The Paradox of Turkish-Israeli Relations

Today offers a good lesson in how paradoxical Turkish-Israeli relations can be. On the one hand, in a front-page article headlined "Scandal in the Rector's Office," the Turkish daily Hurriyet reports about an incident in which the rector of Istanbul University kicked out of his office both the Israeli ambassador to Turkey and consul general in Istanbul because he was offended by the presence of their armed bodyguards. It's the kind of event that certainly adds to the sense among some that a certain frost has settled over the once warm relations between Turkey and Israel (perhaps because of the election of the liberal Islamic Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2002).

On the other hand, if we dig a little further in Hurriyet, we also find this article, which tells us about Turkey's plans to bring together its energy minister together with his Israeli and Indian counterparts to talk about joint projects in the energy field. In particular, the meeting would discuss the creation of a underwater pipeline that would link the Turkish port of Ceyhan with the Israeli port of Ashkelon. The new pipeline would carry oil from the Caspian region brought to Turkey via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline. From Ashkelon, yet another pipeline would take the oil to Eilat, where it would be loaded onto tankers and shipped to India. (Confused? If so, you can read more about the project in an article I wrote for the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.) The pipeline, if built, would be a very concrete link joining Turkey and Israel on a number of levels.

What we have here is the continuation of a dynamic that's been going on for at least the last decade. On the popular level, Israel's image in Turkey keeps dropping. Recent public opinion surveys, for example, found that Israel is one of the countries least liked by Turks. On the political and economic level, though, the ties between the two countries keep deepening, with trade relations continuing to grow and the two countries looking for other ways to cooperate, beyond the Ceyhan-Ashkelon pipeline. In many ways, the relationship has normalized, moving away from one based almost exclusively on military ties to one that's more multi-dimensional (and perhaps more stable). But the split between the popular and official view of Israel is one that -- save for a peace agreement with the Palestinians and Israel's integration into the wider Middle East -- is likely to continue.

Can Turkey Bring the U.S. and Iran Together?

In a recent interview with the New York Times, Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan offered Turkey's services as a mediator between the United States and Iran. Although it's not clear if Washington really needs Ankara's help if it decides to start talking to the Iranians, the offer is part of Turkey's ongoing effort to recast itself as a regional mediator and (soft) power broker. Here's an article I wrote for Eurasianet about Turkey's new Middle East foreign policy, and another from the Christian Science Monitor about Ankara's effort to mediate between Israel and Syria.

UPDATE I: I explore this topic a bit more in an analysis piece for Eurasianet.

UPDATE II: The Iranian ambassador in Turkey seems to throw some more cold water on Ankara's mediation offer in an interview with Hurriyet, a Turkish daily.

Photo of the Day

A couple prays in front of the ark at the historic synagogue in Canakkale, Turkey. Although only a handful of Jews are left there, members of the community now living in Istanbul make an annual pilgrimage to Canakkale in October in order to keep the synagogue alive. You can read more here. (Photo by Yigal Schleifer)

Banned!

Access to this blog, as well as to the millions of others ones that use the Blogger hosting service, was recently blocked in Turkey by court order. Although the ban was provisionally lifted after five days, the Blogger ban is part of a worrying trend in Turkey, which has seen overzealous bureaucrats and ill-informed judges blocking access to more and more websites. YouTube has been blocked in Turkey since May, one of the more than 850 websites banned so far this year. Is Turkey on its way to becoming a leading internet censor? Read more....

Turkey's Military Under Fire

My article in today's Christian Science Monitor about how Turkey's powerful military is facing unprecedented criticism from an unlikely source: the public. It may be a sign that Turkish democracy is maturing, but the generals are already striking back. Read on....

Photo of the Day

An old woman sitting in the courtyard of an Assyrian church in Midyat, southeast Turkey. The Assyrians are one of the oldest Christian sects in the world, living mostly in Turkey and Iraq. Recent decades have seen the Assyrians flee the region because of war and ethnic violence, but the last few years have seen a slow revival of the religious minority in its ancestral homeland in southeast Turkey. You can read more about this in a photoessay I wrote for Eurasianet in 2006. (Photo by Yigal Schleifer)

Unearthing a Painful Past in Cyprus

My article in today's Christian Science Monitor, about a project in to unearth mass graves in Cyprus, reminders of the violence that gripped the island in the 1960's and 70's. The project, perhaps the most successful bi-communal effort in Cyprus, is being seen as an important step in helping reunify the divided island.

In a related story for Women's eNews, I profiled Sevgul Uludag, a Turkish Cypriot journalist whose brave pioneering work helped bring the mass graves issue to the top of the agenda on the island.