Egyptians will look back on 2025 as a year of geopolitical turbulence, as the country sought to navigate escalating conflicts and shifting regional alliances. To Egypt’s northeast, Gaza was bombed for most of the year, while to the south, Sudan’s brutal civil war showed no signs of ending.
The war in Gaza cast a long shadow, inflicting economic strains, heightened security risks, and diplomatic pressures, but Egyptian negotiators played a key role in the mediation that finally brokered a ceasefire that offered a tentative respite from the devastation and killing in the Palestinian territory.
In Sudan, fighting sent refugees fleeing to neighbouring countries. Egypt’s concern is that the civil war has become a proxy war. As the year closed, there were reports of renewed Russian support for the national army, in return for a Red Sea naval facility at Port Sudan.
Further upstream, Ethiopia inaugurated the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) despite Egyptian concerns for its downstream water security. Cairo worries that this could set a precedent for further unilateral developments across the Nile Basin.
Amid these challenges, there were some bright spots. For one, Cairo mended a decade-long rift with Ankara to foster trade ties, investment partnerships, and defence cooperation. Egyptian and Turkish interests align on several dossiers, not least Gaza, Sudan, and the Horn of Africa.
