The fact that Egypt is no longer under Saudi Arabia’s cloak despite needing its oil represents a hard blow to Riyadh’s policy, which has so far lost twice — the first time when it was unable to control Egypt, and subsequently when signs of Egypt joining the alliance between Iraq, Iran and Syria showed, albeit indirectly.
Either way, Iraq now has the chance to lead the Arab scene once again or at least build new national alliances to strengthen its presence and positions on the Arab level, as well as take advantage of its relationship with Egypt to get what it wants from Saudi Arabia.
Iraq will not only pull Egypt closer on the political, security and economic levels, but it could even score some gains on the religious level if it was able to get a fatwa from Al-Azhar to help it fight extremism in the post-Islamic State phase, or even put an end to accusations claiming the Popular Mobilization Units is a sectarian, illegitimate force.
However, one might still wonder whether the current Iraqi diplomacy is able to understand the game and use the tension between Riyadh and Cairo to its advantage, or whether it would only provide oil and promote a positive relationship with Egypt without achieving any concrete results.
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