Rondo Alla Turca

While everyone is on tenterhooks waiting to see the outcome of the Ukraine crisis, I decided this week to digress, moving on to a seemingly unrelated topic.

An op-ed posted in Foreign Policy by Aykan Erdemir a former Turkish politician, caught my eye. Dr. Erdemir is currently senior director of the Turkey programme at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies.

“The diplomatic map of the Middle East is shifting yet again. A surprising thaw seems to be afoot between Israel and Turkey, former close partners whose relations nosedived under Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.” Erdemir wrote. “Last week, Erdogan announced that Israeli President Isaac Herzog will visit Ankara in mid-March, which would make Herzog the first Israeli president to visit Turkey since Shimon Peres’s 2007 trip. The Israeli government has yet to confirm the trip, but has acknowledged a possible visit.

Hopes for a Turkish-Israeli rapprochement were bolstered further by a phone call last month between Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu—the first publicly acknowledged conversation between the two countries’ foreign ministers in 13 years.

“That Erdogan is looking for new partners—and appears willing to mend relations—is understandable. He faces a collapsing economy, rising domestic opposition to his rule, conflict with Arab neighbours and traditional Western allies, and new turmoil in the region as Russia prepares to invade Ukraine.”

Turkey was the first Muslim-majority country to recognise the state of Israel in 1949.

Israel and Turkey enjoyed robust diplomatic, security and intelligence cooperation over many years.

However, since Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party rose to power in 2002, bilateral relations have turned sour.

“Now, Turkish president is facing growing isolation in the Eastern Mediterranean and economic woes at home are forcing him to reach out to his sworn enemy.”

Israel is treading carefully, given Erdogan’s frequent antisemitic and anti-Israeli vitriol, which the U.S. State Department called out as “reprehensible” and “incendiary” as recently as May 2021. “I have no illusions with regard to Turkey,” Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said in an interview last week.

High on the list of Israel’s concerns is Erdogan’s unwavering support for Hamas. Ankara has granted Turkish citizenship and passports to senior Hamas operatives, Erdogan has flaunted hosting two senior Hamas leaders, Saleh al-Arouri and Ismail Haniyeh, both of whom are on Washington’s list of global terrorists. It is therefore no surprise that Israel’s Shin Bet intelligence agency “stressed in the internal discussions about Turkey that any normalisation process must include limiting Hamas activity in Turkey,”  

Rest assured, any normalisation of Israeli-Turkish relations won’t happen as quickly as it did between Israel and the UAE.

Israeli suspicions are understandable considering Erdogan’s efforts to undermine the Abraham Accords, just two years ago.

Since then, Erdogan has made an effort to mend relations with the UAE, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and other Arab countries with which Turkey has clashed in recent years—and now, with Israel. “The diplomatic flurry included a November 2021 visit to Ankara by Emirati Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, whom Turkish state media demonised as a “dark prince” as recently as 2020. Erdogan clearly hopes to tap into Emirati capital to help stem Turkey’s economic meltdown.

“Since their rapprochement, Abu Dhabi and Ankara have signed a $4.9 billion currency exchange agreement, while Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund has pledged to invest $10 billion in Turkey. The UAE, for its part, not only expects a good return on its investment but also sees Turkey as a potential hedge against Iran as the Biden administration reaches out to Tehran for a new nuclear deal.

While Israel doesn’t have state-controlled petrodollars to shower on Turkey, it does have financial, economic, and technological power in the region. Improved relations with Israel could also help burnish Turkey’s tarnished global image, not least as an investment destination. An unprecedented exodus of Western capital from Turkey over the last few years has risked Turkey’s designation as an emerging market by leading financial institutions and could result in its demotion to the category of so-called frontier markets, placing Turkish bonds and equities below the worthwhile investment level  for most of the world’s funds. That would hasten Turkey’s economic implosion—and compound Erdogan’s political worries.”

In another piece he wrote for Foreign Policy Dr. Erdemir said, “There is also the enticing future possibility of building an Eastern Mediterranean pipeline to bring Israeli natural gas to Turkey and from there to Europe.

This suggested alternative route could help boost morale for Turkish businesses and households protesting paralysing power cuts and skyrocketing utility bills.

Recalling the Turkish-Israeli rift that followed the 2010 Gaza flotilla crisis, Turkey regularly snubbed possible energy deals with Israel, but Erdogan revamped the pipeline project earlier this month and appears enthusiastic about getting back to business. Following the Biden administration’s withdrawal of its support to an envisioned Israel-Cyprus-Greece pipeline last month, which Ankara has spun as a Turkish victory, Erdogan has another reason to capitalise on the Israel-Turkey alternative.

“At least as importantly, Erdogan also hopes that mending relations with Israel and Egypt will help reverse Turkey’s growing isolation in the Eastern Mediterranean. The region has witnessed an astonishing and unprecedented diplomatic and military partnership among Israel, Egypt, the UAE, Greece, and Cyprus, which have all been alarmed by Turkey’s growing assertiveness in the region; the group is also enticed by the prospects of energy cooperation under the umbrella of the East Mediterranean Gas Forum, an organisation Ankara hopes to join one day. Turkey has long seen Greece and Cyprus as archrivals, and another purpose of Erdogan’s diplomatic flurry might be to try to dislodge them from the region’s fast-evolving network of partnerships. As of now, that does not appear to be a price Israel is willing to pay. The Jerusalem Post reported that, according to an Israeli government source, “improvements in Jerusalem-Ankara relations will not come at the expense of Israel’s alliance with Greece and Cyprus.”

While Erdogan’s sudden about-face with Israel has raised suspicions among Israeli analysts, there is a cautious optimism among Israeli officials for a gradual improvement of ties with Turkey. That could allow not only an exchange of ambassadors but also tactical cooperation against Iran and its proxies in the Middle East. Policymakers in Ankara are “no great friends of Iran, to put it mildly, and we can’t afford to make assumptions that will prevent us from creating alliances,” an unnamed Israeli diplomat recently told Haaretz.

Considering Erdogan’s antagonistic attitude toward Israel over the last two decades and his frequent U-turns, it will take time and effort to rebuild trust. But Erdogan surely knows that Israel is now, thanks in part to the Abraham Accords, less isolated in the Eastern Mediterranean than Turkey, and it has less to lose if normalisation attempts with Turkey fail. The onus is thus on the Erdogan government to be proactive in improving relations.

“Ultimately, a real rapprochement built on trust might have to wait for a new Turkish government. A big-tent opposition bloc appears poised to defeat Erdogan in the 2023 presidential and parliamentary elections. But as an embattled Erdogan seeks to undo some of the economic and foreign-policy damage he has wrought, setting in motion a return to better relations with Israel would be a good way to start.” 
Aykan Erdemir said.

Despite the many uncertainties regarding renewed ties with Turkey President Isaac Herzog plans to meet the presidents of Greece and Cyprus in the coming weeks ahead of a possible visit to Turkey for talks with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The trips are meant to assure Athens and Nicosia that a rapprochement with Ankara will not come at the expense of the close ties Israel has developed with them in recent years.

I want to conclude with a Jewish anecdote I have told maybe two or three times in the past. However, this time I’ll recount it in a different context.

In better times before the Erdogan era, my wife and I visited various places in Turkey.

During our last visit we stayed at a hotel in Antalya and toured with a group of Israelis staying at another hotel. Our tour guide was a 40-year-old former English teacher named Ahmet. He told us how he had been forced into early retirement when the Turkish Ministry of Education replaced him with a younger graduate teacher. Finding it difficult to live comfortably on his meagre pension Ahmet took a course in tour guiding in order to supplement his income.

One day while the rest of the group went off shopping Roni and I joined Ahmet who suggested visiting a site not included in the tour itinerary. At that stage in the tour, we had already established an open amicable relationship, so I felt confident enough to tell Ahmet the Jewish anecdote without causing offence or embarrassment.

I explained that almost every Israeli is familiar with the colloquial Hebrew expression that translates as “Kill a Turk and rest," meaning – “Take it easy, one at a time, don’t rush.” I believe it’s derived from the Jewish anecdote.  The whole story goes like this:  

A tearful Jewish mother goes with her son to a railway station before he leaves for the front lines after being recruited to fight in the Czar's army against Turkey in 1877. She is of course very worried about her son's safety and survival. "Listen to me,” she says, “When you get to the front, kill a Turk, and rest, then kill another Turk and rest. Don’t overexert yourself." The reluctant Jewish soldier interrupts her “But what if one of the Turks kills me first.” “But why would he do that,” she replies in total disbelief? “What have you done to him?

Ahmet laughed, understanding that the anecdote wasn’t disparagingly anti-Turkish, just a bit of self-Jewish humour.

 

Have a good weekend.

 

Beni                                                                17^th of February, 2022.