Egypt is clamping down on media incitement aimed at relations with fellow Arab countries, especially the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, threatening to take punitive action against violators.
The expanding campaign is energised by an escalating tug of war between social media influencers and journalists on both sides, who in recent days have been sparring over Iranian attacks on GCC countries and Egypt's posture towards these attacks, on one hand, and the US-Israeli war on Iran, on the other.
The Egyptian Ministry of Information has appealed to journalists, cultural figures, and ordinary people in Egypt and other Arab countries to help protect relations between their countries.
In a statement on 24 March, it called on the same people to stifle attempts to encourage what it described as "sedition" among Arab states.
"This is a time of unity and solidarity in the face of the challenges facing the Arab nation," the ministry added in its statement.
Egypt's media regulatory authorities have also issued a series of rules for state-controlled and private media to abide by when covering the war, in their bid to curb content, including coverage and articles, that could strain relations with these countries.
The Media Regulatory Authority, which is authorised to set rules for social media sites, also threatened to take action against influencers and users who criticise fellow Arab states or stage attacks against them.
The Egyptian civil society, the Journalists' Syndicate, and some of the nation's publications and media outlets are also stepping in to defuse media tensions between Egypt and other Arab states, with some local news sites and newspapers inviting Arab opinion writers and columnists to publish their articles in them as a sign of unity. Tug-of-war Deep under alarm in the corridors of the nation's media regulatory authorities are fears that public outrage at the Israeli-US war on Iran and comments on Iranian attacks against GCC countries would spoil relations between Egypt and these countries and translate into an official position from their governments, observers said.
"These Egyptian fears are credible, especially in the light of current blistering social media campaigns that aim to spoil relations with other Arab countries," Egyptian political analyst Islam Mansi said.
Speaking to The New Arab , he added that the same campaigns have crossed a "red line" by evolving into a real war that threatens to undermine ties between Egyptians and GCC peoples.
Egyptian social media users and influencers have been bitterly critical of the US and Israel and supportive of Iranian attacks against Israel since the beginning of the war.
Despite Egyptian social media sympathy for GCC countries reeling under Iranian retaliatory attacks, most influencers and opinion writers in these countries apparently view this sympathy as too feeble to meet high expectations of Egypt, the most populous Arab country and one believed to possess the most powerful Arab military.
This may explain the campaign instigated by social media influencers and writers in these countries against Egypt.
Kuwaiti writer Fuad Al Hashim launched into dire criticism of the Arab country, specifically ridiculing the presence of what he described as "too many" stray dogs on its streets, and "rampant poverty" in it.
UAE political science professor Abdulkhaleq Abdulla lashed out at what he perceives as Egypt's failure to provide real backing to his country and other GCC countries in the face of Iranian attacks. Also, he dwelt on Egypt's poor economic conditions. Striking where it hurts This escalating media and cyberspace war has apparently impacted Egypt's official discourse towards Iranian attacks against GCC states, prompting Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to use every public gathering he attended in the past three weeks to reiterate his country's condemnation of Iranian attacks against the same states.
The Egyptian president was also keen on relaying the same condemnation to GCC leaders by phone and during visits to the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
He also delivered the same message to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian during a phone conversation on 13 March.
These efforts are rooted in the dangers inherent in the cracks in media and cyberspace campaigns, taking the war centre stage, which can cause conflict between Arab countries, specialists said.
"Egyptians can never rejoice at Iranian attacks against other Arab states and any such action can only be done by a few individuals," Yahya Qallash, the former head of the Journalists' Syndicate, the independent guild of the nation's newspapermen, told TNA .
In any case, he added, relations between Arab states should not be influenced by the reactions of people on the streets.
Nevertheless, Qallash faulted the authorities' current crackdown on people expressing their views about the war for violating their right to free speech.
"Free expression can only be countered by free expression, not by anything else," he said.
Other observers attribute the current official campaign to Egyptian fears that the aforementioned media war is negatively affecting public attitudes in GCC countries, and consequently to official perceptions and policies in these countries in the future.
Arab states, especially GCC member states, have offered Egypt enormous financial, political and diplomatic support through its successive economic crises over the past decade, pumping tens of billions of dollars into the Egyptian economy and keeping it afloat.
Millions of Egyptians also work in GCC states, sending back tens of billions of dollars in remittances, which keep the national economy going and help the national treasury meet urgent obligations.
This is probably why the Egyptian government is upping its crackdown on what it describes as media "incitement", even taking its campaign outside national borders.
The Ministry of Information has decided to take legal action in the Kuwaiti courts against Al Hashim, the Kuwaiti writer who satirised Egypt in an article.
The same issue came up in phone talks between the Egyptian and Kuwaiti foreign ministers on March 24.
These efforts come amid calls to prevent social media from fostering negative public perceptions of Egypt in other countries that can linger for decades.
"Media regulatory agencies have the legal right to intervene to prevent harms to Egypt's relations with other Arab states," Mansi said.
"These relations are inseparable from Egypt's national security," he added.