialized unit at the Investment Authority is dedicated to working with potential Egyptian investors abroad. It will inform them about the various lucrative opportunities in the domestic market and accelerate the required bureaucratic procedures, such as issuing governmental licenses and doing bank transactions. 

Moreover, the specialized unit at the Investment Authority shall facilitate the contributions of Egyptians abroad, whether in the form of investments or donations, to national projects. In the past few years, Egyptians abroad made financial contributions to the Egyptian sovereign fund to support the state-led comprehensive development plan. 

The size of Egyptians living and working worldwide is roughly estimated at 14 million people. Yet, only 9.5 million are recorded by the Egyptian Central Authority of Mobilization and Statistics. The Arab Gulf countries host at least one-third of the Egyptian workers abroad, while North America and South America host the majority of Egyptian immigrants. A large portion of the Egyptians living in Europe, estimated at 12% of the total number of Egyptian immigrants, had entered Europe through illegal immigration via the Mediterranean Sea in the late 1990s and early 2000s. 

Most Egyptian immigrants, especially those who live in western countries, support the current political leadership of President El-Sisi. Between 2014 and 2016, they played a tremendous role, using their political advocacy advantage as citizens of these countries, in refuting the distortion campaign led by the Muslim Brotherhood against El-Sisi’s administration. 

In addition to their political muscle, the Egyptian diaspora has the financial ability to make a real difference in the future of the Egyptian economy. In August, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) highlighted a record increase of 1.6% in the remittance inflow by Egyptians abroad, reaching 31.9 billion dollars for the first time. A large portion of these transmittals has been invested in purchasing EGP certificate deposits with high-interest rates, which the government offered earlier this year to counter the spiking exchange rate of the U.S. dollar.

In that sense, the Egyptian government's initiative to utilize the financial capacities of the Egyptian diaspora is a clever move that will mutually benefit the Egyptian state and the potential Egyptian investors abroad, especially during the current depreciation of the Egyptian pound. If appropriately implemented, this plan could boost the Egyptian economy, which has been struggling, for months, under the pressure of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

Also, it could push forward the macroeconomic reform plan that the Egyptian Prime Minister announced a few months ago. The government set a goal to attract ten billion dollars in foreign investment per year for the coming four years. That amount is less than one-third of the remittances annually transferred by the Egyptians abroad. 

Nevertheless, a long list of bureaucratic obstacles needs to be addressed first. That is not only to encourage local investments by the Egyptians abroad but, most importantly, to attract more general foreign investments to the Egyptian economy. 

Egypt Cannot Afford Losing in Libya

Egyptian foreign minister, Sameh Shoukry, withdrawal from the Arab League’s ministerial meeting, on September 6th, was shocking. The minister’s antagonistic reaction to the ascendance of the Libyan foreign minister, Najla Mangoush, to the presidency of the session, renewed the controversy about Egypt’s contradicting and unstable positions on the Libyan crisis.

According to the bylaw, it is Libya’s turn to take the leadership of the 158th ordinary session of the Arab League Council, which was held in Cairo, last week. However, Shoukry objected to Libya’s leadership role because he believes that Libya’s interim Government of National Unity (GNU), which Mangoush represents, lacks legitimacy. The spokesperson of the Egyptian foreign ministry told the press that “the issue had been discussed before the meeting started.” Some media staffers, who were present at the meeting, hinted that Shoukry got personally offended because Mangoush declined to honor his objection.

GNU’s rival government of Fathi Bashagha immediately applauded the Egyptian minister’s action and called upon the other Arab ministers to do the same. However, none of the participating Arab ministers wanted to withdraw, including those who favor Bashagha’s government to GNU. Rather, they decided to continue the meeting under Mangoush’s leadership and without the Egyptian minister. Even more, some of the Arab ministers had one-on-one meetings with Mangoush after the official session ended. 

Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh leads the Government of National Unity (GNU) from Tripoli, since March 2021. GNU was elected by representatives of Libyan political factions under the supervision of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), in Geneva, to act as an interim government to reconcile the eastern and western rivals and hold presidential and parliamentary elections before a deadline set on June 2022. 

However, in March, the parliament installed a parallel government under the leadership of Fathi Bashagha to force Dbeibeh’s government to cede power before holding the elections to protect the expired political elite from losing their powerful positions. 

In the past three months, the clashes between the informal armed groups affiliated with the two parallel governments of Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh and Fathi Bashagha hit an alarming threshold. Tens of people, including innocent civilians, were killed and civilian properties have been destroyed as a result of militias’ clashes. 

The Arab League’s ministerial meeting issued a resolution with 12 items on the deteriorating situation in Libya. Among other issues, the resolution echoed the insistence of Dbeibeh’s government on holding elections, by calling for accelerating the process of establishing the constitutional base, or the legal framework, that regulates the presidential and parliamentary elections, so elections could be held in the nearest time possible.

Ironically, it seems that Egypt is the only supporter of Bashagha’s parallel government, at the time. The supporters of Bashagha’s parallel government in eastern Libya are already giving up on him. Two weeks ago, Haftar’s forces declared that they have nothing to do with the conflict over power in Tripoli. Also, the news is circulating that some members of the parliament, which appointed Bashagha’s parallel government earlier, are rethinking their decision that renewed the deadly conflicts in the capital city. That brings us back to the question of why Egypt is betting on Bashagha despite his weak position, rather than fostering ties with GNU and helping Libya get out of the bloody rut. 

If Egypt wants to succeed in Libya, it has to position itself as a leader, not as part of the war. That can happen by adopting a policy similar to its policy in Gaza. One of the reasons why Egypt has been successful in mediating between Israel and Hamas for a ceasefire in Gaza, last year, is that the Egyptian state keeps the perfect balance in relationships between all the sides of the conflict. That brought a lot of benefits to Egypt’s profile in the eyes of the international community and restored its lost role as a regional leader. 

In practice, that means for Egypt to immediately stop taking sides in the Libyan conflict and push for holding the elections as soon as possible. Libya will not calm down until a permanent government is installed, via free and fair elections. Otherwise, Egypt’s national security and interests in the region will remain under threat.  

The Egyptian state is not doing itself any favor by taking sides in the Libyan conflict. The growing political power of local militias, even over the politicians who pays them, is making it costly for regional actors to support one side of the Libyan conflict against the other, especially if they are as geographically close to Libya as Egypt is.

التحيز في ليبيا ليس من مصلحة مصر

 

كان انسحاب وزير الخارجية المصري سامح شكري من الاجتماع الوزاري للجامعة العربية يوم ٦ سبتمبر صادمًا للغاية، حيث جدد رد فعل الوزير المصري على تولي وزيرة الخارجية الليبية نجلاء المنقوش رئاسة الجلسة، الجدل حول مواقف مصر المتناقضة وغير المستقرة تجاه الأزمة الليبية. 

بحسب اللوائح، جاء الدور على ليبيا لتتولى رئاسة الدورة الحالية لاجتماع مجلس وزراء الخارجية العرب الذي عقد في القاهرة الأسبوع الماضي. إلا أن شكري اعترض بشدة على تولي المنقوش، وهي الوزيرة الممثلة لحكومة الوحدة الوطنية المؤقتة في ليبيا لرئاسة الجلسة لأنه يرى أن حكومتها فاقدة الشرعية. صرح المتحدث باسم وزارة الخارجية المصرية للصحافة، في نفس اليوم، بأن "الموضوع نوقش قبل بدء الاجتماع"، وألمح بعض الصحفيين الذين حضروا الاجتماع الوزاري إلى أن سبب غضب شكري هو أن المنقوش رفضت قبول طلبه تنحيها عن رئاسة الجلسة.  

أشادت حكومة فتحي باشاغا المنافسة لحكومة الوحدة الوطنية على الفور بفعل الوزير المصري ودعت الوزراء العرب الآخرين لفعل الشيء نفسه. لكن لم يرغب أي من الوزراء العرب المشاركين في الانسحاب على غرار ما فعله الوزير المصري، بمن فيهم أولئك الذين يفضلون حكومة باشاغا على حكومة الوحدة الوطنية. بل قرروا جميعاً مواصلة الاجتماع بقيادة المنقوش، ومن دون الوزير المصري. بل وأكثر من ذلك، عقد بعض الوزراء العرب اجتماعات منفردة مع الوزيرة الليبية بعد انتهاء الجلسة الرسمية.

يقود عبد الحميد دبيبة حكومة الوحدة الوطنية من طرابلس، منذ مارس ٢٠٢١، حيث كان قد تم انتخابه بواسطة ممثلين عن الفصائل السياسية الليبية، تحت إشراف بعثة الأمم المتحدة للدعم في ليبيا، لتكوين حكومة مؤقتة مهمتها الرئيسية المصالحة بين الأطراف المتصارعة في الشرق والغرب، وإجراء انتخابات رئاسية وبرلمانية قبل نهاية يونيو ٢٠٢٢. لكن في مارس، شكل البرلمان حكومة موازية بقيادة فتحي باشاغا لإجبار حكومة الدبيبة على التنازل عن السلطة قبل إجراء الانتخابات، من أجل حماية النخبة السياسية المنتهية الصلاحية من خسارة ما تحت يدها من سلطة سياسية وثروات مادية. 

في الأشهر الثلاثة الماضية، وصلت الاشتباكات بين الجماعات المسلحة غير الرسمية التابعة لحكومتي عبد الحميد دبيبة وفتحي باشاغا إلى مرحلة مقلقة، حيث تسببت في مقتل عشرات الاشخاص بينهم مدنيين أبرياء، فضلاً على ما دمرته من شوارع ومساكن ومحال تجارية وغيرها من ممتلكات المواطنين، وهناك توقعات بأن استمرار الحال بهذا الشكل قد يدخل البلاد في حرب أهلية ثالثة. 

أصدر الاجتماع الوزاري للجامعة العربية قرارا يتضمن ١٢ بند بشأن تدهور الأوضاع في ليبيا. من جملة أمور أخرى، انحاز القرار إلى موقف حكومة الدبيبة المصرة على إجراء الانتخابات قبل تسليم السلطة، من خلال الدعوة إلى تسريع عملية إرساء القاعدة الدستورية، أو الإطار القانوني، الذي سيتم على أساسه تنظيم الانتخابات الرئاسية والنيابية، بحيث يمكن إجراء الانتخابات في أقرب وقت ممكن. 

الغريب أنه حتى أنصار حكومة باشاغا في شرق ليبيا قد تخلوا عنه. قبل أسبوعين، أعلنت قوات حفتر أنه لا علاقة لها بالصراع على السلطة في طرابلس، كما تتداول أنباء عن أن بعض أعضاء البرلمان، الذين عينوا حكومة باشاغا الموازية في وقت سابق، يعيدون التفكير في قرارهم الذي جدد الصراعات المدمرة في العاصمة. من ثم، يبدو أن مصر هي الداعم الوحيد لحكومة باشاغا الموازية في الوقت الحالي، وهذا يعيدنا إلى السؤال عن سبب إصرار مصر على الرهان على باشاغا على الرغم من موقفه الضعيف، بدلاً من تعزيز العلاقات مع حكومة الوحدة الوطنية ومساعدة ليبيا على الخروج من أزمتها عبر مسار الانتخابات.

إذا أرادت مصر النجاح في ليبيا، فعليها أن تنصّب نفسها كقائد إقليمي في القضية الليبية وليس كطرف من أطراف الصراع. يمكن أن يحدث ذلك من خلال تبني مصر سياسة مماثلة لسياستها في غزة على حدودها الشرقية. أحد أسباب نجاح مصر في التوسط بين إسرائيل وحماس لوقف إطلاق النار في غزة، العام الماضي، هو أن الدولة المصرية تحافظ على التوازن المثالي في العلاقات بين جميع أطراف الصراع هناك. وقد جلب ذلك الكثير من الفوائد لمصر في نظر المجتمع الدولي وأعاد دورها المفقود كقائد إقليمي.

من الناحية العملية، يعني ذلك أن تتوقف مصر فورًا عن الانحياز إلى جانب معين في الصراع الليبي، وأن تضغط من أجل إجراء الانتخابات في أقرب وقت ممكن. لن تهدأ ليبيا حتى يتم تشكيل حكومة دائمة عبر انتخابات حرة ونزيهة. وإلا فإن الأمن القومي المصري ومصالح مصر في المنطقة ستظل تحت التهديد.

الدولة المصرية لا تقدم لنفسها أي خدمة بانحيازها الفج إلى أحد أطراف الصراع في ليبيا، خصوصاً أن القوة السياسية المتنامية للميليشيات المحلية، والتي أصبحت تفوق حتى قوة السياسيين الذين يمولونهم، تجعل من المكلف جداً على الجهات الفاعلة الإقليمية دعم جانب من الصراع الليبي ضد الآخر، خاصةً إذا كان هذا الفاعل الإقليمي قريب جغرافياً من ليبيا مثلما هو الحال بالنسبة لمصر.

Egypt: National Dialogue Stuck in Bureaucracy

The National Dialogue initiative in Egypt has gotten stuck in the rusty wheel of bureaucracy. For three months, the initiative’s leadership has achieved no tangible progress on the core purpose of holding such a dialogue. That is, opening space for opposition political parties and civil society organizations to practice their work free from fear of reprisal. Instead, they have been busy with the routine procedures of assigning the leading board, specialized committees, and subcommittees.

According to Diaa Rashwan, the General Coordinator of the National Dialogue, the initiative’s board of trustees has held five meetings over the past two months. The meetings discussed the formation of specialized committees and subcommittees that are supposed to steer the dialogue. So far, 15 committees have already been formed to cover economic, political, and social topics of concern to Egyptian citizens. In the coming weeks, a dozen subcommittees should be established to facilitate the work of the specialized committees. 

The board of trustees has reviewed the biographies of about 350 nominees to select the rapporteurs and assistant rapporteurs of these steering committees. Unsurprising, most selected names are of old and outdated politicians from the Mubarak era. While the board of trustees is trying to please all participating parties by making compromises on selected nominees, they are repeating the classic political mistake of putting the wrong person in the wrong place just to keep everyone happy. 

The careful selection of the participating politicians and the clarity of the desired outcome are two of the five key factors that make or break a national dialogue. That is what a comprehensive report, published in 2017, by the United Nations Department of Political Affairs found through studying 17 cases of national dialogues held in several countries, worldwide, between 1990 and 2014.

Nevertheless, the lingering process of forming the steering committees gives the impression that the national dialogue initiative is meant to be a permanent presidential organization, rather than a purposeful time-bound initiative. In other words, it seems that the direction now is to turn the national dialogue into a semi-governmental body similar for example to the specialized national councils that had been formed under Mubarak to address topics related to social rights. Most of these councils are directly affiliated with and work under the supervision of the president of the state. So is the case for the currently evolving national dialogue initiative. 

The Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, called for the national dialogue, in April, amidst the early waves of the economic crisis that hit Egypt following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The surprise call of the Egyptian president was widely welcomed by political parties, on opposite sides of the political spectrum, as a new path for the long-delayed democratic reform. Yet, it seems that the opposition parties are not so satisfied with the direction the initiative is heading toward. 

The Civil Movement, on September 7th, criticized the slow progress of the National Dialogue and disapproved of its administrative structure. “The formation of the political committees of the National Dialogue did not achieve the required balance, that we have agreed on with fellow participants;” noted the movement’s leaders in a press statement. The Civil Movement is an umbrella bloc of leftist/socialist political parties and politicians, who comprise the majority of the opposition parties participating in the dialogue.  

The Civil Movement, also, warned that the dialogue is prone to fail if its initial request to release prisoners of consciousness is not met shortly. The leftist political parties have a modest influence on the Egyptian street, compared to pro-state or Islamist parties for example. Yet, the Civil Movement is the most powerful actor in the National Dialogue. The Egyptian state refuses to include the Islamist parties in the dialogue, which makes the Civil Movement the only representative of the opposition. In other words, if the Civil Movement decides to withdraw itself from the dialogue, the entire National Dialogue initiative will collapse or at least lose credibility and viability.

The National Dialogue leadership ought to accelerate the bureaucratic procedures of forming committees. They need to rather sit to address the issues that concern the people, either on the level of political freedom or economic prosperity. The Egyptian state does not need to further deplete its budget by forming another permanent national council, filled with tens of committees and subcommittees that are managed by expired politicians. Instead, Egypt needs a genuine dialogue, that engages everyone and excludes none, to start at the nearest time possible.

Implications of Libyan Militias’ Expanding Power

Libya is stuck at a grave political stalemate that threatens the eruption of a new civil war, that neither Libya nor its neighbors in North Africa and the Mediterranean can afford its dire consequences on regional security. The latest episode of street fighting between the Tripoli-based militias, last week, is a resounding alarm on the potential manifestation of this dreadful scenario, if not properly pre-empted by the international community and regional actors with interest in the Libyan affair. 

The Libyan Ministry of Health recorded a death toll of 32 souls and 159 injuries, including innocent civilians, out of the fierce battle that erupted between the local militias, in Tripoli, on August 27th. Civilian properties, residential homes, and trade shops have been destroyed, while the government security forces rescued and evacuated 64 families in the populous neighborhoods where the militias fought. 

All these damages are the direct outcome of a relatively short exchange of fire between two informal armed groups, that lasted for only a few hours. The size of damage compared to the time length of the battle and the random silhouette of the battling groups is a worrying indication of the heaviness of the arms they possess and the size of the funding that they enjoy.

Tug of War

The foreign and home-grown militias and mercenaries are, arguably, the biggest beneficiary of the current tug of war between the two parallel governments of Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh and Fathi Bashagha. Each of them has been showering the informal armed groups with money and political promises to gain their loyalty.

The latest militia clash is the deadliest since the brief outbreak, in Tripoli, on July 22nd, which slayed 13 people and injured 27. The rounds of deadly friction between militiamen, in and around the capital city of Tripoli, have not stopped since May, as Fathi Bashagha and Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh have been mobilizing local armed groups against each other, to debate the legitimacy of their parallel governments.

Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh leads the Government of National Unity (GNU) from Tripoli, since March 2021. GNU is an interim government elected in an UN-supervised process by the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum (LPDF). GNU’s main mission was to reconcile eastern and western rivals, unite the armed forces held by both sides, and hold presidential and parliamentary elections before a deadline, that has already expired in June 2022.

When GNU failed to hold the presidential elections, in December of last year, due to what the electoral commission described, at the time, as “force majeure;” the Tobruk-based parliament hired Bashagha on top of a new parallel government. The parliament is led by Aguila Saleh, a close ally of Warlord Khalifa Haftar, the commander of the armed forces known as the “Libyan National Army (LNA)” in Benghazi. Dbeibeh, who was shocked by the move of his political opponents in eastern Libya, refused to cede power and insisted that his government will not leave Tripoli until presidential and parliamentary elections are held.

The United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) agreed with Dbeibeh’s stance but immediately proceeded to work with the conflicting political elite in Tripoli, Tobruk, and Benghazi on creating a legal framework that allows holding the election under the new status quo. UNSMIL and most international observers agree that holding elections, at the nearest time possible, is the only way to get Libya out of this rut. However, no tangible progress has been achieved from UNSMIL efforts, up to this day. That made the hope for proceeding with the political solution diminish, and the power of the militias expand.  

Expanding Militia

It is not the first time to see two parallel governments competing over legitimacy in Libya. This happened, at least, twice since the fall of Gaddafi, over one decade ago. However, this time, the competing heads of the two parallel governments are equally powerful, in terms of political power, financial means, and popularity. Each of Dbeibeh and Bashagha has a solid base of popular support that extends all over Libya, strong foreign backers, and most importantly tough militias to protect him. 

Each of the two powerful politicians promised, at the beginning of their conflict in March, not to use violence against each other, to avoid the bloodshed of innocent Libyan citizens. But it did not take long for them to change their minds.

For two months after his appointment, Bashagha and the parliament tried to force Dbeibeh to cede power by applying different diplomatic and economic pressures that almost paralyzed his government. The latest of which was a wave of riot that kept the gas and oil production idle for weeks, suffocating one of the main veins of income that Dbeibeh’s GNU relays on. To the disappointment of the eastern adversaries, Dbeibeh’s wealth and experience as a businessman bailed him out of this crisis. 

In the meantime, Bashagha realized that his parallel government will not gain full legitimacy, either in the eyes of the Libyan people or the foreign observers, until he rules from inside Tripoli. As the political pressures failed to opt Dbeibeh out of the capital city, Bashagha resorted to the option of recruiting militia, to help him penetrate Tripoli, the same way Fayez Sarraj did in 2016.

Sarraj, who was appointed by the UN, in 2015, to lead the former interim Government of National Accord (GNA), had been locked out of Tripoli, for months, by a parallel government supported by Haftar. Only when powerful politicians and businessmen in his cabinet were able to align some of the Tripoli-based militia to their side, GNA was finally able to enter Tripoli. Eventually, in early 2016, Sarraj and his cabinet entered Tripoli on a boat sailing from Tunisia, under the protection of militia. The militia, also, continued to protect the GNA against armed assaults by Haftar’s LNA, until, in 2019, the GNA sought the help of Turkey to deter the LNA's advances toward Tripoli. 

Fathi Bashagha served as the Interior Minister in Sarraj’s GNA; thus, he already has strong links with most of the militia inside Tripoli. In addition, he has command of armed groups in Misrata. Therefore, it was easy for Bashagha to launch offensive operations on the GNU, either from inside or outside Tripoli. Yet, so far, all of Bashagha’s attempts to enter Tripoli by force have failed. That is mainly because the urban terrain and the defensive and offensive positions of the warring parties on the military strategy board work perfectly in favor of Dbeibeh.

What is it now? 

The latest deadly clashes, in Tripoli, ended with the victory of Dbeibeh’s forces and the withdrawal of Bashagha’s fighters, mainly because of Dbeibeh’s success in attracting a greater number of militiamen to his side. In the past two months, Dbeibeh succeeded in stripping Bashagha off most of his supporters, starting from the Tripoli-based militiamen up to his eastern political allies. Dbeibeh, allegedly, invested tens of billions of dollars in purchasing the loyalty of the militia affiliated to Bashagha, in Tripoli, as well as enhancing the military capabilities of the armed brigades that work under the command of his government. 

In addition to the growing support of local militia to Dbeibeh, he also enjoys the support of the Turkish troops and affiliated mercenaries, who are working from inside Tripoli, alongside the national armed forces, since 2019. The Turkish military provides the armed forces affiliated with GNU with training and equipment, in addition to sensitive intelligence that helped them predict and obstruct the latest attacks on Tripoli.   

On the flip side, Bashagha has not only lost some of his militiamen to Dbeibeh, but it seems that the eastern politicians have already started to give up on him. That was highlighted by Haftar’s LNA washing their hands from the ongoing struggle over power in Tripoli, despite their initial support to Bashagha against Dbeibeh. 

“We do not provide any support for Fathi Bashagha or any other person, in the ongoing competition over power in Tripoli. Both competitors have their own armed groups on the ground there to fight for them… Whoever is eventually stationed in the capital city will be the representative of the Libyan government. We can only respect the will of the Libyan people, in this regard;” said the spokesperson of Haftar’s LNA, in a televised interview, only two days before the eruption of the fight between the militias in Tripoli, on August 27th, which ended with the withdrawal of Bashagha militia and Dbeibeh announcing himself the victor. 

The change in LNA's position towards Bashagha is perceived as a response to Dbeibeh’s concession to some of Haftar’s demands to share power and state revenues. For example, Dbeibeh recently decided that the GNU will pay the salaries of the LNA troops. Also, he appointed one of Haftar’s loyalists as the president of the national oil production facility, which represents the largest frontier of income for the Libyan state.

What is next? 

It seems that the eastern politicians are, now, more inclined to make a deal with Dbeibeh, rather than continuing to support Bashagha. In the end, what concerns the political elite in Libya, either from the west or the east, is to remain in power for as long as they can. If Dbeibeh can offer them guarantees to keep them in power, even after the elections are convened, then most probably they will not mind working with him, rather than working against him. If that scenario unfolds as predicted, we may see rounds of negotiations between Dbeibeh, the parliament, LNA, and the state council, in the coming weeks.  

On another level, some Libyan thinkers are calling for forming a third interim government by a new person from outside the existing political elite. Some others call upon the military committee (5+5) to take the country's leadership until the sought-after elections are held. However, none of these propositions is realistic enough to be considered for application. Installing a third interim government is merely a reinvention of the same barren system that has kept Libya stuck in deadly conflicts for years. Likewise, the military committee (5+5), which can hardly reach a consensus on their limited scope agendas, stands a minimal chance to succeed in running state affairs and organizing elections.

Nevertheless, it would be unrealistic to expect that Bashagha may not take another shot at entering Tripoli with the help of the militia. He has already been mobilizing militias at Tripoli's southern and western gates, for over a month. He may even try to enter Tripoli via the sea or the coastal road in the north. But, for this to happen he should re-earn the trust and the support of Haftar and the parliament. If this scenario follows, the battle will be even more brutal than the ones we saw in the past few months. This situation may easily ignite another civil war that will eat up the remainder of Libya and expose the entire region to huge security and economic risks. 

The international community and regional actors – except for Turkey – appear to be unwilling to engage themselves in the security standoff inside Libya, this time. The economic burdens of the ongoing war in eastern Europe could, to a great extent, explain this state of global indifference towards the escalating crisis in Libya. Yet, it also reveals a state of confusion that the policymakers in international bodies and concerned countries are having towards the masterminds of both sides of the chronic Libyan crisis. Due to the growing political power of local militia, even over the politicians who pays them, it has become too costly for interested foreign actors to support one side of the Libyan conflict against the other.