Iran's president expected in Egypt on milestone visit amid Middle East upheavals

Leaders of the two countries set to meet on the sidelines of D-8 summit

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian will travel to Egypt for talks with President Abdel Fattah El Sisi. Reuters

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi is expected to raise the issue of attacks on Red Sea shipping by Houthi forces backed by Tehran when he meets Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in Cairo this week, sources have told The National.

The attacks, launched in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, have cut by half Egypt's revenue from the Suez Canal, which links the Red Sea and the Mediterranean. Egypt is already gripped by an economic crisis and foreign currency shortages.

Also high on the agenda will be other upheavals in the Middle East, including the war in Gaza, where the Iranian-backed Hamas has fought Israel since October 2023. Lebanon will also be up for discussion, where another Iranian proxy, Hezbollah, lost a significant portion of its assets in its war with Israel.

The two leaders will also review the situation in Syria, where the regime of president Bashar Al Assad, which had for years been propped up by Iran and Russia against armed opposition, collapsed this month.

The sources said Egypt has been urging Iran to persuade the Houthis to halt their attacks on shipping but to no avail. Cairo has also been seeking guarantees that the Houthis will not make good on threats to close Bab Al Mandeb, the narrow strait at the southern mouth of the Red Sea.

Egypt and Iran have in recent years held several rounds of consultations to normalise their relations after decades of tension following the 1979 overthrow of the Shah in the Islamic revolution. However, they are yet to upgrade their diplomatic representation to ambassadorial level, reflecting lingering differences.

Cairo has repeatedly called on Iran to stay out of the affairs of Arab nations and stop arming and bankrolling non-state players across the Middle East. Now, Iran's proxies have been considerably weakened, except for the Houthis in Yemen and armed Shiite groups in Iraq.

While in Egypt, Mr Pezeshkian will participate in a summit of the D-8 Organisation for Economic Co-operation, which groups his country together with Turkey, Egypt, Pakistan, Indonesia, Nigeria, Malaysia and Bangladesh.

His visit will be the first by an Iranian president since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in February 2013 made a historic trip to Egypt, which was then ruled by Mohammed Morsi.