Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi. Photo: Russian Presidential Press and Information Office.

i24 News – Some nine months after brokering a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, Egypt is continuing to assert a greater role in Mideast peacemaking, expanding its visible presence in the Gaza Strip, the Associated Press reports.

Days before the Egyptian-mediated ceasefire took effect on May 21, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi pledged $500 million for reconstruction efforts in the Palestinian coastal enclave.

The Egyptian leader also sent work crews to clear the rubble from 11 days of fighting, as well as building equipment and engineers.

While it is unclear how much of that money has been delivered, Egypt’s presence today is seen across Gaza in the form of Egyptian flags and billboards praising Sisi, as well as subsiding construction projects.

Notably, Egypt is aiding the construction of three towns that will house some 300,000 residents and assisting in a project to upgrade Gaza’s main coastal road, according to Naji Sarhan, the deputy director of the Hamas-run Housing Ministry.

Egypt has a long history of involvement in the affairs of the Gaza Strip, controlling the territory from 1949 until 1967.

The country signed a peace deal with Israel on March 26, 1979 at the White House following the 1978 Camp David Accords.

The Gaza war last May “allowed Egypt to once again market itself as an indispensable security partner for Israel in the region … which in turn makes it an indispensable security partner for the US,” Hafsa Halawa, an expert on Egypt at the Middle East Institute, a Washington think tank, told AP.

“Gaza is a reminder to everybody, effectively, that you can’t really do anything without Egypt.”