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October 26, 2026

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Analysis

What's at stake as Libya's eastern parliament approves Turkey maritime deal

Libya's eastern-based parliament's approval of a long-disputed maritime deal with Turkey marks a strategic win for Ankara as Saddam Hifter seeks Turkish backing for his presidential ambitions, according to analysts.

Ezgi Akin

In Ankara, reporting on diplomacy, EU-Turkey ties, NATO

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi attends a joint statements and agreements during the EU and Egypt summit in Brussels, on Oct. 22, 2025.

Sisi says Egypt has no ‘territorial ambitions’ after Israel’s Smotrich threatens Sinai

The Egyptian president’s remarks follow a warning from Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich that Israel would seize the Sinai Peninsula if Egypt attacks.

China's President Xi Jinping (center L) walks along with his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah al-Sisi followed by their wives Peng Liyuan and Entissar Amer (R) upon their arrival at the Cairo International Airport on September 1, 2026. President Xi Jinping arrived in Egypt on September 1, making a rare trip to the Middle East as both countries face the threat of US sanctions over financial links to Iran. (Photo by Khaled DESOUKI / POOL / AFP via Getty Images)

Analysis

Why renewed Egypt-Ethiopia tensions are a problem for China

For Beijing, the renewed Egypt-Ethiopia standoff is a zero-sum bind that threatens vital strategic interests on both sides of the Nile.

Joyce Karam

A quadrilateral summit was held on Oct. 4, 2026, attended by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al‑Sisi, Eritrea President Isaias Afwerki, President of Somalia Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, and Chairman of the Transitional Sovereignty Council of Sudan Gen. Abdel Fattah al‑Burhan, in New El Alamein City, Egypt.

Egypt, Eritrea, Somalia and Sudan hold summit amid Ethiopia tensions

All four countries have increasingly tense relations with Ethiopia, driven by disputes over the Nile, Red Sea access and security.

Latest News

Explainer

Why are Egypt and Ethiopia clashing over Tigray, Somalia and the Nile?

This general view shows the site of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in Guba, Ethiopia, on February 19, 2022. - Ethiopia's massive hydro-electric dam project on a tributary of the Nile has raised regional tensions notably with Egypt, which depends on the huge river for 97 percent of its water supply. Government officials said the dam would begin producing electricity on Sunday, more than a decade since work first started. (Photo by Amanuel SILESHI / AFP) (Photo by AMANUEL SILESHI/AFP via Getty Ima

Ex-Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar to sue Netanyahu over Oct. 7 accusations: What to know

Ronen Bar, former chief of Israel's domestic Shin Bet security agency

On secret UAE visit, Netanyahu asked MBZ to deny pre-Oct. 7 warnings

Israeli PM

20 Israelis stranded in Ethiopia seek evacuation as fighting resumes: What to know

A general view of the damaged building housing Tigray TV, the state broadcaster of the Tigray region, following a drone strike in Mekelle, Ethiopia, Sept. 27, 2026.

Beatrice Farhat

Associate Editor (Lebanon)

In Beirut, reporting on regional news, culture, conflict

Jonathan Fenton-Harvey

In London, reporting on North Africa and Gulf politics

Mohammed Magdy

In Berlin, reporting on Egyptian politics

Ayah Aman

In Cairo, reporting on politics and culture

Salwa Samir

In Giza, reporting on politics

Nada Shaker

In Cairo, reporting on culture

The remains of the Sheikh Zewaid shrine is seen after it was blown up by Islamist extremists following the revolution, at a graveyard in Sheikh Zewaid city, in north Sinai, March 7, 2012. Islamist extremists who believe in the strict application of Islam blew up the Sheikh Zewaid tomb, a landmark shrine for one of the early Muslims to arrive in Egypt, after local Sufis who believe in the holiness of the Sheikh used to practice their rituals beside it. To match Insight EGYPT-SINAI Picture taken March 7,

Sufis look for a political role in Egypt

Sufis have vowed to make an impact during Egypt’s next elections, in an attempt to push back against the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists.

Egyptian policemen inspect the site where the militants fired mortar in Egypt's northern Sinai of el-Arish on late July 13, 2014, at a military base, killing a soldier and seven civilians, included 23 personas injured. AFP PHOTO / STR (Photo credit should read STR/AFP/Getty Images)

Security expert: Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis 'gasping for breath'

As Egyptian terrorist group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis swore allegiance to the Islamic State, several Egyptian security experts dismissed its significance, citing strong gains by the army against the Sinai-based group.

People check the scene where a car bomb exploded in near the port town of El-Arish in Egypt's Sinai peninsula July 24, 2013. A car bomb exploded near a police base and two soldiers were killed in separate, multiple attacks in Egypt's lawless Sinai peninsula, which has seen a spike in violence since the July 3 army ouster of the country's Islamist president. Four militants died when the car, rigged with gas canisters and carrying explosive belts, detonated in a desert area near the port town of El-Arish on W

Islamic State pledge in Sinai raises stakes for Egypt

Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis’ decision to declare allegiance to the Islamic State undercuts President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s efforts to reassure the Egyptian public that his government is winning the war on terror in the Sinai Peninsula.

An Egyptian soldier keeps watch at the closed Rafah border crossing, between southern Gaza Strip and Egypt November 6, 2014. At Egypt's border with the Gaza Strip, families are emptying their homes - lugging mattresses and furniture onto waiting vans as soldiers look on from armoured cars. In nine villages along the frontier, 680 houses - homes to 1,165 families - are being razed to seal off smugglers' tunnels and try to crush a militant insurgency in northern Sinai that has intensified since the army overt

3,500 Palestinians stuck outside Gaza

The author interviews several Gazans stuck in Egypt and other countries, herself included, who are unable to return to the Gaza Strip following the terrorist attack in Sinai and the subsequent closure of the Rafah crossing.

United States Secretary of State John Kerry (L) greets chairwoman Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) (R) before testifying at the House Appropriations Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington March 12, 2014.
REUTERS/Gary Cameron (UNITED STATES - Tags: POLITICS BUSINESS) - RTR3GRSC

Congress weighs easing restrictions on military aid to Egypt

Lawmakers are debating whether to give the Obama administration the power to sidestep legal obstacles to the $1.3 billion annual aid package

Bedouin women work in a field of Miramiya plant (East Mediterranean sage) in the town of Sheikh Zoueid, near Rafah city, north Sinai, March 7, 2012. REUTER/Asmaa Waguih (EGYPT - Tags: SOCIETY) - RTR2Z01J

Contaminated water delays Sinai canal

Despite demands to accelerate development and land reclamation projects in the Sinai Peninsula, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi postpones plans for a crucial canal due to health concerns.

A member of Hamas security forces stands next to plastic bags filed with confiscated drugs at a storage room in the prosecutor's headquarters in Gaza City December 2, 2009. Alarmed by mounting drug abuse and addiction among the cooped-up Palestinians of Gaza, Islamist rulers of the enclave plan to introduce the death penalty for gangs getting rich off smuggled narcotics. Picture taken December 2, 2009. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem (GAZA POLITICS SOCIETY CRIME LAW) - RTXREJY

Despite isolation, Gaza drug smuggling continues

Even with the closure of most tunnels between Gaza and Egypt, drugs such as Tramadol are still finding their way onto Gaza’s streets.

Members of special police forces stand guard as police investigate the car from which an explosive device attached to it detonated outside a court in the Heliopolis area in Cairo, June 25, 2014. One person was wounded from the small explosion outside the court on Wednesday, the head of Cairo's bomb disposal unit told Reuters. At least four people were wounded in a series of small explosions in metro stations in Greater Cairo earlier in the day. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih (EGYPT - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RT

Military trials in Egypt undermine civil law

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi issued a new law, whereby the perpetrators of assaults against public and government facilities shall be referred to military courts.

Farmers work at a rice field near the Great Giza pyramids on the outskirts of Cairo November 2, 2014. According to local media, black clouds rising over the Delta and Cairo have become a yearly event since 1997 which environmentalists and experts have blamed largely on the burning of leftover rice straw by farmers, an agricultural waste management problem which has yet to be solved for almost two decades. The burning of rice straw has caused not only severe pollution, but brings with it several potential h

Egypt farmers call for aid, threaten strike

Egyptian farmers are threatening to halt cultivation of certain crops to call attention to the need for state action to support and protect the industry.

U.N. Special Envoy Bernardino Leon (C) attends a meeting in Ghadames September 29, 2014. Libya's elected parliament held U.N.-brokered talks with foes tied to a rival assembly on Monday calling for a ceasefire by armed factions and more dialogue to end a confrontation driving the OPEC member state close to civil war. Leon said after the meetings that both sides agreed on the need for a ceasefire, for humanitarian aid for victims of recent clashes in Tripoli, and to work to reopen airports closed by fighting

Is Algeria's dialogue initiative for Libya still viable?

Algeria had announced a dialogue initiative bringing together Libya’s rival factions to be held in October, but the month passed without a meeting being held.

CAIRO, EGYPT - JULY 04: A black flag associated with salafist islamist movement flies in from of supportors of of former Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi perform midday prayers, the morning after Morsi, the country's first democratically elected president, was ousted from power on July 4, 2013 in Cairo, Egypt. Adly Mansour, chief justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court, was sworn in as the interim head of state in ceremony in Cairo in the morning of July 4, the day after Morsi was placed under house a

Egypt’s Islamists try to distance themselves from IS

As Egypt’s Islamist groups fail to take a common stance on domestic politics, they agree at least that the Islamic State is giving political Islam, as a movement, a bad reputation.

Boats sail on the river Nile in Cairo June 12, 2013. Most of Egypt's population live clustered around the Nile valley and delta, and the river is both a vital resource for the country's citizens, and a potent national symbol. In a recent dispute with Ethiopia over the construction of a dam upstream, Egypt's foreign minister Mohamed Kamel Amr underlined the country's reliance on the river's waters: "No Nile - no Egypt," he said. Picture taken June 12, 2013. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih (EGYPT - Tags: POLITICS SOCIET

Ethiopian minister upbeat about dam talks with Egypt

In an interview with Al-Monitor, Ethiopian Minister of Water and Energy Alemayehu Tenegu says negotiations with Egypt and Sudan over the Renaissance Dam are improving.