Talking Turkey: ‘Syria was the appetizer, Egypt is the main course, and Israel is the dessert as far as Erdogan is concerned’

JERUSALEM – As the sun begins to set – although some would argue not quickly enough – on the failed and discredited Biden administration, and President-elect Donald Trump waits in the wings to resume his seat in the Oval Office, it is worth taking a moment to scan the political landscape – in this case with an international slant – and truly marvel at how much the so-called “adults in the room” have so royally managed to mess things up.

Whether one buys the Trumpian line of “having begun no new wars,” or not, during his first administration, the facts speak for themselves, and when he left office in January 2021, the world was not aflame. Four years of Bidenism – or was it Obama 3.0? – on the international scene has proved to be an unmitigated disaster. It’s hard to think of any region which is better off now than it was in 2021, and this particularly true of the Middle East.

Without question, the main catalyst for this change was the slaughter that was Oct. 7, and Israel’s response to it. Large swaths of the region are largely unrecognizable compared with how they were 15 months ago; a more-than 50-year-old dynasty has crumbled to dust in Syria, and a more-than-four-decade foreign policy of the Islamic Republic has similarly been obliterated.

Where some have lost, others have gained; and one of the biggest winners is undoubtedly Turkey. It will be one of the main issues in the Trump inbox as he must now attempt to navigate an Ankara – a supposedly NATO ally – which seems inexorably on the march. It is also a subject vexing Israeli decision-makers.

On Monday, the Nagel Committee, headed by Prof. Jacob Nagel, which is a supervisory and deliberative body, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu set up in late 2024 to examine defense spending and IDF military force design for the future, warned Israel should prepare for war with Turkey.

For Michael Rubin, director of policy at the Middle East Forum, Turkey’s current posturing is emblematic of the country under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s leadership, which he labeled “an engine of radicalism and irredentism.”

“Turkey will now repeat the Iranian pattern: It will use proxies – of which Syria is one – to attack Israel while preparing its own forces to eventually eradicate the Jewish state. The fact Turkey may also follow Iran down the path of a covert nuclear program makes the parallels even greater.”

Dr. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak from the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University took a slightly different approach, arguing that now Turkey and Israel no longer have Syria as a buffer state between them, there is a greater likelihood of Israel potentially hitting a Turkish target there, which even if it was by mistake, could be a conflict-igniting spark “Israel seeks to avoid such incidents, as it does not want Turkey – a nation with which it maintains peaceful relations – to transform into a hostile state,” he said.

There is no doubt Turkey has been the main beneficiary of the demise of the Assad regime, not least because forces it substantially backed – whatever the ins and outs of Syria’s day-to-day administration under Ahmad al-Sharaa and his HTS cronies – are currently running the country. Ankara is clearly feeling emboldened by several elements, which play into its sense of self-confidence, as it has seen the dominoes of many of its most powerful regional adversaries fall, in particular the Islamic Republic of Iran.

These two countries have been locked in a hegemonic struggle for influence over the region for centuries, and now their modern iterations vie to reanimate the luster of fallen empires. As Iran’s fortunes have waned over the last few months – particularly with Israel’s pounding of Hezbollah in Lebanon, largely responsible for the subsequent collapse of the Assad regime – Turkey’s have waxed. Erdogan senses an opportunity for his replacement of Ayatollah Khamanei as the dominant force.

“Just as Iran will use religion, language, and the legacy of the Persian Empire, whatever is convenient at any given moment, to expand its influence, so too does Turkey use Sunnis, Turkish, and the legacy of the Ottoman Empire to claim the right to dominate. Trump may celebrate the Abraham Accords and hope to use them to check Iranian influence but increasingly as great a threat comes from Turkey itself,” Rubin warned.

To this end, two additional pieces of information are crucial. Turkey’s Russian-built nuclear reactor is due to become operational this year. As Rubin wrote in a recent article published on the Middle East Forum website, “the notion that it is proliferation-proof rests on the assurance of Ankara and Moscow.”

Erdogan himself has hinted he finds the idea of Turkey not being allowed to possess nuclear weapons an intolerable one. Also, the Turkish president recently announced Turkey’s production of intercontinental ballistic missiles with an increase in range from 500 to 1,250 miles.

For Yanarocak Turkey’s desire to increase the range of ballistic missiles could be seen as them being in direct competition with Iran. “After all, compared to Iran, Turkish missiles have a much shorter range.”

Neither he nor Rubin thought it was axiomatically true that Turkey’s production of longer-range ballistic missiles would necessarily be used to threaten Israel. Indeed, Rubin suggested it might export the missiles to “even the most odious regimes.” He assessed it was likely Turkey’s clients might use the missiles – as well as its advanced drone technology – to “murder and destabilize.”

While Israel has obviously been consumed by the threats emanating from Iran and its proxies arrayed as they have been in Qassem Soleimani’s phrase a “ring of fire,” it could be that one potential regional hegemony with designs on Jerusalem and the eradication of the Jewish state is simply replaced by another. It would spell almost unimagined disaster if Turkey were to effectively control the government in Syria and be able to topple al-Sisi’s regime in Egypt.

Dr. Yanarocak didn’t think Erdogan would make any moves against Cairo at the moment, although he noted that Erdogan’s connection to the Muslim Brotherhood, the movement to which al-Sisi’s predecessor Mohamed Morsi – before his removal in a coup – belonged, is a definitely a source of tension.

He also pointed out Syria and Egypt were once considered as one under the name of the United Arab Republic – even going to war against Israel because of it. For Rubin, however, the conclusion was much more straightforward; “Syria was the appetizer, Egypt is the main course, and Israel is the dessert as far as Erdogan is concerned.”

The issue of Turkey, coupled with the equally nefarious influence of the non-NATO ally Qatar, is an aspect of foreign policy Trump and his team will need to get a strong handle on … and quickly. Despite Turkey’s NATO membership, it would be an understatement to say it does not have the interests of the other members as any kind of priority.

Rubin asserted Trump should go so far as to label both “state sponsors of terrorism,” and if they are not content with the designation then they should alter their behavior.