The news put into perspective every Saturday, thanks to the historian Fabrice d’Almeida. Saturday October 28: relations between Israel and Turkey.
President Recep Tayip Erdogan called for a major demonstration of solidarity with Gaza on Saturday October 28, 2023 in Istanbul. This is a new reversal in relations between Turkey and Israel.
However, everything started rather well between these two countries. Geopolitics brought them together: one used Israel to counterbalance the rise in power of Nasser’s Egypt, while the other saw it as a means of loosening the grip of hostile states in the region. Two multi-faith countries with a secular dimension.
They exchanged intelligence and goods, including water, essential for Israel. The high point of this alliance was found in 1996, with the signing of a military cooperation agreement. Israel will notably modernize Turkish military aviation.
The coming to power of Erdogan and the AKP changes the situation
The AKP, created by the Muslim Brotherhood like Hamas, wants to establish the supremacy of Islam and Erdogan dreams of restoring the Ottoman Empire. Several verbal confrontations occurred: in 2004 when Israel assassinated Sheikh Yacine, then when a blockade of Gaza was established after Hamas came to power in 2007.
Above all, blood separates the two States with the attack by Israeli commandos of a humanitarian flotilla leaving Turkey to force the blockade of Gaza. Netanyahu must pay compensation to the victims to restore relative calm in 2013. But the following year, in 2014, the military intervention in Gaza provoked a virulent reaction from Erdogan, who said that the Israelis were “worse than Hitler”. This time, we will have to wait until 2022 to see a normalization of relations.
The current conflict is once again alienating these former partners, whose military agreements no longer have much meaning. Because Erdogan dreams of playing the role of leader of a global Muslim coalition. The big demonstration on October 28 allows him to show himself as a religious leader, in opposition to the ideal of a secular republic desired by Mustapha Kemal Ataturk exactly a century ago. We were supposed to celebrate its birth on Sunday.
For Turkey’s Jewish minority, these tensions may bode ill. When politics follows religion, intolerance advances.