The Nile flows on

Egypt has more success with trade than with foreign policy

As it struggles to keep its role as Middle East peace broker, Cairo is also juggling its emerging ambition to become the region's largest and most advanced free-market economy. From the Gaza Strip to Mogadishu, it has tried both to play the Arab card and to be seen as honest broker. Yet in both cases and in many in between, it has little to show so far. Both Israel and the United States regard Egypt as the Arab state with which they can do business about Palestine. That is why Washington gives Egypt US$2.1 billion a year, $1.3 bn. of it in military aid.

Article Tags:
Israel, United States, Binyamin Netanyahu, Mohamed, Abu Ghazala, Ehud Barak, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Somali, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Emad Hamid, Issayas Afeworki, Hussein Mohamed Farah 'Aydeed', Mohamed Said Hirsi 'Morgan', Libya, Rwandan, Mahmoud Ahmed Mahmoud, Hosni Mubarak, Meles Zenawi, Amr Moussa, Sudan, Uganda, Djibouti, Kenya, Muntassir el Zayat, Moammar el Gadaffi, Congo-Kinshasa, El Gama'a el Islamiyya, El Gama'a, Gama'a, Gama'a

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