Convention of El Arish

In December 1799 the British government had issued orders that its commanders were not to allow a separate treaty to be agreed between the Ottomans and France in which their troops would be returned to Europe.

The army was in a poor position, threatened by Ottoman force under Kör Yusuf Ziyaüddin Pasha advancing from Syria and Kléber's troops were near to mutiny following their abandonment by Napoleon.

Kléber made contact with the commander of local British naval forces, Commodore Sidney Smith, with regards to entering peace negotiations.

Kléber stated that any peace would be contingent on his men being allowed to leave Egypt on board Ottoman ships with all their baggage and weapons.

[1] However Smith's commander Lord Keith had received orders from London, dated 15 December 1799, that he was not to allow any separate treaties to be agreed between the Ottomans and France nor "to consent to any capitulation with the French troops at least unless they lay down their arms, surrender themselves prisoners of war, and deliver up all the ships and stores of the port of Alexandria to the Allied Powers".

[2][1] This letter reached Kléber at Cairo on 18 March, by which time Yusef had moved an army of 40,000 men to nearby Heliopolis.

In the meantime the British government, led by William Pitt the Younger, had received a copy of the convention and agreed to its acceptance.

Wright endeavoured to communicate the acceptance to the French rank and file and induce them to revolt against their generals who refused to allow them to go home, but was turned away.

Jones praised Smith's actions and stated that the requirement of keeping British troops tied up in Egypt to fight the French may have caused the loss of Hanover to the forces of the Second League of Armed Neutrality in April 1801; the loss of Portugal to Franco-Spanish forces during the War of the Oranges in June 1801; and severely weakened the defences of the British Isles.