Opinion: Egypt leads anti-terrorism campaign in ME ‘always and forever’

CAIRO – 29 July 2017: President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi issued a presidential decree on Wednesday to form the National Council to Combat Terrorism and Extremism.

Sisi is the anti-terrorism pioneer in the Arab region, and even in the world. He has directed to set up an anti-terrorism council to mobilize institutional and societal capacities to reduce the causes of terrorism and to address its effects.

Sisi’s regional initiative has been preceded by establishment of a similar anti-terrorism office under the auspices of the United Nations.

The Egyptian anti-terrorism office is deemed as a fruit harvested from the Arab-American summit held last May on the Saudi soil. By the establishment of this counter terrorism council on the Egyptian territory, Egypt affirms the control of the ruins of the anti-terrorism campaign at the Egyptian administration’s grip.

Egypt has controlled the keys to solve the Middle East’s issues and crises. Despite the Arab-Qatari rift is described as an intra-Gulf rift in many western and American media outlets, but the Egyptian leadership has stressed it owns keys to resolve all the region’s crises and problems “always and forever.”

Moreover, the United Nations established an anti-terrorism office in June, upon the adaptation of General Assembly resolution 71/291, preceding the appointment of Mr. Vladimir Ivanovich Voronkov as Under-Secretary-General of the office on June 21, 2017.

As suggested by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in his report (A/71/858) on the Capability of the United Nations to Assist Member States in implementing the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, the Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force and the UN Counter-Terrorism Centre, initially established in the Department of Political Affairs were moved into a new Office of Counter-Terrorism headed by an Under-Secretary–General.

The new Under-Secretary-General will provide strategic leadership to United Nations counter-terrorism efforts, participate in the decision-making process of the United Nations and ensure that the cross-cutting origins and impact of terrorism are reflected in the work of the United Nations.

Providing leadership on the General Assembly counter-terrorism mandates entrusted to the Secretary-General from across the United Nations system and enhancing coordination and coherence across the 38 Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force entities to ensure the balanced implementation of the four pillars of the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy are the main functions of the newly-established UN Office of Counter-Terrorism.

The anti-terrorism office shall improve visibility, advocacy and resource mobilization for United Nations counter-terrorism efforts and ensure that due priority is given to counterterrorism across the United Nations system and that the important work on preventing violent extremism is firmly rooted in the Strategy.

Sisi has sought to present himself as an indispensable bulwark against terrorism in the Middle East.

In his speech during the Arab-American summit held in Riyadh on May, 21st, Sisi said that terrorist is not only the one who carries arms, but also the one who trains, funds, arms and offers a political and ideological cover.

President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi first announced plans to form the counter-terrorist council in April in response to the Palm Sunday bombings that killed 48 people and injured dozens of others in Tanta and Alexandria.

During his speech in Riaydh, Sisi stressed that Combating terrorism is a comprehensive approach, which goes beyond the military perspective, and must include a political and developmental approach.

He asserted that Egypt is in a daily fight against terrorist organizations in Sinai, which is a part of a global war against terrorism.

“The success to eradicate the threat of terrorism requires a confrontation with all terrorist organizations in a comprehensive and simultaneous way on all fronts,” Sisi added during the Arab-American summit.

Sisi’s remarks reflected the Egyptian administration’s keenness to eradicate all the terrorism sources in the region. Egypt’s boycott to the Qatari regime, along with Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain, comes within the four Arab nations’ endeavors to undermine the terrorism’s arms in the Middle East.

On June 5, the Arab quartet severed the diplomatic ties with the oil-rich state of Qatar, wishing the Qatari administration won’t tear the Arab fabric apart. However, Qatar preferred to oppose the Arabs’ unity against terrorism and radicalism.

The United Arab Emirates offered to host the UN counter-terrorism office, as this reflects the Emirati eagerness to eradicate extremism and terrorism in the Arab region.

When the four Arab nations offered a 13-demand list to Qatar, they aimed at re-inviting Qatar to the Arab unity direction against radicalism and extremism.

Unfortunately, the Arab demands’ list rejection by Qatar and uncovered documents on its ties and funding to terrorism groups in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Libya, the UAE and Yemen revealed recently by U.S. Congress members during the Congress hearing session assessing the intra-Arab crisis on Wednesday may increase the gap between the Arab quartet on one hand and the Qatari regime on the other.

While Saudi king referred to the Iranian Revolution as the spearhead of terrorism. “The Iranian regime is spreading sectarianism, in collaboration with other allied groups,” during the Arab-American summit, the Qatari regime has boosted its ties with Iran.

Qatar breached the Memorandum of Understanding to monitor terrorism funding resources that was signed at the onset of the US-GCC summit when it insisted to defy the Arabs’ 13-demands’ list.

The Arab Quartet have reaffirmed many times that Qatar is a brotherly state that must reconsider its foreign policy so as to be re-integrated again to the Arab unified fabric.