TURKEY-ISRAEL RELATIONS: QUO VADIS?

Journal of Turkish Weekly
Jan 15 2010

An Interview with Prof. Dr. Alon Ben-Meir

What is your view of the new Turkish foreign policy as promoted
by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, particularly in regards to
Turkish-Syrian relations? How you feel these developments have impacted
the region as a whole?

I think the policy strategy based on Davutoglu’s philosophy of "zero
problems with neighbors" is very important, is very sound. It is very
important because it can improve Turkey’s accession to the EU. After
all, the EU doesn’t want to end up with neighbors like Iran, Iraq, or
Syria as the enemy of another EU member. But more so, it would improve,
and has improved considerably in my view, the Turkish position in the
Middle East and in the region, so the thrust to improve relations
with Iran, with Syria, with Lebanon and the agreement with Armenia
are all very, very important, very positive. I just do not think that
this improvement necessarily should be done at the expense of another
regional and strategic ally. That’s why we have a little problem in
terms of, again, what precipitated the conflict with Israel, and we
can agree or disagree on the merit of disagreement.

Turkey is a regional power that can mediate effectively, and not
just with Syria – it can mediate with Iran, it can mediate with
Hamas, it can mediate with all the conflicting parties. It will be
much better off if it also maintains good relations with the State
of Israel. I just want to mention, in connection with Syria, it was
Bashar Assad himself who appealed to Erdogan and said, "Turkey needs
to maintain solid relations with Israel." This coming from Syria is
very significant. And this is why I think the policy is sound, why it
should be pursued, but we need to work on improving the relationship
between Israel and Turkey, and the sooner the better.

Do you think that the US or Israel is ever concerned with Turkey’s
actions in the region?

I don’t think they are concerned because Turkey is able to, and can,
and should improve relations with its neighbors. I think they see this
only as positive. They will look at it as negative only if improved
relations with Syria and Iran come at the expense of something else,
because then it will have negative effects. As a matter of fact,
when President Obama met with Prime Minister Erdogan recently in
Washington, one of the two things he mentioned to him was that it is
very important to keep a good relationship between Turkey and Israel
for regional purposes, for the strategic purposes of Turkey as well.

So it’s not something that you can just dismiss. Because Israel remains
a fact of life and there is no need to undermine the relationship
with Israel in order to build a better relationship with the rest
of the region when in fact they don’t demand it. Like as I said,
Syria is asking Turkey to keep good relations because Turkey can’t
help Syria if it doesn’t have good relations with Israel.

Going back to the Iranian nuclear issue, what do you think about
Turkey’s involvement? Do you think their participation is a bit late
in the game, that they should have been included earlier?

I don’t think it’s too late. I think Turkey can and should play
a significant role in this regard. Turkey, the prime minister of
Turkey being a Muslim, can sit down and talk to Khamenei directly. I
advised someone yesterday from the Turkish government, I don’t want
to mention any names, and basically suggested the following. There’s
hardly any dialogue today between the United States and Iran, at
least not a direct dialogue. Certainly, there’s no dialogue between
Israel and Iran. In this regard, being that diplomacy has failed,
or will fail as only a question of time. Turkey can interject itself
into the negotiating process. I suggested to American officials that
Turkey should be invited to the P5+1, to make it the P5+2 (Germany and
Turkey), but more importantly, that Turkey should enter into secret
negotiations with Iran, and basically explain to the Iranians the
serious ramifications if Iran is to become a nuclear power. It’s not
only a problem for Israel; it’s a problem for the whole Middle East.

There would be a proliferation of nuclear weapons just about
everywhere. The Saudis would pursue it, the Gulf countries would
pursue it, Egypt would pursue it, and even Turkey itself may end up
wanting to have its own nuclear arsenals in order to remain a regional
power. Moreover, Iran could intimidate every single Arab country in the
Middle East. It could intimidate its small neighbors, Bahrain, Qatar,
Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and others. It could intimidate the Iraqis, not to
mention the Saudis as well. So that is also going to be a problem.

Iran with a nuclear weapon could prevent the Syrians as well as the
Palestinians from making peace with the State of Israel, sort of
keeping the Middle East percolating for years to come, for decades
to come. Iran with a nuclear weapon becomes a bully in its foreign
policy. So it’s not just Israel that is the problem here, it is what
Iranian nuclear power is going to do to the region, and how that
might cause the proliferation of nuclear weapons of mass destruction
throughout the region. That is the danger of Iran, and that is why it
is so critical. Israel may act on its own because it is concerned with
itself and wants to stop it. But the rest of the region today, believe
it or not, Arab states, Arab writers in the Gulf are openly speaking
about the fact that Iran must be stopped. This is the first time in
the history of this country that actually the Arab commentators from
the Gulf and Saudi Arabia have said that Iran must be stopped. Even
if Israel has to do it, it is better today than waiting another year
when Iran already acquired a nuclear weapon.

Do you think that the Turkish attempts regarding the Iranian issue
have been successful thus far?

I think that they have had the opposite effect, as a matter of fact.

When Prime Minister Erdogan went to Iran and he said, "Why are we
focusing on Iran? We have to focus on Israel. Israel has the weapon,
Iran doesn’t; Iran is pursuing peaceful nuclear power." The other
day he said more or less the same thing when Prime Minister Hariri
was in town. So basically that encourages Iran to pursue its program
almost with impunity. Whereas if Erdogan was true to his knowledge
(and he knows that Turkey does not want Iran to have a nuclear weapon)
he should have said that neither Iran nor anyone else should have
them, but once there is peace between Israel and the Arab world,
then Israel should be able to dismantle its nuclear weapons. That is
a different take. By saying the opposite I think he is contributing to
the impasse rather than helping the situation. And that’s unfortunate.

Can we discuss the recent situation between the Turkish and Israeli
foreign ministries, with the escalated tensions between the two
countries?

Again, I think this whole thing is very unfortunate, most unfortunate.

Prime Minister Erdogan’s initial reaction to Gaza probably was, I’m
sure, in part his feelings for the Palestinians, an emotional reaction
to what happened. After all, that was a terrible tragedy in Gaza,
without getting into whether Israel could or should have gone into
Gaza. I always say, you know, if a country feels violated, if it feels
its sovereignty is violated day in and day out, what is it supposed
to do to stop these violations? So when you try to make a judgment
based on how many Israelis died, and how many Palestinians died,
that is not how you judge whether an operation was right or wrong,
that is not the correct measurement if the Israelis happen to be more
sophisticated in their military approach. But the fact is that Hamas
fights from within the civilian community. There is no military front,
unlike conventional wars; there is no military formation here or there
or over there. They are fighting from within the civilian community. No
matter how careful you may be, you’re going to kill civilians. If
you ask me do the Israelis want to kill civilians, I can tell you
categorically that the Israelis do not want to kill civilians, and the
reason is that they have to live with these people and they know it.

Israelis tell me, "We have to live with the Palestinians, one way
or another, whether we are friends or enemies, we have to live with
these people. Why do you think we would want to make our life more
difficult by killing innocent Palestinian people?" It doesn’t make
sense for the Israelis. So to suggest that Israel would do something
like this deliberately is really not the right conclusion. But the
reaction to it from the Turkish government was in fact related to the
number of losses, to the destruction that took place. I can understand
their reaction.

I had many conversations with Turkish officials in Washington and
elsewhere. I wrote two articles about it, suggesting Turkish-Israeli
relations are solid, that they will continue to be so because of
this and this and that. The importance of the strategic relationship
between the two countries cannot be obliterated and dismissed because
of these incidents. Because there is a long-term relationship that is
critically important to both parties. So now we have reached a point
where the rhetoric is escalating, and the terrible manifestation of
this came about in Israel the other day. And we see the escalation
in rhetoric makes things considerably worse. Both parties know the
strategic relations are very important, the bilateral relations in
every aspect – military, civilian, diplomatic – are very important.

The sooner things calm down, the better it is going to be for both
countries, and the more consistent it will be with the Davutoglu
policy of moving forward and having very good relations with all
the neighbors in the Middle East. This will allow Turkey to play its
legitimate role as a mediator who has had wonderful relations with
everybody in the region, at least for now, and in so doing be able to
be influential with the Syrians again, with the Palestinians and Hamas,
with Iran. That is the only way it can happen. If the relationship
is not rectified soon, Turkey will be handicapped. It will not be
able to play its intended role, which I still think is very, very
important. As of yesterday I was telling some officials here that
it is so critical that we make sure that this not escalates further,
but unfortunately we may not be able to control it.

Even though Israel has sent an apology letter, do you think that the
damage has already been done? Could any apology really repair the
insult that has been caused?

I would like to think that there would not be long lasting damage, but
it could become long lasting if neither side takes proper constructive
action towards each other. And that is really the prerequisite here. A
letter of apology in and of itself is not enough. Israel needs to make
another gesture, a goodwill gesture towards Turkey. And Turkey needs
to have some goodwill gesture as well, at the minimum by stopping the
verbal attacks that is going to be necessary to start with. And Israel
is going to be in a much better position to make additional goodwill
gestures, to demonstrate that the friendship and the alliance between
the two countries cannot be destroyed because of one or two incidents.

So the letter itself is a good beginning, but it is not enough. I
think Israel needs to do more, to demonstrate something else. And
the Turkish government also needs to demonstrate that there is now
a mutual desire to quiet things down a bit and begin to gradually
restore the relationship. If that is done, there will be no lasting
damage in the relationship between the two countries. But if this is
not done, and the Israelis settle for only writing a letter, then I
think there will be serious damage to the relationship.

Interviewed by Kaitlin MacKenzie (JTW)

Dr. Alon Ben-Meir is an expert on Middle East politics and affairs,
specializing in peace negotiations between Israel and the Arab states.

Member of the Editorial and Advisory Board of the RILP, Review of
International Law and Politics(Uluslararasi Hukuk ve Politika Dergisi)
For the past twenty five years, Dr. Ben-Meir has been directly involved
in various negotiations and has operated as a liaison between top
Arab and Israeli officials. Dr. Ben-Meir serves as senior fellow
at New York University’s School of Global Affairs where he has been
teaching courses on the Middle East and negotiations for 17 years. Dr.

Ben-Meir is the columnist of JTW.

Friday, 15 January 2010

Journal of Turkish Weekly

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