The ongoing war between Israel and Hamas is not finding a political solution but is entering a new round of tension that threatens to turn into a major regional conflict. What follows Recep Erdogan’s statement on the possibility of Turkey entering the Palestinian conflict and the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran?

Will Turkey join the military conflict against Israel?

Turkey, under the rule of Recep Erdogan, began to publicly engage in controversial polemics with Israel in 2009, starting with the Davos Summit. This was followed by an escalation in Turkish-Israeli relations after a shooting incident in 2010, when Israeli special forces prevented a Turkish Navy humanitarian aid flotilla from entering the Gaza Strip.

After a while, Ankara and Tel Aviv, mediated by Baku, restored full relations and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was scheduled to visit Turkey. Moreover, the Azerbaijani oil pipeline, which supplies Caspian oil to Israel, runs through Turkish territory. However, after 7 October, following the outbreak of military conflict between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip, Turkey publicly supported the Palestinian side without receiving Israel’s support for its diplomatic initiatives for a political settlement of the conflict.

Such a position by Ankara irritates the Netanyahu government, which Erdogan compares to Hitler, accuses of genocide and calls for the recognition of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. Recep Erdogan pursues a policy of strengthening Turkey’s independence from external influences, has established partnership relations with the main centres of the world (especially China and Russia), aims to increase the role of his state in the system of international relations towards a regional superpower and the revival of imperial status within the framework of neo-patrimonialist and neo-ottomanist strategies. Turkey is trying to position itself as the leader of the Islamic world and claims to be a permanent member of the UN Security Council.

The ambitions of the Turkish leadership are quite transparent. Erdogan has begun to strengthen the national defence industry, to use cooperation with NATO countries to obtain breakthrough modern technologies (for example, in the field of unmanned aerial vehicles), and to conclude lucrative military-technical cooperation agreements with Russia. The tactic of engaging in “small (local) conflicts” has also become the hallmark of modern Turkey.

In particular, Ankara entered the military conflict in Libya on the side of the Tripoli authorities in order to establish a naval base and gain access to Libyan energy resources. In Syria and Iraq, under the slogan of fighting Kurdish separatism and the PKK, Turkish forces have become involved in local military conflicts and are trying to establish control over important oil transit areas.

In Nagorno-Karabakh, Turkey has actively supported Azerbaijan both in terms of arms and direct involvement in the military conflict in 2020 and 2023 through the installation of advisors, commanders, special forces and the recruitment of fighters from Arab countries. The success of the Second Karabakh War provided Ankara with a breakthrough in the realisation of the Turan Project in the post-Soviet East, with the prospect of controlling Central Asia’s richest resources.

Turkey continues to unequivocally support the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which is unrecognised except by Ankara, and regularly threatens Greece with “night invasions”. At the same time, Turkey is seeking to secure its energy interests in the eastern Mediterranean.

At the end of July, Turkish President Recep Erdogan, speaking to his party colleagues (Justice and Development Party), announced a similar threat of a “night invasion” of Israel over the ongoing military conflict in Gaza. In particular, according to the Turkish publication Sabah, the Turkish leader said: “Just like we entered Karabakh, just like we entered Libya, we might do similar to them.”

These revelations by Erdogan drew an immediate response from the Israeli side in the person of Foreign Minister Israel Katz, who reminded the Turkish President of the sad fate of Saddam Hussein and then called on NATO to expel Turkey from the alliance (although, apart from the Netherlands, no one has yet supported this idea).

However, Turkey supports the Palestinian side in the conflict with Israel only at the level of diplomacy, public appeals and a relative economic embargo, but does not take any action in the field of military assistance. In contrast to Turkey, Iran behaves differently, forming a kind of axis of resistance against Israel with pro-Iranian proxy forces in Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Syria.

The point is that Turkey, as a NATO member and in a sense a country dependent on the West for its strategic security, cannot get into a direct military conflict with a key ally of the North Atlantic Alliance. Otherwise, the collective West, led by the United States, could inflict irreparable strategic damage on Turkey itself by exploiting its internal and external contradictions.

Many experts tend to believe that Erdogan made an emotional threat against Israel. Arguments for this view:

-       Turkey has no direct border with Israel, so the land army will not be able to enter the war easily and quickly;

-       The numerical superiority of the Turkish navy does not guarantee the Turks a repeat of the Cyprus success of 1974, as Israel has a more modern naval combat fleet and a superior air force;

-       Israel is a key NATO ally and the Jewish lobby can create problems for Turkey within NATO;

-       If Turkey’s 84 million people enter a military conflict against Israel’s 7 million, Tel Aviv will use nuclear (possibly tactical) weapons against Ankara;

-       The naval and air forces of the USA and other NATO countries will directly support Israel in the conflict with Turkey, and the military defeat of the Turks will lead to the dismemberment of the Turkish Republic into several parts (Greek, Kurdish, Arab, Armenian).

-       As a result, Turkey will again limit itself to verbal disputes instead of entering the war against Israel either alone or as part of a united front of resistance of Islamic states.

Will the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran lead to a direct military conflict between Iran and Israel?

Iran has suffered a series of unexpected and brutal blows and technical disasters from the Israeli side in recent months. These include sabotage and terrorist operations by Israeli security agencies to eliminate a number of senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) officers in Syria and Iraq responsible for supporting pro-Iranian proxy forces. In May, Iran lost President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in a helicopter crash. And on the night of 30-31 July, a high-level Iranian guest, Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh, was assassinated in Tehran, not far from the Iranian President’s residence, while attending the inauguration of the newly elected Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshkian.

The chain of such high-profile acts of sabotage and terrorism, and the crash of Air Force One, point to major problems in Iran’s internal and external security system (particularly in terms of counter-intelligence and intelligence). The assassination of Haniyeh is in some ways a challenge to the Iranian state and its sovereignty in terms of its inability to provide guaranteed security to high-level foreign guests.

However, due to the well-known turbulent processes in the Middle East and the official position of the Iranian authorities, it is natural that the war will be fought not only on the line of contact between the conflicting forces in the Gaza Strip, but also far beyond Israel’s borders. Iran’s support for anti-Israeli forces, not only at the diplomatic level but also through proxy forces, is creating the conditions for an escalation of tensions.

Iran, through its Supreme Leader, rahbar Ali Khamenei, has promised to punish the organiser of the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh. Some sources believe that unlike Iran’s mass rocket and drone attack on Israeli military installations in April, this time Tehran may use a lightning tactic of simultaneous attacks on Israel with the participation of all regional proxy forces.

Others do not rule out the possibility that Iran will attack not Israel but the country from which Israeli intelligence organised the attack on Tehran. It is not yet clear how and from which territory the missile /drone was launched.

Third experts believe that Tehran, whose newly elected President from the reformist bloc, Masoud Pezeshkian, suggests that the West resume the negotiation process to reduce tension and search for compromises, is hardly interested in the escalation of the Middle East conflict and will not allow Iran’s involvement in a large-scale war. In this regard, the view remains that Iran will make a symbolic military response against Israel, and Tel Aviv will not escalate further. Besides, Iran is not sufficiently prepared for war not so much with Israel as with its Western allies led by the US.

Sometimes the forest of coincidences destroys any logic. How events will go this time – time will tell. In any case, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict requires a political denouement and a cessation of hostilities.

Alexander SVARANTS – PhD of Political Science, Professor, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.” Courtesy

https://journal-neo.su/2024/08/08/the-middle-east-on-the-brink-of-a-new-conflict/