No one admits it belongs to Israel.
In the course of the debate, which has been going on in parliament for the last two days, Abed el-Aziz Sayef a-Nasser, an aide to the Egyptian foreign minister, was called as an expert witness. A-Nasser is the director of the Egyptian Foreign Ministry's legal department.
"Eilat, or by its former name Umm Rashrash, belongs to the Palestinians," he said, representing the opinion of the Egyptian Foreign Ministry.
His predecessor, Dr. Nabil el-Arabi, was the head of the Foreign Ministry's legal department and headed the delegation for negotiations at Taba. He also emphatically declared: "Eilat belongs to the Palestinians."
A-Nasser's response was meant to calm tempers in the rowdy debate in the Egyptian parliament, after dozens of opposition representatives demanding holding negotiations to have Eilat returned to Egyptian sovereignty.
Opposition MPs recruited several legal experts, international law lecturers and experts on geography and topography who showed documents and opinions that Eilat is territory that belongs to Egypt and was captured in 1949 by Israel. They contend that the Egyptian negotiating team to Taba conceded Eilat to Israel 20 years ago "in the framework of the wish to build confidence and to display Egyptian good will in the spirit of the peace
agreement."
This was not the end of the matter. An Egyptian international law expert presented an intermediate position in parliament: "Eilat belongs formally to Egypt and administratively to the Palestinians."
In the debate in parliament two days ago, an opposition MP, Mohammed el-Aadali, whipped out a document from 1906 which states, in the name of the Ottoman sultan: Umm Rashrash belongs to Egypt. In this spot-said the Egyptian experts on topography and geography-Egyptian pilgrims would stop and rest on their way to the holy cities in Saudi Arabia.
OK, let's look at the UN partition map of 1947. The green part is dedicated for the Jewish state, even in 1947 (this is not designated as Palestinian Arab land):
And the southern tip in more detail:
Now, let's look where Eilat lies today:
Eilat is right on the tip of the Gulf of Aqaba while the partition shows that the Jewish state boundaries are some file miles to the south.
Evidently the heralded Egyptian Israeli peace treaty is not as great an example of cooperation and understanding as many would have you believe. Even Egypt looks upon it as a first step towards slicing Israel up into smaller and smaller slices until it is gone.