Egypt’s foreign policy has become a policy of cheap exploitation and manipulation. The tense relations between Egypt and Saudi Arabia have surfaced recently after kept quite for some time. This tension became evident after a Yemeni delegation consisting of Houthis rebels and associates of former president Abdullah Saleh was received in Egypt in Cairo.

Moreover, Egyptian forces did not participate in the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen, Operation Decisive Storm. Instead, they were content with having their name in the alliance in order to win promises of future favours from the Saudi regime.

Yet, all that was hidden away recently been exposed during the recent Security Council meeting regarding the Syrian crisis. Egypt was one of only four countries that voted for the Russian resolution.

This prompted the Saudi ambassador to the UN to say “It was painful that the stances taken by Senegal and Malaysia were much closer to the agreed-upon Arab decision than the stance of an Arab delegate — the Egyptian one.”

This was followed by a fierce media campaign against Saudi Arabia launched by the pro-coup government satellite channels, especially after Aramco stopped exporting oil to Egypt. The government media said that it is not important because Egypt’s arm cannot be twisted and that it will not bow down to anyone.

It has become clear that Egypt has prepared itself to move to the other side of the Gulf. This has been going on for a while, and everyone has seen this. Britain’s The Guardian published a letter sent by the Iranian Foreign Minister to his American counterpart, John Kerry, stipulating that Egypt and Iraq’s ministers attend the Lausanne conference in Switzerland to discuss the Syrian conflict in order for Iran to attend.

Thus Iran hoping to add Egypt to its list of Arab allies along with Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Yemen, just as posters featuring Ali Khamenei spring up on large billboards across Egypt.

This shift is also reflected in context of Egypts negotiations over the status of the Tiran and Sanafir Islands. These were recently ceded to Saudi, but now government officials are now willing to stand up in court and claim – once again – that they are Egyptian, but these were the same voices that said, not too long ago, they were Saudi islands.

This is a policy of manipulation that the Egyptian foreign ministry has introduced to its global diplomatic record.

Source: www.middleeastmonitor.com