‘Deal of century’ won’t include land concession: Egypt

By Mohammed al-Rayes

CAIRO

Egypt has dismissed reports about conceding any territory as part of “the deal of the century” that is being promoted by U.S. President Donald Trump as the formula for resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

“President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi cannot give up a single inch of Egyptian land,” Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said in an interview with Egypt’s flagship newspaper Al-Ahram on Wednesday.

In April, al-Sisi spoke during a visit to Washington about the significance of concluding what he described as “deal of the century” to solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

The Egyptian leader, however, did not give details about the nature of the deal, but reports claimed that the deal would include the concession of an area in the Sinai Peninsula to be annexed to the Gaza Strip where a Palestinian state will be established.

Shoukry said there was a “misinterpretation with a view to creating controversy and clamor."

He said al-Sisi was speaking that solving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict “would be a major achievement in the world and thus will be described as the deal of the century”.

Palestinian-Israeli negotiations collapsed in April 2014 after Israel refused to stop settlement activity, accept a two-state solution based on the 1967 borders and release Palestinian detainees from Israeli jails.