After nearly 13 years, political relations between Israel and Turkey are finally normalizing and embassies will be reopened in both countries.
The relationship between Israel and Turkey deteriorated dramatically during and after the first war between Hamas and the Israeli army (IDF) in late 2008 and early 2009.
At the time, Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan openly sided with Hamas, accusing Israel of committing war crimes and causing a riot during the March 2009 World Economic Forum in Davos, where Erdogan reiterated his harsh criticism of Israel and drew the ire of then-Israeli President Shimon Peres.
After Erdogan finished his rant, a visibly emotional Peres replied and asked the Turkish leader what he would have done if rockets were fired at residential areas in Istanbul.
Erdogan then demanded that the chairman of the forum give him the opportunity to respond to Peres, but was rebuffed because of the protocol, after which the Turkish leader stood up in furor and left the hall.
The Mavi Marmara crisis
A major crisis later erupted between Turkey and Israel after Israeli commandos boarded the Turkish vessel Mavi Marmara in international waters off the coast of Ashdod in southern Israel.
The Turkish ship was part of an international flotilla assembled by the Turkish terrorist organization IHH and, according to the Turks, had “humanitarian goods” destined for Gaza onboard.
During a visit to the IDF base in Tzrifin, after the ship was unloaded in the Israeli port city of Ashdod and the goods were transferred to the Tzrifin base, I was able to see for myself that there were no humanitarian goods on board.
The only humanitarian aid the Mavi Marmara was carrying was a large number of expired medicines.
The IHH action was carried out with Erdogan’s permission and was intended as a clear provocation of Israel.
When the United Nations published a report on the Mavi Marmara incident in 2011, declaring that the Israeli military blockade of Gaza was justified under international law, Erdogan expelled Israel’s ambassador and recalled the Turkish ambassador from Tel Aviv.
The crisis continued until President Barack Obama more or less forced ex-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to apologize to Turkey.
That was in March 2013, when Obama finally paid a visit to Israel and the Netanyahu government later even paid compensation to the families of the nine killed IHH members, which was one of the Turkish conditions for reconciliation with Israel.
A new crisis in 2018
The new reconciliation did not last for long, however, and in 2018 Turkey again expelled the Israeli ambassador after Arabs staged violent demonstrations in Jerusalem, and Israeli security forces used force to contain those demonstrations.
The Arab violence was openly encouraged by Turkey after the US administration of President Donald J. Trump announced that the United States embassy would be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and also recognized the entire city as the capital of Israel.
The new diplomatic crisis eventually led to a general rift in Turkish-Israeli relations and caused Yossi Cohen, the then-head of Mossad (Israel’s secret service), to label Turkey a threat to peace in the Middle East.
Turkish aggression
Cohen’s remarks about Turkey had to do not only with the open hostility Erdogan showed towards Israel, but also with other aggressive actions Turkey carried out in the Middle East and against its neighbors Greece and Cyprus.
For example, on orders from Erdogan, Turkey carried out two incursions into Syria that caused great misery among the Syrian Kurdish population and resulted in thousands of displaced civilians.
These invasions were invariably justified by Erdogan with the false allegation that the Syrian Kurds were “terrorists” threatening Turkey.
The aggressive Turkish actions in Syria, as well as in northern Iraq, where the Turkish army regularly attacks targets of the banned Turkish Kurdish movement PKK, eventually led the IDF to add Turkey to its list of threats to Israel.
Turkish-Israeli relations had now reached an all-time low and the crisis appeared to be further exacerbated when the Arab Gulf states made peace with Israel in 2020, something Erdogan originally labeled as “treason” against the Palestinian Arabs.
The turnaround in relations
The improvement in Turkey-Israel relations eventually began after the Bennett-Lapid government took office last June, but can be attributed almost entirely to Israel’s President Isaac Herzog, who visited Ankara last March and received a warm welcome, to the surprise of many in Israel.
The Israeli president’s visit took place at the invitation of Erdogan, who had earlier called Herzog to congratulate him on his appointment as President of Israel.
Since then, the Turkish leader moderated his anti-Israel rhetoric and even had his Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu pay a visit to the Jewish state on May 25th this year, marking the first time in 15 years that such a visit took place.
At the same time, both Erdogan and Cavasoglu emphasized that the renewal of relations with Israel did not mean ending Turkey’s support for the Palestinian Arabs, while he visited the areas under the administration of the Palestinian Authority during his trip.
At the time, Israel still reacted reluctantly to the sudden positive turn in relations with Turkey and seemed to condition normalization of relations on Ankara expelling Hamas terrorists, who were allowed to operate against Israel from Turkish territory.
Apparently, the Jerusalem government has now decided that this issue can be better resolved after the new normalization in relations with Turkey takes effect following the upcoming Israeli election.
The why of Erdogan’s sudden turnaround
Now that diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey have been restored, the question arises as to why Erdogan suddenly changed his attitude and sought conciliation with Israel.
The answer to that question is that a mix of primarily economic interests and Turkey’s increasing isolation in the Middle East prompted Erdogan to shift his aversion to the Jewish state into a more conciliatory stance.
For example, the dire state of the Turkish economy, which is now on the brink of complete collapse, has been a major reason for the Turkish leader to change his attitude towards Israel, which has become the region’s number one economic powerhouse.
Turkey now needs Israel to launch new economic initiatives like the exploitation of gas in Turkey’s economic zones in the Mediterranean, as well as the construction of a gas pipeline to Europe.
Turkey also needs income from Israeli tourism, which hit a snag during the political crisis and during the COVID-19 pandemic, and is interested in purchasing Israeli state-of-the-art technology and inventions that can give a push to the country’s ailing economy.
Erdogan also saw that the so-called Abraham Accords between Israel and some Arab countries yielded enormous economic benefits for the parties involved and didn’t lead to a rift in the Arab world.
So it’s mainly about interests and not about a sudden change of heart on the part of the Turkish dictator.
It is a fact that in recent years Turkey, under Erdogan, has joined the group of countries that threaten world peace and especially stability in the Middle East.
Turkey, a NATO member state, has recently strengthened ties with Russia and Iran, as well as with Libya, which is a hotbed of Islamists and has seen a revival of its civil war in recent weeks.
Also, the fact that Turkey has not changed relations with Hamas shows that the new-found reconciliation with Israel is merely a cosmetic change.
