{"id":129181,"date":"2026-10-17T23:37:22","date_gmt":"2026-10-17T20:37:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/?p=129181"},"modified":"2026-10-17T23:37:22","modified_gmt":"2026-10-17T20:37:22","slug":"sisi-egypt-defend-saudi-arabia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/2026\/10\/17\/sisi-egypt-defend-saudi-arabia\/","title":{"rendered":"Sisi says Egypt ready to defend Saudi Arabia, seeks parliament backing"},"content":{"rendered":"

(The Turkish Post) –<\/strong> Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said on Oct. 17 that Egypt would take any measure needed to defend Saudi Arabia if the kingdom asks, and called on parliament to be ready to meet in an emergency session to authorize military support.<\/p>\n

Sisi’s pledge comes as Houthi missile and drone attacks on Saudi airports and oil facilities have escalated in October. Egypt, the most populous Arab country, is not part of the defense pact that Saudi Arabia signed with T\u00fcrkiye and Pakistan in August.<\/p>\n

Sisi pledges to defend Saudi Arabia<\/h2>\n

Sisi spoke at a graduation ceremony at the Egyptian Military Academy in the New Administrative Capital, east of Cairo.<\/p>\n

“We will take any measure to protect Saudi Arabia,” he said. “We stand firmly to protect and defend the territories of our brothers in the Gulf.”<\/p>\n

He said any action would follow the directives of Saudi King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Sisi said he hoped parliament would convene in an emergency session to grant the authorization if Riyadh made such a request.<\/p>\n

“I am not speaking in order for us to fight anyone or attack anyone. I am speaking only for defense,” Sisi said. He did not say what kind of military support Egypt might provide.<\/p>\n

Saudi Arabia had not publicly asked Egypt for military help, and Saudi officials had not commented on the offer by the evening of Oct. 17. Egypt’s constitution requires the approval of the House of Representatives before the armed forces are sent on combat missions abroad.<\/p>\n

Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia<\/h2>\n

Sisi said attacks on Saudi Arabia undermine Arab and Egyptian national security, and he warned against threats to the security of the Red Sea and international shipping lanes. Egypt earns much of its foreign currency from the Suez Canal, which depends on traffic through the Red Sea.<\/p>\n

Houthi attacks have hit several Saudi airports this month. A missile strike on Riyadh airport<\/a> on Oct. 10 killed 12 people and wounded 309, and later attacks hit the airports of Riyadh and Dammam again.<\/p>\n

The fighting in Yemen intensified after the Saudi-backed government launched an offensive against the Houthis in early October. On Oct. 16, a Houthi strike on the al-Maashiq palace in Aden<\/a>, the seat of the government, killed at least five people.<\/p>\n

Gulf support and the Mecca defense pact<\/h2>\n

Sisi thanked Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait for the support they gave Egypt after 2013, which he described as historic. Gulf states sent Egypt fuel and financial aid after the military removed President Mohamed Morsi that year.<\/p>\n

T\u00fcrkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed a mutual defense agreement in Mecca on Aug. 7, under which an armed attack on one of the three is treated as an attack on all. On Oct. 5, the three countries agreed to activate collective deterrence measures in response to the Houthi attacks.<\/p>\n

Sisi says his rule ends in 2030<\/h2>\n

In the same speech, Sisi said he would not seek to stay in power after his current term. “The period leading up to 2030 will be the end of my term as president of the state, if I am still alive,” he said, adding that the constitution “would not be touched.”<\/p>\n

Sisi, 71, a former army chief, has led Egypt since 2014. Constitutional amendments approved in a 2019 referendum extended presidential terms from four years to six and allowed him to run again. He won re-election in December 2023 for a term that ends in 2030.<\/p>\n

He said the years before 2030 would be used to prepare a new generation of officials, and that the Military Academy would train future ministers and officials.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said Egypt would take any measure to defend Saudi Arabia if the kingdom asks, and called on parliament to be ready to authorize military support. He also said his rule ends in 2030.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":129180,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_bookmark_settings":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[373,160,47,53,48,46],"class_list":["post-129181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world","tag-abdel-fattah-el-sisi","tag-egypt","tag-houthis","tag-red-sea","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-yemen"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129181"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129181\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129188,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129181\/revisions\/129188"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishpost.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}