Maneuvering for Eastern Med gas supremacy continues: New Europe looks at what it positions as a political consensus behind the East Med pipeline, which would connect Israeli and Cypriot gas fields to Europe via Crete and mainland Greece as an alternative to Russian gas. The proposal would curb Egypt’s ambition to emerge as a natural gas hub for the Eastern Med. The story — essentially a puff-piece backed by DEPA, which with Italy’s Edison is a 50% partner in the Eastern Med pipeline — is relevant to Egypt primarily because this is the first time that a December political meeting on the issue has hit our radar: “The fact that East Med enjoys solid political support from the Greek, Cypriot, Italian and Israeli governments is already established … the next step is in December, 2016, when Greek, Israeli, Cypriot and European officials are going to meet in Jerusalem to discuss trilateral energy cooperation and mutual gas projects.”