But it will likely be a troubled road toward warming the chill between Cairo and Washington. Egypt's security forces have waged a fierce crackdown against the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist backers of ousted President Mohammed Morsi, as well as against secular-minded youth activists.
El-Sissi, considered certain to win presidential elections taking place Monday and Tuesday, has made clear he wants better ties, but on his terms. The retired field marshal has also raised worries in Egypt and the United States over potential restrictions on freedoms and civil rights, with his tough line against dissent as he pushes for stability he says is needed to repair the economy.
Tamara Cofman Wittes, the Director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, described the Egyptian-US relations as in a moment of reflection because direction is not clear.
El-Sissi removed Morsi on July 3 after protests by millions demanding that the Islamist leader go, and since then, supporters of the move have furiously rejected the idea that it was a military coup, saying the ouster was the people's will.
After much deliberation, Washington decided not to declare it a coup, a step that would have required a cut-off in aid. Still, after hundreds of Morsi's protesting supporters were killed in an escalating crackdown in August, the United States withheld millions of the more than USD 1.5 billion in aid a year that it provides Egypt, mostly to the military.
Since Morsi's ouster, Egyptian media have been enflamed with anger at the United States, accusing it of backing the Brotherhood, raising conspiracy theories about the United States working with the Islamists to divide Egypt.
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