Dutch foreign minister Maxime Verhagen and his Danish colleague, Per Stig Møller, made the proposal during the recent escalation of conflict there. The Egyptian government now blames the Netherlands for doing Israel’s dirty work.

Reacting to questions from NRC International, Egyptian deputy foreign minister Hossam Zaki said the proposal was “inappropriate” and “badly prepared”. Zaki said Cairo had been unpleasantly surprised by Verhagen’s initiative. Even though the proposal directly concerned Egypt, it was reportedly never consulted. “Our EU embassies told us the Dutch and the Danish were working on something, but we were surprised to find that our position was not reflected in their proposal.”

On January 7, Maxime Verhagen an his Danish colleague sent a letter containing the controversial proposal to the Czech government, the current holder of the rotating presidency of the European Union. An observer mission was to effectuate an end to smuggling operations via tunnels from the Sinai desert to the Gaza Strip. Israel says Hamas uses these tunnels to smuggle arms into Gaza. Ending these activities was cited by Israel as one of the main objectives of the three-week military operation against Hamas.

Zaki says Egypt had made it clear long before that it would not accept foreign soldiers on its borders. “This is unacceptable to us. The president has repeatedly said so in public statements. We could not take the Dutch-Danish proposal seriously. It was vague and badly prepared.” He says he is convinced the proposal originated with the Israelis and was later copied by the Dutch foreign minister. “If you want to present a proposal, you first need to talk to all parties concerned, not just to the Israelis and then use their wishes as a foundation to build on. In diplomacy that is a non-starter”.

A spokesperson for Verhagen says he did in fact consult with his Egyptian colleague Ahmed Aboul Gheit. In a telephone conversation with Verhagen, the Egyptian minister reportedly did not express any objections against the Dutch proposal.