The deal to export gas from Israel to Egypt– recently approved by the Israeli government, was not presented as a routine economic announcement. Instead, Israel’s leadership framed it as a central national and strategic achievement, using it to recast the country’s energy narrative. Yet that carefully constructed message — polished at the press conference podium — quickly gave way to a deeper domestic debate over the deal’s motivations, timing, and limits, and over whether it truly enhances Israel’s security or merely postpones difficult questions.
At a joint press conference with Energy and Infrastructure Minister Eli Cohen, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought to cast the agreement as “the largest in Israel’s history.” In a statement issued by his office and received by Alhurra, Netanyahu said the deal was valued at 112 billion shekels, with approximately 58 billion shekels expected to flow into state coffers. He said the revenues would be used to strengthen education, healthcare, infrastructure, security, and “the future of coming generations,” explicitly linking the agreement to Israelis’ standard of living.
“I approved the deal after ensuring Israel’s security interests and other vital interests,” Netanyahu said, adding that the agreement “strengthens Israel’s standing as a regional energy power and contributes to stability in our region.” Israeli observers noted that this emphasis on security — offered without public details — appeared aimed at giving a sovereign and strategic veneer to what is fundamentally a commercial export deal, at a time of deep regional uncertainty.
Energy Minister Eli Cohen, for his part, described the agreement as a “historic moment,” saying it cements Israel’s position as a “regional energy power on which neighboring countries rely.” He said the deal followed lengthy negotiations and guarantees of Israel’s security and economic interests, stressing that it preserves priority for the domestic Israeli market, includes mechanisms to improve gas pricing at home, and involves direct investments exceeding 16 billion shekels.
The official narrative, however, did not silence domestic criticism. Israeli journalist and political analyst Ziki Yakobi told Alhurra that Netanyahu is attempting to leverage the deal for electoral purposes. “That was clearly evident in the press conference with the energy minister and in how the deal was presented to the public,” he said.
Yakobi noted that the agreement has revived a long-standing debate in Israel over the size and longevity of the country’s gas reserves. “There is a heated discussion in Israel that goes as follows: if you export gas to Egypt, you may be undermining your strategic reserves to the point where Israel could find itself without gas in twenty years — a prospect many experts have warned about,” he said.
He pointed to Egypt’s own experience as a cautionary tale. “Egypt was once a gas-exporting country, and today it imports gas because its reserves were depleted,” Yakobi said, warning that excessive exports could lead Israel down a similar path.
Looking beyond economics, Yakobi argued that approval of the deal was not purely an Israeli decision but also reflected U.S. political pressure. “The approval came under pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, as part of efforts to push forward negotiations related to the second phase of his plan on Gaza and to sustain the broader regional negotiating track,” he said.
According to Yakobi, this pressure was coupled with an American desire to provide economic support to Egypt, placing Netanyahu in a complex political equation. “In response, Netanyahu emphasizes the economic justifications and expected revenues — the billions entering the state treasury and the promise of economic improvement — as a way to balance external pressure with domestic sensitivity around the gas issue,” he said.
The debate also played out in the Hebrew-language press. Yedioth Ahronoth reported that despite the deal’s scale, it includes no written guarantees from Egypt toward Israel, whether political or security-wise. The paper noted that Netanyahu’s repeated references to “ensuring security interests” reflect an Israeli awareness of the deal’s limitations and an effort to reassure critics amid the absence of clear reciprocal commitments from Cairo.
The newspaper added that the agreement could be used as a platform for a trilateral meeting involving Israel, Egypt, and the United States, in an attempt to translate the economic achievement into broader political leverage — even as Egypt insists on keeping the agreement strictly commercial.
On the Egyptian side, officials moved quickly to strip the deal of any political meaning. Al-Ahram quoted the head of Egypt’s State Information Service as saying the gas agreement is “purely commercial,” concluded on the basis of economic and investment considerations alone, and carries no political understandings. He stressed that the contract adheres to market rules and international investment mechanisms, and that Egypt’s interest lies in reinforcing its role as a regional gas hub in the Eastern Mediterranean, leveraging its advanced infrastructure.
The Egyptian official warned against politicizing the agreement or attaching political interpretations to it, while reaffirming Cairo’s firm position in support of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.
In sum, the Israel–Egypt gas deal exposes a clear gap between official rhetoric and political interpretations within Israel — between what is said from podiums and what is debated behind closed doors. It is presented as an historic economic achievement but read politically as part of a broader regional equation shaped by Israeli elections, U.S. pressure, and the intersecting calculations of energy and security in the Eastern Mediterranean.
