President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt replaced the powerful head of the country’s intelligence services on Wednesday, according to state media, switching out the Egyptian official who plays a leading role in cease-fire negotiations between Israel and Hamas.
The official, Gen. Abbas Kamel, had overseen many of Egypt’s most important domestic and foreign policy matters, becoming the face of its extensive security apparatus, which has overseen crackdowns on political opponents and kept Mr. el-Sisi firmly in control. The spy chief’s power often appeared to be second only to the president’s.
The reasons for the move were unclear, and the longstanding secrecy surrounding the highest levels of Egypt’s government means that Mr. el-Sisi’s decision is likely to go unexplained. But it came as Egypt is rocked by the regional instability set off by the nearby war in Gaza, which is damaging Egypt’s already struggling economy and putting intense pressure on its peace treaty with Israel as well as on its relationships with Hamas and the United States.
State media and the presidency’s statement said only that General Kamel was replaced by Maj. Gen. Hassan Mahmoud Rashad, who, according to the state-linked Extra News channel, had served as a deputy to the departing intelligence chief. General Kamel was named a special envoy and adviser to the president and general coordinator of the security services, according to the statement.
It was not immediately clear whether this was a promotion or a demotion for General Kamel or whether he would continue to play a role in the talks between Israel and Hamas.
Working closely with William J. Burns, the C.I.A. director; David Barnea, the head of Israel’s spy service; and Qatar’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani, General Kamel had become a key mediator in the negotiations over the past year to end the conflict. He also helped broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas in May 2021.
But the current talks have stalled since a weeklong truce in November, which paused the fighting and saw more than 100 hostages abducted in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack on Israel released from Gaza. Israel also released Palestinian prisoners and detainees during that pause.
General Kamel’s career has been intertwined with Mr. el-Sisi’s since they were young military officers together, according to analysts who have tracked their rise.
As Mr. el-Sisi climbed from general to head of military intelligence to defense minister, he kept General Kamel by his side as chief of staff and gatekeeper, even as other confidants were dismissed or sidelined.
Audio recordings leaked in 2015 appeared to show the spy chief as a steadfast loyalist who helped Mr. el-Sisi seize power in 2013, deposing Egypt’s first democratically elected president, who was voted into office after Egypt’s 2011 Arab Spring revolution brought down its longtime autocratic president.
In 2018, after Egypt’s intelligence apparatus failed to alert Mr. el-Sisi about a coming electoral challenge by three military officers, the president put General Kamel in charge. Aided by another new hire — Mr. el-Sisi’s son Mahmoud el-Sisi — General Kamel soon purged the ranks of anyone suspected of opposing the president.
Since then, the agency that General Kamel leads, the General Intelligence Service, has become the primary instrument of Mr. el-Sisi’s authoritarian rule.
General Kamel took control over all key foreign policy matters, according to analysts, regularly making official visits to neighboring countries and overseeing relationships like those with United States officials and the oil-rich gulf countries on whom Egypt depends for aid and investment. Egypt’s once-influential civilian foreign ministry was largely shunted aside amid Mr. Kamel’s ascent.
Those responsibilities placed General Kamel at the heart of the corruption case against Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, who was charged with steering aid and weapons to Egypt in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes as part of a wide-ranging and yearslong conspiracy. The New York Times has reported that General Kamel was one of the officials described anonymously in Mr. Menendez’s indictment as personally nurturing Egypt’s relationship with the senator.
The intelligence agency has also shouldered broad responsibility within Egypt, ensuring Parliament acts in Mr. el-Sisi’s interests and keeping Egyptian media in line. General Kamel was deputized to manage the state’s relationship with political parties and smooth things over with opposition leaders when Mr. el-Sisi needed to show he was becoming more politically inclusive, opposition members have said.
General Kamel’s agency would also instruct government mouthpieces on Egyptian TV news channels on what to emphasize. It openly owns much of the media, shaping the state’s narrative with news sites and even hit TV shows and movies produced by companies owned by the state security services.
Along the way, the General Intelligence Service has greatly enriched itself by handing sweetheart contracts to cronies or buying up highly lucrative companies, experts on Egypt, including Timothy E. Kaldas of the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy, say. Hotels, cement manufacturing, pasta factories, bottled water and gas stations are just some of the industries the security establishment has invested in. These opaque companies are typically not subject to the taxes, customs or regulations that private-sector businesses face.
The profits are used to reward loyalists, analysts say — an insurance policy of sorts for a leadership hemorrhaging support among ordinary Egyptians, who are struggling to stay afloat during Egypt’s worst economic crisis in decades.
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