Egypt is a strong influential country, Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit has said.
He told "El-Watani El-Yom" the National Democratic Party (NDP) weekly that countries like Egypt could not go under the gun.

Nobody dares to insult Egypt, the FM said.

Egypt is a country of active people, armed forces and influential diplomacy, Abul-Gheit added.
The Foreign Minister has once again denied press reports quoting him as having said that the Arabs were willing to go to war even if it meant exhausting the Egyptian army to the last soldier.
The reports claimed that Abul- Gheit had said so during a meeting of the Shura Council's Arab, Foreign Affairs and the National Security Committee.

Commenting on that Abul- Gheit said those were not his words.

The FM made it clear that Egypt had never given up its Arab role.

Cairo bas always been the first to act, Abul -Gheit continued, noting that he visited Syria only four tours after Hezbollah's operation was made public.

While in Syria, he conveyed President Hosni Mubarak's reading of the whole situation, expecting a harsh response from Israel, and so it was.

Abul- Gheit has drawn a picture of a "New Middle East" where Muslim lives are spared, an independent Palestinian State is established on all occupied lands, a strong Iraq arises with no foreign troops and Lebanon's independence is preserved.

It would be acceptable like that, the FM noted. He rejected the idea of a new Middle East based on chaos, division, occupation and the use of force, as was currently the case in the Palestinian territories and Lebanon.

"That is not the way I see it," Abul- Gheit said.