Israel and Turkey will allow interests to reconcile them

The Daily Star, Lebanon
March 9 2009

by Ofra Bengio

Israel’s three-week offensive in the Gaza Strip in January of this
year threatened to wreck the unique relationship between Turkey and
Israel. This begs the question: could or should a crisis between
Israel and a third party bring about a deep transformation in the
bilateral relations that have been developing between the two
countries for more than 15 years?

The harsh Turkish reaction to the offensive was taken as a major
indication of a Turkish volte-face at both the official and popular
level. In a series of unprecedented attacks, Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan lashed out at Israel, declaring that the blood of dead
Palestinian children would not be left on the ground and that Israel’s
deeds were "a crime against humanity." Worse still, he called for the
expulsion of Israel, a Turkish ally, from the United Nations for
ignoring the organization’s call to stop the fighting in Gaza.

Then came the Davos incident at the end of January, in which Erdogan
demonstratively walked off the stage during a debate with Israeli
President Shimon Peres. No wonder Erdogan came to be considered a hero
by Gazans, Iranians and Syrians. Taking their cue from him, the media
and the Turkish street escalated their anti-Israel and at times even
anti-Semitic attacks to a point that in some instances surpassed those
voiced in Arab countries. Huge anti-Israel demonstrations flooded the
streets of Turkey’s major cities and towns; demonstrators burned
Israeli flags and waved anti-Israel and anti-Semitic slogans. One of
the placards read: "Jews and Armenians cannot enter, but dogs can."

The reaction at the popular Turkish level was part spontaneous and
part officially organized, including even the mobilization of school
children, which pointed to a political hand acting behind the
scenes. Turkey, caught up in these dynamics, appeared to be finding
common ground with Hamas, Syria and Iran in the axis of evil.

In fact, Turkey’s stance on Gaza should be understood as part of the
proactive foreign policy of the government, led by the ruling Justice
and Development Party (AKP). It was a diversionary ploy at home and a
challenge to rivals at home and abroad. Evidently, there was genuine
sympathy for the Palestinians among the Turkish people. But the
government was also apparently attempting to manipulate this sympathy
in order to mobilize support for the AKP in the upcoming Turkish local
elections in March by deflecting attention away from the domestic
problems with the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK), while also challenging
the military – the architect of relations with Israel – and enhancing
Turkey’s role among Arab and Muslim countries.

Yet for all these rhetorical and emotional reactions, the Turkish
government did not initiate any "punitive" move against Israel. It did
not recall its ambassador from Israel as it had done on an earlier
occasion. Moreover, at the very time that Erdogan was lashing out at
Israel, the two states reportedly signed a new bilateral arms deal.

Many Turks wonder why Turkey, a major power in the region, still needs
strong relations with Israel at a time when the entire regional
strategic map has drastically changed from the one existing back in
the 1990s, when the two forged their strategic ties? The answer seems
obvious. To fulfill its proactive role, Ankara needs to remain on good
terms with Israel, and thus enhance its stature and maneuverability as
an honest broker. It has to preserve its image as a role model of a
democratic Muslim country, maintaining the age-old balances between
East and West, between the Arab world and Israel, and between Muslim
and non-Muslim countries. Most important of all, Turkey needs to
maintain its strategic alignment with Israel to ward off the primary
dangers facing both countries, especially international terrorism and
the possibility of nuclearization of the region.

In Israel, wisely enough, the official reaction to the Turkish attacks
was low-key. Indeed, in the eyes of some Israelis it was even too
conciliatory. In fact, Israel could not afford the luxury of
antagonizing such an important partner in a largely hostile
region. The Israeli government was willing to bury its resentment in
the understanding that if it managed to contain the crisis in Gaza, it
would be able to weather the Turkish storm as well.

Past experience has shown that the two countries’ bilateral interests
are stronger than sentiments. Notably, the correlation between
progress in the peace process with the Palestinians and
Turkish-Israeli relations, first apparent in the early 1990s,
continues to hold. In the interim, the collapse of the peace process
in October 2000 and the ensuing violence caused considerable damage to
relations, whereas Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza in summer 2005
engendered a flood of visits by high-ranking Turkish officials and
even the establishment of a hotline between Erdogan and then-Israeli
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

For all the damage done to Turkish-Israeli relations due to the Gaza
offensive, the historic bonds of amity between the two peoples and the
two states are likely once again to prove strong enough to overcome
the latest crisis, even though it might take much longer this time.

Ofra Bengio of the Moshe Dayan Center and the Department of Middle
Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University, is the author of
"The Turkish-Israeli Relationship: Changing Ties of Middle Eastern
Outsiders" (NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004). This commentary first
appeared at bitterlemons-international.org, an online newsletter.