Egypt tables new St. Catherine’s deal that would cement state control

A new deal that asserts the state’s ownership of St. Catherine’s Monastery and its lands was presented last week by the Egyptian government to the archbishop of the holy site, two sources close to the monastery tell Mada Masr.  The deal, presented on July 5, was discussed in a seven-hour meeting between Archbishop Symeon Papadopoulos and representatives of the finance and justice ministries, and includes seven provisions.  The most notable of these provisions is the recognition of the monastery as an Egyptian legal religious entity, granting its abbot and monks — who hold Greek, American and Lebanese nationality — renewable three-year-residency permits. It also grants the monks possession rights over the monastery and its religious institutions — meaning the right to reside on the grounds and practice religious rites — while leasing the surrounding gardens and land from the Egyptian government for a nominal fee over an extended period.  The agreement, however, does not recognize the monks’ ownership of any of the land. Papadopoulos, who was elected 10 months ago as head of the monastery, declined to sign and requested time to present the deal to the monks before taking a final position, according to one of the sources close to the monastery. The proposed deal comes in the wake of a court ruling from May of last year that settled a decade-long legal battle in favor of the government’s claim that the archbishop of the monastery had seized land without a legal basis. Per the ruling, the monastery, which is owned by the Greek Orthodox Church, was ordered to vacate 14 plots of land and granted usufruct rights over the remaining 57 plots of land that the monastery sits on.  Prior to the ruling, Greek-sponsored negotiations had resulted in a draft agreement recognizing the Greek Orthodox monastery’s ownership of all 71 disputed plots, affirming its autonomy in managing its internal affairs and establishing coordination with Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, according to a draft previously obtained by Mada Masr and cited by Greek media and official statements.  However, since the May 2025 court ruling, the politics around the monastery have changed.  The Greek parliament passed a law in August of the same year to establish a public authority based in Athens with sweeping powers to manage the monastery’s assets — both movable, such as funds, manuscripts and artifacts, and immovable, like lands, gardens and buildings. Angered at the infringement on centuries of autonomy, the monks of St. Catherine’s Monastery ousted the former Archbishop Damanios for supporting the law.  With the Greek path forward blocked, the new deal proposes a larger role for Egypt, which is keen to push forward major development work around the monastery’s historic grounds.  Today, the sources close to the monastery tell Mada Masr that Greece supports the Egyptian proposal, and Egyptian officials are working to pressure Papadopoulos and the rest of the monks to agree to the terms.  This pressure can be seen in the legal status of Papadopoulos since his election.  Since he was elected on September 14, no official recognition has been issued by the Egyptian state, according to the first source. This leaves Papadopoulos unable to deal with the monastery’s Egyptian bank accounts or conduct transactions with state institutions in South Sinai.  The source notes that while Papadopoulos holds a Greek diplomatic passport, which allows him to travel to and from Egypt for two years, the rest of the monks hold 12-month tourist visas that take three months to renew, leaving them with, in reality, only nine months of residency.   In last week’s seven-hour meeting, Egyptian state officials pushed Papadopoulos to agree to the deal in exchange for a presidential decree ratifying his election and appointment as monastery head, both sources say.  The first source considers this an attempt to pressure the head of the monastery and its monks to accept a deal that strips them “of their right to ownership of the monastery’s lands, as its faithful custodians.” For the second source, the agreement is an act of abuse against the abbot, who has been denied Egyptian citizenship, and against the monks, whom the Egyptian government insists on treating as temporary visitors despite some having served the monastery for over 40 years. All of this, according to both sources, has paralyzed the management of the monastery and restricted the ability of its head and its monks to carry out their monastic lives normally. For more than four centuries, St. Catherine’s Monastery has enjoyed spiritual and administrative autonomy. In 1575, the Greek Orthodox Autonomous Archdiocese of Sinai — under which the monastery falls — secured its independence from the Patriarchate of Constantinople. Despite its long-standing ties with Constantinople and spiritual links to the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, St. Catherine’s Monastery has retained its autonomy to this day. Within this framework, authority at the monastery has always rested with the community as a whole. The Brotherhood of Sinai ensures that no single figure monopolizes authority. The Greek government supports the Egyptian agreement, the two sources close to the monastery add, saying that Egyptian government representatives arrived at the monastery on July 5 after reaching a prior understanding with Athens. The Friends of St. Catherine’s Monastery Facebook page, which reflects the views of a number of monks, called the agreement a disastrous formula being packaged as a realistic solution and diplomatic achievement that in reality dismantles the monastery of its rights and deprives it of its ownership.  The monastery is being sold in the market of political and economic interests in exchange for the energy agreement that Athens seeks to conclude with Cairo, the group stated.    On July 4, Greek newspaper Proto Thema reported that the dispute at the monastery was close to being resolved and that it had reached an agreement with the Egyptian government, ahead of expected rulings on the appeals filed between the two parties regarding the ownership of the monastery’s lands. According to Proto Thema, the key point of the agreement is that the Egyptian government would grant the monastery “legal personality” under Egyptian law, which would entail legal obligations to protect monastic life and guarantees of the monastery’s continued operations, without interruptions.  The Greek newspaper also reported that the agreement restates the court ruling: granting the monks the right of possession and use of monastery lands, including its building and areas containing several churches and shrines, while confirming that they remain state property and are subject to the supervision of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.  Regarding the land from which the court ordered the eviction of the monks, which they are currently using as gardens and farms belonging to the monastery, the agreement includes an offer from the Egyptian government to lease them to the monastery under long-term lease contracts for a symbolic fee.  The agreement also stipulates that the settlement may not be challenged again before the courts.  The report noted that while Greece is not directly participating in the ongoing negotiations between the monastery and Egyptian government, its government is closely monitoring the developments, with  Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis raising the issue during direct communications with President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis managing government-level discussions and  General Secretary for Religious Affairs Georgios Kalantzis remains in continuous contact with the monastery and its legal team The report added that the Greek government had already reached a preliminary understanding with Egypt regarding the monastery.   For one of the sources close to the monastery, the coordination between the two sides is manifesting in pressure on the monks to sign a deal that cedes land rights without adequate guarantees for the continuation of monastic life. Egypt is working to consolidate its control over the monastery’s lands to proceed with the Great Transfiguration on the Land of Peace project, while the Greek government prioritized political and economic considerations that encourage it to move forward with an energy agreement with Egypt.  In April 2024, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union included the GREGY submarine cable project linking Egypt and Greece in its list of energy infrastructure projects of common and mutual interest. Under this designation, the cross-border section of the project is given priority within permitting procedures of the EU, along with regulatory coordination between countries and relevant parties.  It also makes it eligible for funding from the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) Energy program — an EU funding program that allocates grants to support energy, transport and telecommunications projects of European importance. The designation also strengthens the confidence of European banks and financial institutions in the project.  According to the GREGY project website, Egypt will export 3,000 megawatts of green energy at competitive prices to Europe via  Greece, which will consume about a third of this domestically and will re-export another third to neighboring EU countries. The remaining third will be used to produce green hydrogen, with the majority of it also to be exported to EU countries.  Copelouzos Group describes the project as “the most strategically important energy project in the region” and “the cornerstone for the creation [of] green energy corridors that will link South to North.”  The electricity interconnection project between Egypt and Greece consists of two routes. The first is a domestic route, which does not benefit from European privileges and includes all the necessary infrastructure components to transport electricity to the transformer station, and from there to the starting point of the submarine cable.  This route includes the construction of solar and wind energy stations to generate electricity and the batteries to store it. It also includes raising the efficiency of the electricity network in the Wadi al-Natrun region by more than 7,000 megawatts, then transferring the 3,000 megawatts through the national grid to Sidi Barrani in the Matrouh Governorate.  The second route is the cross border section, which enjoys European privileges, and begins from Sidi Barrani via a submarine electricity cable extending to the Mesogeia region in Agios Stefanos in Greece, where it connects to the Greek power grid, and from there to the European grid. No statement has been issued by the justice or foreign ministries regarding the new agreement or the meeting that Egyptian officials held with the head of St. Catherine’s Monastery and representatives of the Greek government, as of the time of publication. For his part, the monastery’s lawyer, Fathy Ragheb, denies knowing specific details of the latest negotiations between the monastery and the Egyptian government. He tells Mada Masr that the monastery is waiting for the ruling of the Ismailia Appeals Court in its petition for a reconsideration of the May 2025 ruling.  A decision is expected on the appeal during a hearing scheduled for August 23.The post Egypt tables new St. Catherine’s deal that would cement state control first appeared on Mada Masr.