Surprising: Egypt begged for help from Israel

The Qatari newspaper "Al-Araby Al-Jadeed" reported that "Egypt was forced to ask Israel for help in dealing with a gas crisis that threatens to bring back the power outages in the country." This, according to the report, is partly due to "issues with the arrival of gas shipments to Egypt."

We remind you that a few months ago, we reported that Egypt is taking another step that could increase tensions with Israel and perhaps signal the worrying direction it is expected to head in the coming years.

According to a report on the 'Mako' website, Egypt has signed an agreement with China to purchase Chengdu J-10C fighter jets to replace its fleet of American F-16s. The deal comes after Egypt decided to reject offers from the U.S. and Russia to upgrade or replace the aforementioned fleet of fighter jets.

At first glance, it seems like an innocent and routine step, where a country decides to renew its fleet of aircraft and purchase them from another country. However, when it comes to Israel-Egypt relations—especially after what Israel discovered in the Philadelphi Route and the Rafah crossing—every such step has significance that could have critical implications.

In Israel, there are concerns that the Egyptians' choice of a Chinese plane to replace the American one might be seen as a step towards the axis that includes China, Russia, and even Iran, at the expense of the proximity to the moderate axis led by the United States.