Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, held a series of meetings June 10-11 in Cairo, including with former senior Fatah official Mohammed Dahlan. Samir Mashrawi, a Dahlan associate who also attended the meetings, told Al-Monitor that the Hamas delegation and the delegation that arrived with Dahlan had met four times and discussed various issues to resolve the crisis in Gaza. Sinwar traveled to Cairo at the head of a Hamas delegation to discuss tightening security on the Gaza border with Egypt, increasing the power supply from Egypt to Gaza and extending the hours of the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt.

Al-Monitor has learned that the heads of Egyptian intelligence facilitated the meeting between the two men. Dahlan and Hamas had had a channel of communication in the past, and top Hamas officials had used it to convey messages to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

From Egypt's perspective, Dahlan is one of the few people able to raise donations and budgets from the wealthy Gulf states to help avert the impending humanitarian crisis in Gaza, a scenario that poses a threat to Cairo as well as Hamas. In fact, the Egyptians have an additional interest in a rapprochement between the former Fatah official and the Hamas leader, who were once bitter enemies.

Sisi is hoping that through his close friend Dahlan, he can get Hamas to mount more determined action against his government’s Islamist enemies in the Sinai Peninsula. If Dahlan goes along with the plan, he would be throwing a lifeline to Hamas by helping it maintain power in Gaza. Along with this carrot, there’s a stick: If Sinwar, who took office four months ago, fails to bolster security along the border with Egypt and sever ties with radical Islamist Salafist organizations in Gaza, he would risk the aid that Dahlan is supposed to obtain for Hamas.