Israel in a Post-Arab Spring World

At the end of January, Israeli government minister Silvan Shalom issued an invitation to the small Jewish population of Tunisia to leave their homes and migrate east to Israel. Shalom said that he made the appeal because he feared that the growth of conservative Islamic parties across North Africa would precipitate a rise in anti-Semitism.

Whether Shalom’s fears are justified or not, there is no question that they reflect a growing anxiety in Israel about the ramifications of the Arab Spring. How great a role will Islamists play in the new governments of Tunisia, Libya and, particularly significantly, Egypt? How are their attitudes towards Israel going to change? And what effect will any change have on Israel’s security?

Anti-Zionism in the Egyptian uprising

There is no question that part of Hosni Mubarak's illegitimacy in the eyes of Egyptians derived from his collusion with Israel in the latter's occupation of the Gaza Strip. Egypt’s close relations with Israel stretch back three decades to the signing of a peace treaty between Anwar Sadat and Yitzhak Rabin. The treaty secured Egypt’s silence over Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and, in exchange, offered Egypt the chance to develop a new diplomatic partnership with the United States, which included a hefty annual transfer of military aid from Washington to Cairo.

Ordinary Egyptians, however, have never reconciled themselves to this détente. The extent of their antipathy towards Israel was made strikingly clear last September when dozens of protesters broke into the Israeli embassy in Cairo and proceeded to trash and loot its interior. The Israeli ambassador and his family had to be rescued by an Egyptian commando unit. This demonstration was sparked by an Israeli air raid on the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing a few days earlier which resulted in the death of five Egyptian policemen.

The recent electoral success of Egypt’s Islamist groups – in particular the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party and the Salafist Al-Nour Party – is a further indication of the people’s hostility towards Israel. The Al-Nour Party has expressed a desire to re-negotiate the 1979 treaty with the somewhat cryptic aim of ironing out or amending its “exploitative clauses”. The Muslim Brotherhood, meanwhile, recently reiterated its opposition to the staging of formal talks with Tel Aviv, saying, “It is illogical to open dialogue, any dialogue, given the current Israeli policies against the Arab peoples. We will reject any request from the Israeli embassy to meet with leaders of (our) group.”

Sentiments of this sort are bound to heighten Israeli fears about its border security. In the immediate aftermath of the first round of the Egyptian elections, once the scale of the Islamist victory had become clear, Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak announced he was “very, very disturbed”. Prime minister Benyamin Netanyahu opted for less cautious language, promising to meet any threat coming from the Sinai with “an iron fist”.

Egypt and Turkey: a new alliance

Perhaps the most significant development of the Arab Spring from an Israeli perspective has been the strengthening of the relationship between Egypt and Turkey. Last September, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited Cairo where, according to Time magazine, he was greeted “like a rock star by thousands of adoring fans at the [city’s] airport”. Much of the enthusiasm Egyptians have for Erdoğan stems from his support for an independent Palestinian state and his tough stance on Israel – a stance which has grown yet tougher since Israeli special forces killed nine Turkish civilians on board a Gaza-bound aid flotilla in 2010.

During the visit, Cairo and Ankara agreed a series of commercial deals in technology, communications, tourism, energy and electricity and established for the first time a Turkish-Egyptian Cooperation Council. Turkey also pledged to increase the level of its investments in Egypt to $5 billion and increase its trade by $1.8 billion.

The burgeoning partnership between these two regional powers – the combined population of which reaches 160 million, or half the total population of the Middle East – will be viewed by Israeli leaders with mounting concern. Israel’s relations with other neighbouring and nearby states – notably Iran, Iraq and Syria – are already dangerously fraught, while its regional status has become one of extreme diplomatic isolation. The emergence of a new Turkish-Egyptian alliance will only exacerbate Israel’s paranoia and siege mentality – a state of mind that could manifest itself in disastrous ways.

Think Africa Press welcomes inquiries regarding the republication of its articles. If you would like to republish this or any other article for re-print, syndication or educational purposes, please contact: editor@thinkafricapress.com