Turkey and Israel: The broken alliance

By Sami Moubayed

DAMASCUS - Depending on who one listens to in the Middle East, Turkish-Israeli relations are either very much repairable or have reached a point of no return after the killing of nine Turkish citizens on board the Free Gaza flotilla off the shores of Gaza last month.

A best-case scenario would be for Israel to try and fix the mess resulting from the affair through a basket of political gestures, while a worst-case scenario would be war between the two countries.

War, though, is not on anybody's mind except for a few sensational journalists in the Arab world.

Some in Israel, like Alon Liel, who for many years served as his country's ambassador to Turkey, are nevertheless worried about where things might lead. After the flotilla affair Liel said, "They have already called the Turkish ambassador back to Ankara. I hope very much that this incident will not lead to breaking the diplomatic link. This link has existed for 61 years without interruption and it will be a very severe blow to Israel's international standing if this link will be broken."

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman spoke with a very different tone, furious with his government for releasing the prisoners onboard the flotilla without bringing them before an Israeli court, and saying Israel was too "soft" on Turkey. His stance was challenged by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who raised a red flag that common ground between two countries that had been allied since 1948 had disappeared.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is definitely in no mood to reconcile. He cut short a visit to Chile, withdrew his ambassador from Israel and cancelled joint military drills with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In angry statements from the Turkish parliament, he accused Israel of "state terrorism", while bidding farewell during a speech in the Turkish city of Konya to the Turkish civilians killed onboard the Mavi Marmara. Erdogan said, "If the entire world has turned its back on the Palestinians, Turkey will never turn its back on Jerusalem and the Palestinians."

He said the two peoples were bound by destiny - "a destiny that binds Jerusalem, Ramallah, Hebron and Bethlehem to Ankara," saying "if the world becomes silent over Gaza, Turkey will never be silent."

As far as the Israelis are concerned, these are strong words that echo what has been said in the past, by Egyptian president Gamal Abdul Nasser in the 1950s and 1960s, and by Hasan Nasrallah of Hezbollah since the mid-1990s.

Annoyed as the Israelis are, two weeks into the crisis they have still not recalled their ambassador from Ankara, nor have they called off a military deal with the Turkish army worth US$180 million.

The Turkish parliament has for its part, however, called for an overall review of political, economic, and military ties between Turkey and Israel. Turkish President Abdullah Gul, speaking to the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia on June 8, said, "Turkey will not let Israel escape its responsibilities," noting that the Israeli government must feel the pain of its mistake over the Gaza flotilla incident.

One creative way to solve the crisis would be to lift the two-year siege of Gaza, which Erdogan time and again has said is crucial for any improvement of relations with the Israelis.

Given the mood in Israel, that seems unlikely in the near future, despite pressure from the Quartet - the United Nations, the United States, the European Union and Russia - and international community to gradually reduce the siege with a view to ending and replacing it with international observers.

There are heavyweights in Israel like Ambassador Liel who are pushing strongly for jumpstarting peace talks between Syria and Israel, under Turkish supervision, which had been called off by Damascus in December 2008, during the IDF war on Gaza.

Since then, both the Syrians and Turks have said that they are ready for indirect talks, but Israel has repeatedly said no, claiming that the Turks are no longer honest brokers in the Middle East for having clearly taken sides with Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria.

If Israel accepts the Turkish mediation role - something that Ankara has strongly pushed for since 2008, then boiling tension would certainly soften. More importantly, Israel needs a major public relations campaign to help polish its image in the eyes of ordinary Turks, who whether Islamist or secular are appalled by what happened with the the Gaza flotilla.

Those who realize how important trade, for example, has been between both countries are pushing in this direction from within the Israeli business community. Bilateral trade between both countries reached US$2.5 billion in 2009, regardless of the political tension resulting from the war on Gaza and Erdogan's famous outburst against Israeli President Shimon Peres at Davos.
Sources in Turkey are now saying that their government is no longer interested in extending the Russian Blue Stream pipeline, a major trans-Black Sea pipeline that carries natural gas from Russia to Turkey.

Turkey and Israel have a long history of secretive military cooperation going back to the 1950s. Turkish commentators used to refer to it as "the ghostly alliance". In 1996, the two countries signed an agreement allowing Israeli pilots to train in Turkish airspace in return for which Israel refurbished Turkish military aircraft and provided hi-tech equipment. Since Erdogan's rise to power in 2002, the influence of the Turkish military over the country's civilian leadership has declined.

Simply put, although military relations have not been severed, political relations are damaged almost beyond repair at this stage. The Turks no longer trust Israel. It would be a mistake to trace the entire crisis to the flotilla incident, however, since signs of a confidence collapse between both countries have been evident for nearly two years.

In late 2008, when mediating indirect talks between Syria and Israel, for example, Erdogan was certain that a breakthrough was within reach but was worried by all talk of an upcoming confrontation in Gaza.

Israeli premier Ehud Olmert arrived in Turkey on December 22 and was asked by his Turkish counterpart if there was any merit to these "rumors". Olmert said that war would not break out in Gaza. Five days later it did, prompting Erdogan to snap in front of Peres in January 2009: "President Peres, you are old, and your voice is loud out of a guilty conscience. When it comes to killing, you know very well how to kill. I know well how you hit and kill children on beaches."

An easy argument would be that the Israelis no longer trust the Turks. The Israeli media have been filled with stories about how Erdogan received Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal in Turkey in 2004 and yet refused to meet then-prime minister Ariel Sharon. They point to all the statements fired off by senior Turkish officials and the Turkish media against Israel since mid-2008, arguing that Turkey needs to change before any real improvement takes place.

Erdogan has been in power for seven years. Anybody who expects him to change - or to pursue a path vis-a-vis Israel that looks like anything related to moves taken by predecessors like Jalal Bayar, for example, have no understanding either of the Turkish prime minister, his Justice and Development Party, or of the 80 million people he represents.

As long as Erdogan is in power, Turkish-Israeli relations as we know them are history. Particular gestures, like lifting the siege of Gaza or jumpstarting talks with Syria, could help heal some of the wounds, but the psychological and moral damage caused by the blood of nine Turkish civilians is not likely to heal while Benjamin Netanyahu is in power in Israel.

Sami Moubayed is editor-in-chief of Forward Magazine in Syria.

(Copyright 2010 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us about sales, syndication and republishing.)