CAIRO — Egypt will soon start working off a debt to Israel by importing Israeli natural gas.
Egypt had faced a $1.76 billion settlement awarded to state-owned Israel Electric Corporation (IEC) in 2015 because Egyptian companies for years had been unable to fulfill a long-term contract to supply IEC with natural gas at a fixed rate. To reduce that settlement to $500 million, Egypt is reversing the flow, so to speak, and will buy gas from Israel.