Egypt replaces spy chief who played key role in now-stalled hostage-ceasefire talks
Sissi appoints Hassan Rashad to replace Abbas Kamel, who is moved to become a special adviser, as Iran’s FM visits Egypt as part of Middle East tour to discuss regional tensions
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi reportedly replaced his trusted spy chief on Wednesday who has played a key role in hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas.
According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, Abbas Kamel was considered the second-most powerful person in Egypt for years and during his tenure, built strong relationships with officials in US and Israeli intelligence, as well as leaders of the Hamas terror group.
Kamel will now serve as a special advisor to Sissi and coordinator of the security services, but the WSJ noted that it was unclear whether the reassignment was a promotion or demotion amid ongoing failure to reach another deal between Israel and Hamas since November.
It was also unclear whether he would continue to be involved in further negotiations.
The November deal, brokered in a joint effort by Kamel along with CIA Director William Burns and Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, saw the release of 105 of the 251 hostages Hamas took during its October 7 attack when it also murdered some 1,200 people.
In exchange for the hostages, fighting was paused in Gaza for every day women, children, and non-Israeli hostages were released, as Israel released female and minor Palestinian prisoners from its jails.
Ongoing attempts since then to broker a deal for the release of the remaining hostages still held captive by Hamas have repeatedly failed as Israel and the terror group accuse each other of sabotaging negotiations.
But even amid these failures, and whether Kamel’s reassignment is a promotion or negotiation, US program director at the International Crisis Group Michael Wahid Hanna told the Journal that Kamel “is and remains one of the few people in the system trusted by the president.”
“I don’t expect that he’s going to be disappearing from the scene,” he added.
Kamel was replaced with his deputy, Hassan Rashad who, according to the WSJ, oversaw key issues in Egyptian intelligence, including the country’s relationship with Iran, which has been fraught at times over the years.
He was announced as the new intelligence chief shortly before Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, arrived in Cairo for the first official visit by an Iranian foreign minister in almost 12 years.
Egypt is Araghchi’s seventh stop on a tour of the Middle East where he has spoken with officials in Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iraq, and Oman about the regional tensions surrounding the war in Gaza and Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah in the north.
He is expected to head to Turkey after his visit to Egypt, the Iranian Foreign Ministry has said.
Araghchi’s trip also comes as Iran awaits an Israeli response to its October 1 ballistic missile attack, which it said it launched in retaliation for Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination and the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July, which Israel did not take responsibility for.
Iran launched some 200 missiles at Israel in the attack, killing one Palestinian man in the West Bank and causing minor damage around the country. The IDF also said a couple of bases were hit, but that none of the army’s capabilities had been compromised.
Tensions have steadily increased in the region since Hamas’s October 7 attack which sparked the war in Gaza.
In response to the attack, Israel launched a ground offensive in Gaza with the proclaimed objectives of dismantling Hamas and securing the release of the hostages.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 42,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 17,000 combatants in battle as of August and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.
Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.
Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and in military operations along the border with the Strip stands at 355.
Israel has also faced near-daily rocket and drone attacks from Hezbollah in the north as the Lebanese terrorist organization said it was attacking in solidarity with Hamas as well as drone and missile attacks from Iran-backed groups in Yemen and Iraq.
Hezbollah’s attacks culminated in Israel stepping up its response last month with a series of heavy airstrikes targeting the group in southern Lebanon and Beirut in which the vast majority of its leadership, including Nasrallah, were killed. Israel also launched a ground operation in southern Lebanon to dismantle Hezbollah’s infrastructure near the border.
The attacks on northern Israel over the last year have resulted in the deaths of 28 civilians. In addition, 38 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September.
Meanwhile, Israel has killed at least 966 Hezbollah terrorists in the last year, but the number is likely higher as the group has not been consistently updating its death toll since Israel began the ground operation.
