By Howaida Awad Ahmed
What we are witnessing today leaves little room for doubt about what appears to be American and Israeli ambitions to reshape and fragment the Middle East, while expanding their influence deeper into Arab countries through a systematic strategy of proxy warfare—following a carefully designed sequence, moving slowly in some areas and rapidly in others.
The United States has provided Israel with extensive intelligence, strategic support, and military capabilities, enabling it to expand its presence inside Syria and Lebanon, with what appears to be assistance from forces that emerged following the fall of Bashar al-Assad.
At the same time, tensions with Iran have been intensified, while conflicts surrounding the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait have been prolonged through cycles of agreements, disagreements, attacks, and counterattacks. Iran’s responses, however, have often targeted Gulf states and regional interests rather than directly confronting the United States.
Looking at these developments from both a short- and long-term perspective, the emergence of conflict involving Iran’s Houthi allies in Yemen and Saudi Arabia can be viewed as a war of attrition against the Kingdom—one that threatens energy infrastructure and consumes enormous amounts of time, resources, and political capital. Such a confrontation also fuels demand for American weapons by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf as a whole.
As a result, the primary concern of the Gulf states becomes the containment of Iranian attacks and those of its regional allies, as well as the protection of their energy infrastructure.
From this perspective, Iran, Israel, and the United States can be viewed as components of a broader geopolitical system in which their respective interests, directly or indirectly, sometimes converge.
The greatest trap threatening the balance of power in the Middle East is the region’s movement toward dependence on a single global pole: the United States.
This is precisely why Egypt has historically served as a pivotal force in maintaining the regional balance. Its leadership has increasingly sought to diversify its strategic partnerships and establish a degree of equilibrium with the world’s largest economic power and America’s principal global competitor: China.
Egypt has diversified its international agreements and partnerships, expanding cooperation with Russia, France, and many other countries. Yet the most significant step has been its pursuit of serious cooperation with China, particularly in technology transfer and strategic economic development.
For Egypt, this represents the essence of strategic balance: maintaining multiple sources of cooperation, partnerships, and international commitments across different fields. It is a message that Egypt seeks to engage with all major powers on the basis of its own national interests and does not wish to become an instrument for advancing colonial ambitions or exploiting the resources of neighboring countries.
The so-called “Shiite Crescent,” whose influence has extended across significant parts of the Levant and Yemen, has also become a source of concern for the region. It can serve as a pretext for proxy wars and for drawing the Gulf states into prolonged conflicts and internal fragmentation.
The danger lies in a scenario in which the United States and its allies ultimately present themselves as the region’s saviors after having contributed to the escalation of tensions—while simultaneously demanding the weakening of Iran’s strategic capabilities, restrictions on its uranium-enrichment program, the imposition of sanctions, and pressure surrounding the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb.
Ultimately, such prolonged conflicts could lead to attempts to redistribute or control the Gulf’s vast wealth. The objective may take years to achieve, but the process is already underway if the Gulf states fail to recognize the broader strategic calculations behind these developments.
From this perspective, some analysts interpret the broader objective as being linked to the long-standing vision of a “Greater Israel,” extending from the Nile to the Euphrates.
The strategic contest, however, is not limited to the Gulf.
The United States and Israel are also pursuing influence in Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Djibouti, and the wider Horn of Africa, while tensions surrounding water resources and regional disputes have direct implications for Egypt’s national security.
The wars and geopolitical confrontations of today are no longer hidden. They are increasingly visible to researchers and observers concerned with Egypt’s future security.
Egypt, China, and Strategic Balance
Egypt’s growing relationship with China reflects this broader strategy of diversification.
The visit of the Chinese president to Egypt—his first visit to the country in ten years—cannot be viewed as an ordinary diplomatic visit. It coincides with the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Egypt and China and serves as a powerful reaffirmation of the relationship between the two countries.
The partnership encompasses trade, investment, technology, military cooperation, and strategic coordination.
The relationship is also mutually beneficial.
China benefits from strengthening its relationship with Egypt because Egypt occupies a strategically critical position in the Arab world, Africa, the Mediterranean, and the global trade system.
China is also emerging as one of the world’s most important competitors to the United States in the global arms market. Egypt, meanwhile, represents a crucial gateway to security and stability in the Arab region, particularly at a time when conflicts are spreading across the Middle East.
Any expansion of regional flashpoints inevitably affects global arms markets, defense production, shipping costs, trade routes, and refugee movements. The strategic competition between China and the United States therefore extends far beyond military power.
During the Chinese president’s visit, the Egyptian leadership reaffirmed its position that Taiwan is part of China—a position that directly contradicts Washington’s approach to the Taiwan issue.
Meanwhile, concerns within the United States over China’s accelerating economic rise continue to grow.
China has increasingly challenged the American economic position not through direct military confrontation, but through industrial capacity, technological development, manufacturing scale, and its growing penetration of global and Western markets.
China has transformed itself from a producer of relatively simple manufactured goods into a comprehensive industrial powerhouse capable of producing machinery, electronics, automobiles, batteries, renewable-energy equipment, and countless intermediate goods required by factories around the world.
Its share of global exports has continued to expand, and when faced with higher tariffs, China has increasingly sought alternative markets across emerging economies.
China’s industrial base is now, by many measures, a defining component of the industries of the future.
It has become a global leader in electric vehicles, batteries, solar panels, and renewable-energy supply chains, while investing heavily in artificial intelligence, advanced computing, space technology, biotechnology, and other strategic sectors.
The competition is taking place at extraordinary speed, with both Beijing and Washington racing to secure technological leadership before the other side does.
Perhaps even more significant is the scale of China’s investment in scientific research and technological development, particularly at a time when questions have been raised over the future of government funding for scientific research in the United States.
Another critical arena is rare-earth minerals.
China dominates significant stages of the global rare-earth supply chain, particularly processing and refining, including the materials required for advanced magnets and numerous high-technology industries. This gives Beijing considerable leverage over strategic global supply chains.
Two Different Models of Global Influence
The contrast between the American and Chinese approaches to international influence is also becoming increasingly visible.
The United States relies heavily on military alliances, strategic partnerships, sanctions, military bases, and security commitments.
China, by contrast, has generally pursued a quieter form of expansion—through infrastructure investment, trade, loans, development projects, and long-term economic partnerships.
In Latin America, for example, China’s presence has expanded through major infrastructure and mining investments, including projects in Peru, Ecuador, and Argentina.
Its engagement with Africa has also grown significantly through investment, infrastructure development, trade, and financing arrangements with numerous African governments.
China has also increasingly positioned itself as a diplomatic mediator in international disputes, seeking to expand its role not only as an economic power but also as a political actor capable of brokering agreements.
At the same time, Beijing has begun building broader international groupings and strengthening partnerships beyond its traditional alliances.
The United States, meanwhile, has maintained an extensive network of alliances involving NATO, Japan, South Korea, Australia, India, Gulf states, and many other partners, alongside hundreds of military installations around the world.
Yet Washington’s position has faced growing challenges, particularly during the Trump era, as the United States increasingly relied on tariffs and economic pressure as instruments of foreign policy while becoming more deeply involved in regional conflicts.
As a result, some Gulf states have begun exploring broader strategic partnerships in an effort to reduce their dependence on any single external power.
Even Europe has increasingly sought to diversify its sources of economic and strategic cooperation, rather than relying exclusively on Washington and becoming vulnerable to American sanctions or political pressure.
China’s model offers many countries an alternative: economic partnerships without the same network of military bases and traditional alliance structures associated with American power.
Its participation in organizations such as BRICS, along with emerging alternative economic and financial platforms, provides countries with additional options beyond the traditional Washington-centered international system.
For these reasons, Egypt—as well as many other countries—has increasingly viewed China as an important component of a strategy based on multiple tracks of international cooperation.
China, in turn, benefits enormously from Egypt’s geographic position.
Egypt sits at the crossroads of Africa, Asia, Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Red Sea, while the Suez Canal remains one of the world’s most important commercial waterways.
Egypt’s cooperation with China through the Belt and Road Initiative, together with expanding economic, technological, and military cooperation, reflects Cairo’s broader strategy of maintaining strategic flexibility without surrendering its independent decision-making.
Ultimately, Egypt’s approach can be understood as an attempt to preserve a delicate balance in an increasingly multipolar world.
Rather than choosing one global power at the expense of another, Cairo appears determined to maintain relationships with multiple centers of power—including the United States, China, Russia, Europe, and other emerging partners—while placing Egyptian national interests at the center of its foreign-policy calculations.
In a rapidly changing international order, strategic autonomy may be the most valuable asset a middle power can possess.
