As diplomats struggle to get Arab-Israeli negotiations back on track after last month's bombings in Jerusalem, Israel seems more isolated than in many years, especially in the Middle East. A closer look, however, shows that Israel actually has two regional friends, Jordan and Turkey. Ties with Jordan have been much in the news due to high-profile visits. But the quiet development of relations with Turkey make it Israel's most important ally in the region.
Turkey's new prime minister, the secular Mesut Yilmaz, signed a trade pact with Israel as one of his first acts after coming to office in June, showing the regard he has for this tie. And if it continues to strengthen, this connection has the potential to alter the strategic map of the Middle East, to reshape Western alliances there, and even to end Israel's regional isolation.
One of the clearest signs of the new alignment took place in February in an unlikely venue, a suburb of the Turkish capital of Ankara. The Sincan town council sponsored a "Jerusalem Day" rally—a celebration in anticipation of the day the city will be conquered—and, as elsewhere in the Middle East, the occasion offered a chance to execrate both Israel and the Arab-Israeli peace process. The guest of honor, Iran's ambassador to Turkey, launched into a well-received anti-Zionist tirade.
'Israel Is Our Friend'
This outburst would normally have attracted little attention, for such events occur almost daily in the world, even in the West. But things went differently in Turkey. The day after the rally, a high-ranking military official told a newspaper: "I followed the meeting in Sincan. I was terrified by what I observed." A day later, the Turkish army sent an assortment of military vehicles through Sincan. That was followed by the expulsion of the town's mayor from office and the Iranian ambassador from Turkey. He was told, "Israel is our friend, you cannot talk like this about it."
In today's Middle East, this turn of events could take place only in Turkey, the one Muslim country where a powerful institution—the military—not only rejects the demonization of Israel but fosters pro-Israel sentiment.
Relations between Turkey and Israel go back to 1949 when Ankara established diplomatic relations with the Jewish state, but only took off with the Oslo accords—the first agreement between Israel and Palestinians—in the summer of 1993. Ankara signed some 13 lesser accords with Israel over the next three years, on such issues as security cooperation and combating terrorism. But in July 1996, the burgeoning relationship was dealt a seemingly fatal blow: Necmettin Erbakan, a fundamentalist Muslim who sees Israel roughly as Iran's leaders do, became Turkey's prime minister.
In any other Middle Eastern state, Mr. Erbakan would no doubt have fulfilled his promises to abrogate the country's agreements with Israel. But Turkey is different, and therein lies its potential as a stabilizing force in the region. Fundamentalism has been kept in check, so far, by the secularist legacy of Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Turkish Republic, and by the military, the keeper of the secularist flame.
When Mr. Erbakan came to office in July 1996, the Turkish military chose to place Israel at the center of its disagreement with the fundamentalists. That it would prevail in expanding ties with Israel became evident just weeks after Mr. Erbakan came to office, when military contacts resumed and even increased. The resulting cooperation, according to formal announcements and talkative aides, includes the upgrade of existing weaponry (including one deal worth $632.5 million), the purchase of Israeli military hardware by Turkey, joint production of weapons, the training of staff, and intelligence sharing.
What explains this sudden blossoming of relations after all these decades? Jerusalem has always sought better relations with Ankara in an effort to drive a wedge through a hostile ring of Arabic-speaking neighbors. But why is Turkey opposing a tide of Arab opposition and seeking such a tight bond with Israel? The answer lies both in a friendly history (most famously, the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 found refuge in Ottoman lands) and common interests today. Turkey has unresolved territorial disputes with Iraq and Syria, both longstanding enemies of Israel. By working with Israel, Turkey gains leverage against them. Should President Hafez Assad of Syria, for example, initiate hostilities with Turkey, he must now also worry about Israel at his country's opposite border. As for Iran, since the Islamic revolution of 1979, the regime in Tehran, seeks simultaneously to destroy Israel and to create an Islamic Republic of Turkey.
Turkish-Israeli cooperation is a great fit internationally as well. Foiled by human-rights groups in Europe and the Greek and Armenian lobbies in the United States, Turkey needs a reliable source of high-technology military equipment. And for Israel to sustain its military industry, it depends on foreign markets for those products. The Turks, who have historically been. outsiders in Washington, now have a well-connected ally. Israelis, always the odd man out in their own region, are now not so alone.
For Turkey, never quite accepted as Western, ties to Israel differentiate it from all other Muslim countries. For Israel, never quite accepted as a Middle Eastern country, those relations breach the wall of rejection; and ties to Turkey might provide a model for Israel's future links to other Muslim states.
If it continues on its present trajectory, the Turkish-Israeli relationship could well alter the strategic map of the Middle East. Strong Turkish-Israeli ties enhance the region's stability by serving as a powerful military deterrent against would-be enemies. Aggressive states must watch their step in the face of the Middle East's largest and most advanced military force, and this diminishes the likelihood of war.
"This budding alliance has altered the strategic power balance in the oil-rich Mideast," writes eminent Turkish journalist Sami Kohen. Moshe Arens, the former Israeli defense minister, deems it "a major change in the geopolitics of the Middle East"
Alliance of Democratic States
Westerners roundly applaud the bond. Defense News describes it as "a brilliant. Joint move" that "elevates Turkish and Israeli security to practically an unassailable level." To its credit, the Clinton administration has solidly backed its only two real allies in the Middle East as they form this partnership. In an unusually blunt statement, a U.S. State Department official said that "it has been a strategic objective of the United States that Turkey and Israel ought to enhance their military cooperation and their political relations. ... If certain other Arab countries don't like that, that's just tough."
Washington knows that closer Turkish-Israeli relations will help bring stability to the region. Most ambitiously, it could provide the nucleus of a Western oriented regional partnership made up of democratic allies—as opposed to the authoritarian rulers that Washington has relied upon for the past five decades. Eisenhower's Baghdad Pact, Nixon's "twin pillars" and Reagan's "strategic consensus" depended mostly on dubious monarchs and ugly authoritarians. If cultivated carefully, Jordan might join in, with more states (perhaps Kuwait) adhering later. The final result could be that most elusive of all goals: a more peaceable Middle East.
Mr. Pipes is editor of the Middle East Quarterly. This article is derived from a longer essay to be published in The National Interest.
