Where are you Egypt?

I’m baffled by our “ally” Egypt.

As a consequence of the peace treaty in 1994 between Israel and Egypt, Egypt has received over a billion dollars a year of US taxpayer money. Recently, a portion of that money has been withheld because of persistent human rights abuses in the country.

Let’s evaluate Egypt’s behavior.

Egypt is ruled by a military dictator who on the one hand keeps the Muslim Brotherhood under control while on the other hand keeps the people under a strong armed dictator who ignores human rights.

Egypt was able to control ISIS in the Sinai but has allowed Hamas and its associates to build 50+ tunnels from the Sinai into Gaza right under their noses.

Recently it was revealed that a Bedouin tribal leader who is a friend of “President” El-Sisi was making millions of dollars extorting Gazans who wanted to leave Gaza and smuggling them out into Egypt.

The peace treaty between Israel and Egypt stipulated minimal troops in the area of the Sinai which Egypt initially violated with Israel’s permission to tackle the ISIS problem but they have maintained those troops ever since.

Egypt has officially refused to take in any of their Arab brethren – who are suffering from a “humanitarian crisis”, yet they still expect American largesse for their own population.

They have even threatened to abrogate the 25 year old peace treaty because of Israeli presence in the Philadelphia corridor (Gaza strip adjacent to the Egyptian border).

Israel took over the Rafah crossing because it was the remaining source of Hamas weapons and funds and was very willing to open the crossing for humanitarian aid but Egypt refused.

My conclusions are:

If Egypt is an American ally, we don’t need enemies (but reality is that we support numerous enemies, such as releasing the sanctions on Iran)

If Egypt and Qatar (a supporter and protector of Hamas) are negotiating a peace deal  between Hamas and Israel – it can not be in Israel’s best interest to accept it. (Why is Biden pushing it – that’s a separate long discussion!)

Why are American taxpayers supporting a dictator with a poor human rights record while at the same time threatening withholding aid from the only democracy in the Middle East?

Why doesn’t Congress withhold the aid from Egypt unless they allow humanitarian aid across their border and allow immigration of some of their brethren, at least into Sinai, if not into Egypt.