Recep Erdoğan’s anti-Israeli attitude is turning into a fear of the threat of Israeli aggression against Türkiye, which, according to the head of the Turkish military department, Yasar Guler, could provoke a third world war.
Is an Israeli military threat to Türkiye real?
Moreover, in October, the IDF launched a large-scale war in southern Lebanon to eliminate Hezbollah strongholds, strengthen the security of Israel’s northern territories and return Jewish settlers. The IDF is not just destroying Hamas in the Gaza Strip via ‘eradicating terrorism in the promised land’, but is also destroying the region by forcibly deporting the local Arab population. In other words, under the cover of military operations, Tel Aviv is changing the ethnic map of Israel in order to protect the nation-state from a relapse of the ‘Toufan al-Aqsa’ and gain stability for development.
Since Israel gets absolutely everything it wants – and it does so in front of the rest of the world (including the Islamic world), where force dictates law – it is no coincidence that even more radical statements by Israeli politicians are openly tossed into the information space.
The Minister of Finance and leader of the far-right ‘Religious Zionism’ party, Bezalel Smotrich, announced the creation of Greater Israel in 2025 by proclaiming sovereignty over the territories of the West Bank of the Jordan River (historical Judea and Samaria), which may well become a reality due to the election of Donald Trump in the United States.
In this regard, the Israel Hayom newspaper reports the following statements by B. Smotrich: “In his first term, President Trump took significant steps, including moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, asserting Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and preparing a statement on the legality and legitimacy of Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. We were one step away from declaring Israeli sovereignty over the settlements in Judea and Samaria and now is the time to do it”.
Nevertheless, the radical Smotrich does not rule out the incorporation of parts of Syria and Saudi Arabia into Israel.
Such statements by members of the Israeli Government cannot stimulate peace and security in the Middle East. Perhaps Netanyahu is provoking the situation and asking his partners for more dividends than just a truce with the Palestinians. Israel is not only expanding the zone and borders of hostilities, but also changing the contours of the ethnic composition of its country, narrowing the political field of solving the Palestinian issue.
Israel considers Iran its main enemy in the region today, against which many reconnaissance and subversive operations and two aerial military attacks have already been carried out. At the same time, Tel Aviv does not lay claim to Iranian territories, but tries to involve the United States in its plan to inflict military defeat on the Iranian regime with the establishment of subsequent military, political and economic control over Iran.
And what about Türkiye? The history of Turkish-Israeli relations is replete with instances of solid partnership. Recent history shows that, without the consent of Istanbul in the early 20th century, the Zionists would not have been able to carry out a mass Aliyah (resettlement) of parts of the Jewish diaspora to the territory of Palestine. In turn, without the intervention of the Zionists, the Young Turks would hardly have been able to carry out a successful coup in 1908 and seize power in Istanbul. Türkiye is quite contradictory, but, nevertheless, it was able to become a member of NATO and an ally of the Anglo-Saxons against the USSR and the Warsaw Pact countries after the Second World War, and this is also a considerable feat of the Jewish lobby in Washington and London. Türkiye was the first country in the Islamic world to recognise Israel and establish diplomatic relations with it. Subsequently, trade, economic and military cooperation between Israel and Türkiye created a favourable market for Turkish exports of agricultural goods and imports of high (including military) technologies.
Ankara-Tel Aviv: the political confrontation heightens
The relations between Ankara and Tel Aviv changed with the coming to power of R. Erdogan’s administration in Türkiye, who is a supporter of the Islamic Muslim Brotherhood organisation. In 2009-2020, Türkiye has allowed for tensions in its relations with Israel, although relations have not been completely severed. Oil supplies from Azerbaijan are being delivered to Israel, using Turkish territory (the port of Ceyhan) as transit. However, the current war between Hamas and Israel, throughout which Erdogan has tried to adopt a wait-and-see approach and conciliatory tactics at the beginning of the conflict, has become another test for bilateral relations. Having received no signals of support for its plan to resolve the Palestinian issue on the principle of creating two states within the 1967 borders and presenting Türkiye with an international mandate as a guarantor of security, Ankara entered political confrontation with Israel, accompanied by loud accusations against Netanyahu.
The Israelis will hardly appreciate the deployment of Hamas leaders in Türkiye (Mossad organised its operation to destroy the head of the political wing of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran, not Istanbul). Türkiye, in turn, cannot be satisfied with the statement of the newly appointed Israeli Foreign Minister, Gideon Saar, on recognising the Kurds, who are “the victims of oppression and aggression by Iran and Türkiye”, as natural allies of the Jewish state.
In other words, if Israel openly interacts with the Kurdish autonomy in Iraq and unofficially with the Kurds of Syria, Iran and Türkiye, then Ankara will have security concerns. It is no coincidence that, following the beginning of the IDF’s invasion of southern Lebanon, Turkish leader R. Erdoğan admitted that Tel Aviv may commit military aggression against Türkiye itself in the future. Well, since the president himself does not rule out such a thing, then what remains for the heads of various Turkish departments?
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has repeatedly and publicly noted that Israel is trying to increase the degree of military tension in the region and expand the borders of the Arab-Israeli conflict (including in the case of a war with Lebanon and an attack on Iran). Turkish Foreign Minister Ismail Kalyn practically repeated the thought of his colleague Fidan.
Turkish Defence Minister Yasar Guler has also decided to echo the opinion about the threat of Israeli military aggression against Türkiye (they say that the IDF has the necessary military potential for such an offensive and that this could provoke a third world war). So, in an interview with TV100, Guler noted: “Would the president have talked about this if he had not sensed this danger? Of course, it [Israel] can attack”. This war, in his opinion, could lead to the outbreak of World War III. In turn, Guler called the recent terrorist attack on the TUSAŞ defence enterprise “significant”, stressing that the target was the national defence industry (the famous Turkish drones).
It is difficult not to trust the opinion of the head of the defence department of NATO member Türkiye. However, if Guler is so independent in his conclusions, then why does he refer to the opinion of the president and not to the facts? How will Israel, which does not have a direct border with Türkiye, carry out military aggression and go on the offensive in Anatolia? Will it use Iraqi Kurdistan as a springboard? How much of the military arsenal of 9-million-strong Israel is enough to defeat the second-largest NATO army, the 87-million-strong Türkiye? Where and when did Guler and Erdoğan receive direct threats from Israel? The Jews, as it seems, are not claiming Ararat, Istanbul or Adana.
Will the Turkish-Israeli confrontation lead to conflict within NATO?
It is difficult to imagine that Israel would provoke an armed conflict with NATO member Türkiye. Israel is one such developed country that does not spontaneously start wars, rather prepares them.
Despite Erdoğan’s loud and harsh accusations against Israel and Netanyahu, Ankara is unlikely to provide military assistance to the Palestinians and Lebanese as Iran does. Although Türkiye has advanced in drone production technologies, this is not enough to start a war against the main US ally in the Middle East. In addition, military bases and strategic forces of the US army are located on the territory of Türkiye itself.
Will World War III begin in the event of an Israeli-Turkish war? Here Mr. Guler is somewhat far from reality. Even other NATO members (except Hungary) will not support Türkiye in the event of such a conflict, but will rather side with Israel. Greece and Bulgaria will get a historic chance to settle the score with Türkiye (as well as non-NATO Armenia with Syria and the Kurdish military resistance). Iran is unlikely to stand up for its geopolitical rival Türkiye. Russia and China will also not aggravate their relations with Israel and the West because of Türkiye, which adheres to some kind of neo-pan-Turanism and supports the sovereignty of Ukraine. The Islamic world is full of contradictions and is not particularly pro-Turkish. So, in this context, Türkiye is unlikely to have defenders around the globe. The Turkic world remains represented by Azerbaijan and the republics of Central Asia. It is obvious that the Asian member countries of the Organisation of Turkic States (Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan) and the observer Turkmenistan will not become military opponents of Israel and the United States. Azerbaijan will remain with Erdoğan, but it is too weak and dependent on Israel. Baku is unlikely to repeat the experience of Ankara’s military intervention in the Karabakh war.
In such a scenario, Türkiye may face difficult times of divisions.
Alexander Svarants — Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”
