Egypt bankrolls Israel’s war crimes with $35bn gas deal

Netanyahu has approved ‘Israel’s’ largest energy deal ever — a $35 billion gas export deal with Egypt. He said the deal “greatly strengthens Israel’s position as a regional energy superpower and contributes to regional stability”. But it raises serious questions about Egyptian complicity, responsibility, and the prioritisation of profit over Palestinian life. This is a long-term economic partnership with a government accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, at a time when legal obligations should take precedence over commercial interests.

Egypt’s 15-year energy deal with the occupation

Under the agreement, gas from Israel’s offshore Leviathan field will be exported to Egypt over roughly 15-years, with Egypt acting as a regional processing and export hub. While the gas is extracted from waters internationally recognised as under ‘Israeli’ control, the deal is inseparable from the broader reality of ‘Israel’s’ occupation of Palestinian territory and its systematic abuse of Palestinian rights, including the deliberate strangulation of Gaza’s economy and infrastructure.

‘Israel’s’ energy boom has unfolded alongside a crippling blockade of Gaza, repeated military assaults, and policies that have left Palestinians without reliable access to electricity, fuel, or economic self-sufficiency. Gaza’s power shortages are the result of deliberate political decisions, and are a tool of control and colonisation. While hospitals, water desalination plants, and sewage systems have repeatedly been pushed to the brink of collapse, the occupation is able to expand its role as a regional energy exporter.

Egypt — Deal ‘purely commercial’

Although Egypt insists the gas deal is ‘purely commercial‘, this claim cannot be justified when viewed against international legal obligations. Under the 1948 UN Genocide Convention, states must not only stop genocide when it is being committed, but also take all reasonable steps to prevent it. Entering into long-term economic agreements that strengthen the economy of the genocidal state of Israel is clearly at odds with this responsibility.

By locking itself into decades of gas purchases, Egypt is not just buying energy. It is also helping to normalise relations with a criminal state. It is also stabilising and legitimising an economy that underwrites military capacity, settlement expansion, and an occupation widely recognised by human rights organisations as apartheid. Economic cooperation with ‘Israel’ sends a message that genocide is no barrier to business as usual.

Multinational energy companies operating in Israel’s gas sector are also deeply complicit. U.S.-based Chevron runs the Leviathan and Tamar offshore fields. British BP holds exploration licences in Israel’s Exclusive Economic Zone alongside Azerbaijan’s SOCAR. And Israeli occupation firms such as NewMed Energy also profit from extraction, transport, and export infrastructure that underpins ‘Israel’s’ economy.

Gas from these fields is used for ‘Israel’s’ domestic supply. But it is also exported abroad, in deals such as this $35 billion deal supplying Egypt. These lock in decades of revenue, strengthening the economy of the apartheid Israeli state, and its military capacity and occupation. These companies continue to benefit financially but remain insulated from the consequences of Israel’s policies on the ground. This raises serious questions of complicity and corporate responsibility.

‘Energy security’

Western governments have provided the diplomatic and political cover that allows these deals to proceed. Europe and the United States repeatedly invoke “energy security” to justify deepening ties with ‘Israel’s’ gas sector, even as they pretend to acknowledge the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. This selective application of international law undermines the legitimacy of the global legal framework these states claim to uphold. Energy dependence is treated as an overriding concern, while Palestinian lives are thought of as expendable.

The Egypt gas deal is part of a broader pattern in which ‘Israel’ is economically rewarded even as it maintains its system of occupation, blockade, and collective punishment. Gas revenues strengthen the zionist entity’s standing with the rest of the world, and increases its bargaining power. This is happening whilst Palestinians are denied control over their borders, resources, and basic economic development.

The Israeli regime’s gas strategy

In October 2023, the Israeli occupation granted offshore gas exploration licences off Gaza’s coast, to six Israeli and international companies. This was in violation of international law. Al-Haq, Al Mezan and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights warned these energy companies that involvement in these licences could amount to war crimes.

So, ‘Israel’s’ gas strategy is not limited to commercially uncontested waters. It is expanding in ways that further entrench Palestinian dispossession. And is increasingly becoming another arena in which occupation is normalised and monetised.

The Israel–Egypt gas deal is a political choice that prioritises stability and profit over international law and human rights. Egypt, Western governments, and multinational corporations all bear responsibility for the consequences of this choice.

It rewards occupation, entrenches inequality, and financially supports a state accused of the worst crimes under international law. Participation in ‘Israeli’ gas exports strengthens a system that denies Palestinians control over their lives, their economy, and their future. Egypt’s claim that this is just a commercial deal is untrue. Economic ties and energy infrastructure are propping up ‘Israel’s’ regime of ethnic cleansing and control, and governments and corporations are choosing profit and gas over international law, humanity, and Palestinian life.

Featured image via the Canary