What annoys Al-Sisi about Hassan Salameh?

Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi knows full well that Hassan Salameh, one of the most prominent leaders of the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, has been in an Israeli prison for 19 years. He is also aware that his decision to involve Hassan Salameh in the prison-break case and sentence him to death would be another rarity and an occasion highlighting the sadness and chaos occurring in “Umm al-Dunya” since he seized power. However, Al-Sisi has decided to disregard public opinion in Egypt and the Arab world in favour of pleasing those he believes will help him reinforce the foundations of his government. The sentencing to death in absentia of Hassan Salameh is a message to Israel’s leaders that they were right to count on Al-Sisi and that he is providing them with the goods.

Salameh has become a legend in his own lifetime after managing in the mid-nineties, while still a young man, to storm the Israeli security system. After sneaking into the West Bank from the Gaza Strip, he established military cells and gave the illegal settlers in the West Bank hell. He planned and supervised the retaliation for Israel’s assassination of Yahya Ayyash in early 1996. These operations killed dozens of Israeli soldiers and settlers and wounded hundreds more. The operations led by Salameh resulted in an unprecedented effect on the sense of personal security among Israelis and escalated the crisis of trust between the government in Tel Aviv and the general public, leading to the fall of the Shimon Peres government in that year’s election.

The former Chairman of the Federation of Israeli Chambers of Commerce, Dan Gillerman, said that Hassan Salameh contributed, more than any other individual, to deterring foreign investors from coming to Israel. Statistics have also indicated that his operations resulted in the increase of reverse immigration from Israel. In condemning him to 48 life sentences, the Israeli military judge said that the hostility Hassan Salameh has in his heart towards Israel that influenced him to harm the Zionist project is unimaginable.

As such, Al-Sisi’s purpose behind accusing Hassan Salameh and the other Al-Qassam Brigades men, most of whom are martyrs, of storming the Egyptian prison during the 2011 revolution, was to reassure Israel’s leaders that they should continue investing in supporting him. It is worth noting that that is how many circles in Israel interpret Al-Sisi’s hostile behaviour towards Hamas.

Zionist orientalist Dr Reuven Berko believes that by being openly hostile towards Hamas, Al-Sisi wants to reassure Israel and the West that he can be counted on in the confrontation with “Islamic terrorism”. (Israel HaYom 27 June, 2014). Even the Zionist commentators most enthusiastic about Al-Sisi’s government who addressed its accusations against Hamas have stressed that this does not reflect reality. Al-Sisi does not need to use such a farce to convince the Zionist leadership and Tel Aviv’s elite of the benefits of counting on him. Nor does he need to reiterate the message sent by Israeli diplomat Ruth Landau to Al-Sisi, published by Yedioth Ahranoth newspaper in October last year, under the heading, “Walk, Al-Sisi, and the Israeli people will walk behind you”. In this message, Landau stressed that one of Al-Sisi’s most important contributions in supporting Israel’s national security is the role he plays in containing and besieging the Palestinian resistance.

Anyone following up on the internal Israeli conflicts would notice that the right-wing Zionist elites, who are the most discriminatory, are also the most enthusiastic about supporting Al-Sisi’s government. There is a very long list of Al-Sisi supporters, including the Likud Minister of Culture, Miri Regev, who leads campaigns to desecrate Al-Aqsa Mosque.

What most reinforces the Israeli realisation of the magnitude of the achievements of the coup in Egypt is the fact that Al-Sisi, unlike Hosni Mubarak, does not hesitate to acknowledge that his security policies serve Israel’s purposes. Al-Sisi has said many times that the deployment of Egyptian forces in Sinai is intended to improve the security situation in Israel. This led Zionist commentator Amir Tefon, who has conducted a series of investigations into Egypt-Israel relations, to conclude that Al-Sisi’s era is considered to be their golden age.

It is worth bringing attention to the fact that official Israel’s keenness on Al-Sisi has reached the point where the Tel Aviv elites avoid admitting the close relations between the Egyptian president and Benjamin Netanyahu in case it creates problems for the regime in Cairo. When Al-Sisi admitted in a recent interview with the Washington Post that he talks “a lot” to Netanyahu, the latter’s office refused to comment. Also, when Ayelet Shahar, the political correspondent for Israel’s Army Radio, cited sources in Netanyahu’s office in her confirmation of Al-Sisi offering Netanyahu a Palestinian state in northern Sinai and that there was no need to evacuate the Jewish settlements in the West Bank, his office immediately denied the story; it was, however, also confirmed by Naftali Bennett.

However, there are a few people in Israel who warn against the dangers of Al-Sisi’s enthusiasm to help Israel in its war against the Palestinian resistance and who believe that his behaviour will lead to counterproductive results. For example, military commentator Amir Aron believes that Al-Sisi’s position during the brutal Israeli war on Gaza last year actually harmed Israel, because his intense hatred of Hamas made him stall the process of reaching an agreement to end the war. This prolonged the war in a manner that harmed Israel (Haaretz 3 February 2015).

In short, Al-Sisi is taking this position against Hassan Salameh and the others because he realises that they represent all that is the exact opposite of himself; they are everything that he isn’t, and he resents that.

Translated from Al-Araby Al-Jadid, 20 May, 2015.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.