Forces from Egypt, 5 other Arab nations to start joint drill

Ground, air and naval units from five Arab nations are arriving in Egypt to join their Egyptian counterparts for war games, according to the Egyptian military, in the first sign that a military alliance proposed by Washington for its Middle East partners may be gaining traction.

A military statement late Wednesday said forces from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain and Jordan will take part in the November 3-16 exercises codenamed "Arab Shield" and to be held in western Egypt. Lebanon and Morocco are taking part as observers.

The announcement came a little more than a month after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met in New York with the foreign ministers from the six nations participating in this month's war games plus those from Oman and Qatar to advance the idea of creating a Sunni alliance uniting America's Middle East partners against Shiite and non-Arab Iran.

However, the Egyptian military statement made no link between the war games and the proposed alliance, which Egypt may be approaching with caution given its sectarian undertones.

Egypt, however, has become heavily dependent on financial assistance and investments from Gulf heavyweights like Saudi Arabia and the UAE and that might in turn influence its decision on whether to join the proposed alliance.

A prominent Egyptian analyst on Thursday warned against such an alliance, framing its creation as part of an ongoing process to replace Israel with Iran as the Arabs' chief enemy and emphasizing that differences between the Arabs and Iran can be politically settled.

"Israel is not a friend and this is a fact despite all attempts to ignore it," wrote Abdullah el-Sinnawy in the independent al-Shorouk newspaper.

"The most dangerous thing here is to create an Arab NATO that includes countries bound by diplomatic relations with Israel like Egypt and Jordan and Gulf region nations like Saudi Arabia."