Eye on the Middle East | Israel's increasingly unpopular war in Gaza is to Turkey’s delight
Presently, the global flow is against Israel, with a ceasefire as the biggest imperative (which is in fact what Turkey has made trade contingent on)
On May 2, four days prior to the first Israeli air strikes in Rafah, Turkey announced the halt of all trade with Israel until a permanent ceasefire is achieved in Gaza. While Israel’s strikes on Rafah are arguably its most internationally unpopular military action thus far (with Washington halting some arms shipments), Israel’s protracted and increasingly intensifying war in Gaza has whipped up a storm in West Asia.
Amid the dust of war, Turkey has emerged as a key player in shaping events. As the part-time host of Hamas chief Ismael Haniyeh (with Ismail Haniyeh and Recep Erdogan publicly meeting as recently as 20th April), Turkey has naturally been involved in pushing Israel hard for a ceasefire and shoring up advocacy for a Palestinian state, while consistently drawing heavy diplomatic fire from Tel Aviv for Ankara’s support to Hamas.
However, as Israel’s war has worsened across 2024, Ankara’s role as a West Asian maverick has returned to the fore. At least in the regional landscape, the new space for Turkish geopolitical manoeuvring can be understood in two full turns, and one half turn. Each of these has been fuelled by domestic politics, regional instability, and global geopolitics cumulatively.
The first turn
As a first step to unpacking Turkey’s geopolitical web, it is essential to assert the central position that Turkey’s national security radar attributes to the Kurds - an ethnic grouping straddling the border areas of Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. Amid all the regional Kurdish groups in Syria and Iraq, Turkey particularly characterises the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) as a terror group, which Ankara has blamed for several terror attacks in Turkey over the past decade.
In the fight against the Islamic State, Kurdish troops proved particularly effective, eventually controlling Northeastern Syria – across the Euphrates. Turkey, in response, launched multiple offensives into Syria (including Operations Spring Shield and Olive Branch in 2016/17 and 2018 respectively), and has maintained its own administration in parts of Northern Syria as a buffer against the Kurds in Syria.
Essentially, for Turkey, Kurdish troops posed as much of a threat as ISIS did, if not more – a view other Arab capitals, and Washington, did not share. Hence, while the United States remained the principal backer of the anti-ISIS Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) during the Syrian civil war, in 2018, Saudi Arabia and the UAE bolstered their support to anti-ISIS Kurdish groups in Syria, drawing Ankara’s wrath. In the same year, Erdogan publicly alleged that Riyadh sponsored the Jamal Khashoggi killing.
On the other hand, Turkey set the cat among Washington’s pigeons with a 2017 deal to purchase Moscow’s S-400 air defence system, with the United States booting Turkey from the F-35 fighter jet joint development programme. While Turkey wavered on this stance based on evolving regional geopolitics – almost ditching the S400 deal in 2019 – it gambled again in 2021 with fresh support for the S-400. By 2021, Turkey had drawn several battle lines for itself in other arenas – in siding with Qatar against Saudi Arabia and UAE (2017-2021), its intervention in the Libyan civil war (notably, against Russian-backed forces), its support to Azerbaijan in the war against Armenia (2020), among others. Amidst this, during his Prime Ministerial and Presidential tenures, Erdogan maintained a strong pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel policy (famously walking out of a debate with then-Israeli President Shimon Perez in 2009); it was an aid ship from Turkey that attempted to breach the Gaza blockade in 2010, triggering a deadly Israeli raid on what became known as the "freedom flotilla".
The second turn
As the head of the Turkish state for two decades, Erdogan’s assertive, cross-cutting regional foreign policy was an old characteristic – of Turkey’s own strategic autonomy. Its NATO membership has long allowed it a special position as a bridge state, furthering its physical bridging of Asia and Europe.
Among its privileges has also been a pocket veto against Israel’s potential NATO membership, even as Israel denies it as a real roadblock. However, in 2021 and 2022, the Turkish Lira lost 44% and 30% respectively, shedding 76% overall in Erdogan’s second term as President.
The net effect of Turkey’s geopolitical choices had left it isolated, both from regional Arab capitals as well as from Washington – its six-decade-old ally. Hence, by 2022, Turkey sought to repair ties across the board – with reciprocal visits between Ankara’s Erdogan and Riyadh’s Muhammad bin Salman in the same year. Amid the visits, Turkey dropped the Khashoggi case, deciding to hand it over to Saudi authorities.
In the same year, it established full diplomatic and economic ties with Israel, after more than a decade. Its rapprochement with Israel fit like a hand in a silk glove, with the Arab pursuit of the Abraham Accords. That both Turkish and Israeli markets responded undeniably well to greater economic ties between Ankara and Tel Aviv was evident, with bilateral trade touching USD 6.8 billion in 2023.
Moreover, by 2023, Turkey’s position evinced a perception again that it was willing to let go of the Russian S400, with advancements in Turkey’s own defence production. However, Turkey also supplied Ukraine with its Bayraktar drones (and set up a manufacturing unit in Ukraine) in its war against Russia - an example of Turkey’s cross-cutting geopolitical manoeuvring.
In Palestine on the other hand, it was Turkey that was key to (failed) attempts at Fatah-Hamas normalisation, in July 2023. Essentially, Erdogan’s quest for regional influence remained – it was only the approach that had changed; embracing more cooperation.
The third ‘half-turn’
Like for the entire region and beyond, Hamas’ October 7 terror attacks and Israel’s ongoing brutal campaign in Gaza, have upset Turkey’s geopolitical chessboard. However, as all states go about rearranging the pieces, with Arab states still looking to preserve the Abraham Accords’ momentum and the promise of economic ties with Israel, Turkey is hedging its bets. This is even as Erdogan’s domestic political challenges are on the rise.
For Turkey, ties with Tel Aviv have almost invariably been a sounding board for ties with Washington. Given the US’ fresh criticism of Israel, Erdogan finds fresh space to assert himself – arguably looking at external geopolitics to help stem internal criticism and pushing his traditional pro-Palestinian stand. By becoming the first regional Muslim state to be decisive in taking adverse measures against Israel for its war on Gaza, Erodgan at once placates the Muslim street, as well as panders to the support base for his renewed Islamisation.
However, the turn is only half, as even Ankara is not looking to entirely swing the other way again (with its pre-2022 lessons in mind). Rather, Turkey is looking to make quick tactical gains, as well as secure a strategic position for itself in a West Asia that is bound to change after a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
Pledging to reconstruct Gaza during his Cairo visit in February, and promising substantial increases in bilateral trade with Egypt, Erdogan is seeking to establish Turkey as an engage-all regional player. This is even as it seizes the opportunity created by the regional instability to drive home its own long-standing Kurd-related security concerns.
For instance, this was evident in dozens of Turkish airstrikes against PKK targets in Syria and Iraq in late 2023 and early 2024 (similar to Israeli strikes against Iranian military targets, and US strikes on Iran-backed local militias).
On the broader geopolitical front, by backing Sweden’s NATO bid, Turkey creates a bigger buffer against potential criticism of other actions in West Asia. In any case, cutting trade ties (or even diplomatic relations) with Israel does not foreclose their potential reopening (as Ankara has done in the past). With both Washington and Ankara continuing to spar (albeit more quietly) on the F35/S-400 issue, Turkey is only looking to go with the flow, while taking advantage of other undercurrents.
Presently, the global and regional flow is against Israel, with a ceasefire as the biggest imperative (which is in fact what Turkey has made trade contingent on, instead of leaving it open-ended). Hence, while it waits for the ‘day after’ in Gaza’, Turkey has fresh space to assert itself, with a mix of policies from the first and second turns, and leaving itself enough room for manoeuvre. The only question that remains is how far will Erdogan push.
Bashir Ali Abbas is a research associate at the Council for Strategic and Defense Research, New Delhi, and a South Asia Visiting Fellow at the Stimson Center, Washington DC. The views expressed are personal.
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