Category: Regions

Did Israel `Apologize’ to Turkey? Well, No, Not Exactly

By Barry Rubin

Israel apologizes to Turkey, reads every headline. That simply isn’t true in the sense it is taken to imply. To understand what happened one must examine the long negotiations on this issue.

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It is important to understand that the flotilla issue was not the cause of Israel-Turkish problems, which had begun long before. The real basis was the election of an Islamist government in Turkey. Discussions inside the Israeli government for years had known Prime Minister Mehdi Erdogan’s hatred for Israel but did not want to be seen as responsible for any breakdown of relations.

During the talks, Erdogan made three demands:

–Israel must apologize completely.

–Such an apology implies a legal responsibility to pay reparations.

–Erdogan insisted that Israel drop the embargo against the Gaza Strip.

Israel rejected these demands and instead offered:

–To say it regretted the clash and the loss of life. This is like saying: If I offended anyone I’m sorry.

–It offered to pay voluntarily, as a humanitarian gesture not as part of a guilty plea, the families of those killed.

–Israel rejected any change on its policy toward the Gaza Strip.

Erdogan angrily rejected Israel’s offer.

Now, a compromise has been reached, apparently with some help from President Barack Obama. The agreement, which includes restoring normal bilateral relations, has been portrayed as some sort of Israeli surrender.

That is simply not true. The agreement is much closer to Israel’s position. There is no change on Israel’s strategic policy toward the Gaza Strip at all. While the word “apology” appears in Netanyahu’s statement, it is notably directed at the Turkish people, not the government and is of the sorry if your feelings were hurt variety.

Moreover, Israel denied that it killed the Turkish citizens intentionally, a situation quite different from what Erdogan wanted, and offered to pay humanitarian assistance to families.

Should Israel have expressed regret when it should instead receive an apology from the Turkish government for helping to send terrorists to create a confrontation? On purely moral grounds, no. Yet as I pointed out Israel did not abandon its long-standing position on the issue. It does not want an antagonism with the Turkish people nor one that will continue long after Erdogan and his regime are long out of office. Perhaps this was undertaken to make Obama happy and in exchange for U.S. benefits. But what has happened is far more complex than onlookers seem to be realizing.

Perhaps these seeming word games and niceties are beyond the interest or comprehension of many people, but everyone involved directly on this issue knows exactly what is happening. Erdogan knows very well that this was not a Turkish victory—except in public relations– though Israel won’t object to letting it be claimed as such.

Israel acted to try to reduce the tension with Turkey but without any illusions that the Erdogan regime would now be friendly. Indeed, there were implications that Erdogan was breaking his commitment on the deal.

Immediately afterward, he said that a legal case against Israeli officers for alleged responsibility in the death of the Turks would continue and he was not yet sending back his ambassador to Israel. This might be posturing for a few hours or a real deal-breaker. We will see.

Obama’s role in this deal is not clear. (I have made clear to readers that I’m not just bashing Obama reflexively but I will also continue to analyze his actions as accurately as possible.) Did he put any pressure on Erdogan or Netranyahu? Did he promise either or both sides some benefits for making a deal? Not yet clear.

The danger is that this is the kind of arrangement that is all too common in the region. The media proclaim progress; the political leaders say what they want; but nothing changes in reality. One possibility is that Obama doesn’t understand (or doesn’t care) how deeply Erdogan’s anti-Israel feeling runs just as he doesn’t understand how deeply that is true for the Muslim Brotherhood.

Still, this deal is clearly in U.S. interests since it supposedly heals a rift between two countries that are close allies to itself in Washington’s eyes. As I said above, let’s see if this deal sticks or if there is any progress in fixing Israel-Turkey relations in the coming weeks.

—————-Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest book, Israel: An Introduction, has just been published by Yale University Press. Other recent books include The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center and of his blog, Rubin Reports. His original articles are published at PJMedia.

Professor Barry Rubin, Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center

The Rubin Report blog http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/

He is a featured columnist at PJM .

Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal Turkish Studies,http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~db=all~content=t713636933%22

Elliott Green Mar 23 10:53PM +0200

Barry, in the third paragraph from the end, you write Obama where I think

you meant Netanyahu.

I hope you’re right in that Netanyahu has made no strategic change. But

paying compensation suggests to other people, outside parties, that you are

admitting guilt.

via Israpundit » Blog Archive » Did Israel `Apologize’ to Turkey? Well, No, Not Exactly.

March 25, 2013
Dr. Josef Olmert: Obama, Turkey and Israel — More Than Meets the Eye

President Obama’s visit in Israel was a resounding PR success, judging by various indicators of Israeli public opinion, but as the dust settles, it becomes very clear that the visit was also an impressive diplomatic achievement. All the president’s men can feel satisfied by the decision of PM Netanyahu to terminate the crisis with Turkey, caused by the initial provocation of an Islamic organization and the disproportionate Israeli reaction, leading to the death of nine Islamic radicals.

The apology was long overdue, but better late than never. This blog called on the PM on September 21, 2012 to do just that, bearing in mind the overall strategic interest of Israel, particularly with regard to the deteriorating Syrian situation and its potential damaging implications.

Netanyahu, to his credit, chose his timing to do that — the Obama visit — thus responding to a long-held American expectation from Israel, providing the president with the ability to show actual positive results for the visit. Netanyahu acted in a way which is typical for Israeli governments, though not necessarily to his own, and that is to do what is in the best interest of Israel, but to present it as a gesture towards the U.S.

There are those who argue that he could and should do more of the kind also in the past, and in this way prevent some of the tensions which have become an all too familiar and undesirable feature of the relations between him and President Obama. Yet, what he did was gutsy, considering the Israeli political environment, and the deep-seated resistance there to admit any wrongdoing on the part of the IDF, which rightly continues to be revered by the vast majority of the Israeli people.

PM Erdoghan of Turkey has made his own political calculus, chief among them the fact that the enmity towards Israel being so much in display after the tragic Mavi Marmara incident, did not really pay dividends to Turkey — not in the U.S., not in the E.U., not even in the Arab world. Erdoghan learned that the Arabs are much more preoccupied with the implications of the Arab Spring, in particular the Syrian situation. The Turkish leader realized, while not admitting in public, that there still is a volume of Arab suspicions towards the Turks, a legacy of the centuries of Ottoman rule.

Whatever is the reason, the Turkish PM demonstrated yet again that he possesses qualities of real leadership, among them the ability to sense an opportunity for a change of diplomatic course and take advantage of it.

He is engaged now in a PR campaign in Turkey, designed to maximize the effects of what is presented as an Israeli defeat, whereas PM Netanyahu is engaged in his own campaign, designed to minimize the domestic ill effects of the apology, which for so long he regarded as a non-starter. But, it is in Washington where the White House can really claim a big victory. Two of the U.S.’ main regional allies were at each other’s throats, not a good situation for the U.S., particularly at a time of major regional instability, exactly the type of situation which requires closing of the ranks among the U.S. allies. The Administration was often criticized for what seemed to be a “come from behind” policy, leading to a considerable diminution of the U.S.’ stature in the region.

Well, not so fast. The U.S. proved again that it is the only power capable of bringing hostile parties together, and doing that in a patient way and exactly at the right time. And timing, as Winston Churchill once said, is 50 % of good diplomacy. Here is where the public announcements of the Americans, Turks and Israelis may give just part of the picture. The Israelis were more open to the former two, acknowledging in public that it was the situation in Syria which led to an Israeli adjustment, and made the apology inevitable. Turkish commentators are suggesting likewise, that Erdoghan’s main priority now is Syria, and certain moves by the Obama administration indicate that also the U.S. view the situation in Syria as a regional time bomb that needs to be dealt with and now, rather than on an unspecified date in the future. So is also the position of King Abdallah of Jordan, another valued American ally. The Saudis have already shown for a long while, that they want to see Bashar Assad out, and the soonest the best.

So, now, with the Israeli-Turkish rapprochement, the U.S. can finally cement a strategy about Syria, which can and will be supported by all its regional allies. Not good news for Bashar Assad, whose whereabouts are shredded with growing mystery. Yesterday there was buzz on Arabic Internet sites, according to which the besieged president was critically wounded in an attempt on his life.

The Al Shami hospital in Damascus was under siege, but as yet, these are unconfirmed reports. But the end is near and the regional implications could be devastating, clearly a potential nightmare for the U.S. and its allies. This is why the U.S. needed the Israelis and Turks to reconcile. The bad guys, the Iranians, so aware of their impending likely debacle once Assad is out, were quick to denounce the Israeli-Turkish new deal as another American machination, aimed at Syria.

Put aside their terminology, they may not be wrong. It is indeed the case, that the Syrian situation requires a coordinated American-led action. President Obama’s visit and diplomacy seem to have done exactly that.

via Dr. Josef Olmert: Obama, Turkey and Israel — More Than Meets the Eye.

March 25, 2013
Turkey sees accords with Israel, Kurds as first step to greater regional role

By Roy Gutman — McClatchy Newspapers

ISTANBUL, TURKEY — After two major breakthroughs in less than a week – an accord to end a three-year squabble with Israel and a landmark step by a jailed Kurdish leader to settle a 30-year insurgency – Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s star appears to be rising – and with it, Turkey’s role as a major regional power.

Erdogan, 59, a moderate Islamist and a former mayor of Istanbul, is described as a man of passion and plain speech, two characteristics that sometimes get him in trouble, such as when he recently equated Zionism with a crime against humanity.

He seemed matter-of-fact and serious on Saturday as he voiced hope that the Turkish-Israeli reconciliation that President Barack Obama brokered on Friday might even help resolve the Arab-Israeli dispute – though he also called for Israel to return to the borders that existed before its 1967 victory in the Six-Day War, something that Israeli officials have rejected previously.

“My wish is that common sense prevails in this process, and we make this process a permanent one, to end the years-long suffering, with (Israel’s) withdrawal to the 1967 borders,” he told reporters Saturday.

Israel, for the first time in memory, formally apologized for a military operation and promised compensation to families of eight Turks and one Turkish-American killed in the attack against the Mavi Marmara, an aid ship bringing supplies to civilians in Gaza in July 2010.

Erdogan avoided hyperbole as well on Thursday when Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed founder of the PKK guerrilla group, called for his followers to end their three-decade-long military campaign for Kurdish independence in favor of constitutional reform and political struggle. Erdogan termed the move, announced in a letter read before a crowd of 1 million Kurds, a “positive development.”

But close students of Turkish affairs say the twin events could be a turning point for both Turkey’s democracy and the Middle East region, as well as providing Erdogan, who became prime minister in 2003, a longer lease on power, possibly as popularly elected president under a new constitution.

“This is an extraordinarily important set of developments,” said James Jeffrey, who retired last year as U.S. ambassador to Iraq and served as U.S. envoy in Turkey before that. “It shows the capability of Turkey to be an extraordinary player in the region. They have reached these accords with folks they’ve been in conflict with, in one case a diplomatic conflict, in the other a guerrilla war.”

He expressed hope that Israel and Turkey would recognize the need for cooperation in addressing Iran’s nuclear program, which Israel is convinced will produce nuclear weapons, and in addressing Syria, which borders both Israel and Turkey and is now in the third year of a brutal civil war.

“Sooner or later, we’re going to have to do something about Syria,” Jeffrey said. Having Israel and Turkey talking to one another again may help the U.S. find a policy that satisfies both U.S. goals and those of Israel and Turkey, Jeffrey said.

Ahmet Davutoglu, the Turkish Foreign Minister, said the deal with Israel showed the value of Erdogan’s insistence on an apology for the Mavi Marmara incident.

“From the outset, we had a principled approach,” he said in a television interview. “This time Israel felt isolated in the process.” Without the apology, he said, “this issue would not have ended, even if it lasted for a century.”

While the Israel-Turkey reconciliation may have received more headlines abroad, in Turkey, the letter written by Ocalan from his prison on Imrali Island in the Sea of Marmara near Istanbul, got equal billing, and may be of even greater significance.

Davutoglu frequently compares the Kurdish insurgency to “shackles on our feet” and tells visitors: “Once we solve this problem, we will be unleashed from those shackles, and we will be able to use our full potential.”

Other officials have compared the insurgency, which has claimed an estimated 40,000 lives since it began in 1984, to a cancer. The end of the fighting, officials hope, will make Turkey a more attractive place for both investment and as a partner in regional political efforts.

“We will be rejuvenated in every sense,” was the way one official put it.

Davutoglu gave a hint of the optimism Turkish officials hold for the agreement in a visit he paid 10 days before the Ocalan letter was read to Diyarbikar, the mostly Kurdish city in southern Turkey. There, he spoke about the historic significance of reconciliation with the Kurds, who comprise a little less than one fifth of Turkey’s 80 million population.

He said the peoples of what is now Turkey were formed in several major historical waves dating back to the 3rd century B.C. “Whatever anybody says, wherever there is anyone with whom we share this common history, they are our relatives and those with whom we share our destiny,” he said in a speech at Dicli University. “That is also the main element if our foreign policy. When defining this we never differentiate between Turks, Kurds, Albanians or Bosnians. All these are peoples to which we are indebted by virtue of our shared history.”

And then he said reconciliation with the Kurdish minority would liberate Turkey to play a bigger role on the world stage.

“Just such a responsibility rests on our shoulders, my brothers,” he said. The restoration of peace in Turkey “will have a domino effect in other places,” he said. “The winds of the resolution process blowing in here with the spring breeze will result in great spring winds.”

Read more here:

March 24, 2013
Turkey wants to share its housing experience

JEDDAH: ABDUL HADI HABTOOR

Sunday 24 March 2013

Last Update 24 March 2013 2:32 am

Ali Babacan, deputy prime minister of Turkey, has said that relations between his country and Saudi Arabia are built on strong and solid historic and cultural foundations.

“Saudi Arabia and Turkey are working together side by side in numerous regional and international organizations within the framework of the G20 countries that form the largest economic bloc in the world,” he said in an interview.

Indicating that Turkish developers are keen on executing more infrastructural projects and housing in the Kingdom, he said: “The Turkish experience in building is based on the cooperation of the state and the private sector.” Buildings in this regard include houses for low-income families implemented by the private sector under the supervision of the government. The other is for middle class citizens but fully executed by the private sector.

“We take the needs of citizens into account as much as possible, in addition to environmental impact,” he said, adding that Saudi Arabia should adopt the most suitable model on both the financial and social levels. “The largest possible number of houses should be built at affordable prices for all classes of society.”

In the field of trade, he pointed out that exports from his country to the Kingdom stood at $ 3.3 billion against $ 4.8 billion in imports from Saudi Arabia. “Last year, volumes of commercial exchange increased by more than $ 1 billion,” he added.

He said the economic transformation of his country relied on long-term and highly transparent economic policy. “Political stability is a very important factor in this process,” he pointed out.

Babacan said that the projected Turkish economic growth is 4 percent this year, coupled with an increase in employment rates and exports to $ 158 billion.

Turkey recently approved regulations to allow foreign ownership of real estate and property. “Citizens of the GCC will benefit greatly from this regulation,” he said.

via Turkey wants to share its housing experience | ArabNews.

March 24, 2013
Israel Says Syria Reason for Restoring Turkey Ties

Concerns that Syria’s stockpile of chemical weapons could reach militant groups bordering Israel and Turkey was the motivating factor in restoring relations with Ankara after a three year rift, Israel’s prime minister said.

Benjamin Netanyahu wrote on his Facebook page Saturday that Israel and Turkey, which border Syria, need to communicate with each other over the Syrian crisis.

“The fact that the crisis in Syria intensifies from moment to moment was the main consideration in my view,” Netanyahu wrote.

Netanyahu phoned his Turkish counterpart Friday and apologized for a botched raid on a Gaza bound flotilla in 2010 that left eight Turks and one Turkish-American dead. Turkey demanded an apology as a condition for restoring ties. Netanyahu had until now refused to apologize, saying Israeli soldiers acted in self-defense after being attacked by activists.

Turkey and Israel were once strong allies but relations began decline after Erdogan, whose party has roots in Turkey’s Islamist movement, became prime minister in 2003. Erdogan has embarked on a campaign to make Turkey a regional powerhouse in an attempt to become the leading voice in the Muslim world, distanced from Israel.

Animosity increased after the flotilla incident and ambassadors were later withdrawn.

Spillover from fighting in Syria’s civil war reaches Israeli communities in the Golan Heights from time to time. Errant mortar shells and machine gun fire have caused damage, sparked fires and spread panic but lead to no injuries so far.

Israel has expressed concern that Syria’s chemical arsenal could fall into the hands of militants like Lebanon’s Hezbollah, an Assad ally, or an al-Qaida-linked group fighting with the rebels.

Netanyahu’s national security adviser, Yaakov Amidror, said the timing was right for reconciling with Turkey. “Between us and Turkey is a country that is falling apart and that has chemical weapons,” he said.

Last week, Syrian rebels and Assad’s government blamed each other for a chemical attack on a village. The U.S. said there was no evidence chemical weapons were used.

The use of such weapons would be a nightmare scenario in the two-year-old conflict that has killed an estimated 70,000 people.

President Barack Obama helped broker the Israeli apology to Turkey. Obama has declared the use, deployment or transfer of the weapons a “red line” for possible military intervention by the U.S. in the Syrian conflict.

via Israel Says Syria Reason for Restoring Turkey Ties – ABC News.

March 24, 2013
Israel is right to apologise to Turkey – though it leaves some Western commentators looking silly

Daniel Hannan

Daniel Hannan is a writer and journalist, and has been Conservative MEP for South East England since 1999. He speaks French and Spanish and loves Europe, but believes that the European Union is making its constituent nations poorer, less democratic and less free.

Israel is right to apologise to Turkey – though it leaves some Western commentators looking silly

By Daniel Hannan Politics Last updated: March 23rd, 2013

A good working relationship is essential for the region

Israelis like to say that they live in a tough neighbourhood, and it’s true. Since its foundation, the Jewish state has been surrounded by hostile dictatorships. The fact that, through all its wars, it remained a democracy – and a gloriously messy, disputatious, cussed democracy, at that – is little short of miraculous.

I remember, some years ago, seeing the place where the military authorities had originally placed part of the protective wall, and then the place to which it had been moved following a successful legal challenge. In how many Middle Eastern countries, I wondered, would the rule of law trump the generals’ decision?

In tough neighbourhoods, you need friends. For a long time, Israel was able to weather the antagonism of surrounding states because it had a workmanlike relationship with Egypt and an entente – it stopped short of being an alliance – with Turkey.

The worst foreign policy failure of the current government – a government which I broadly support – was to alienate these two countries in succession. In both cases, the rupture came about because of unplanned accidents of the sort that happen whenever soldiers are deployed. No one suggests that the Israeli government wanted its troops to shoot at Egyptian security forces, or to kill Turkish blockade-runners. In both cases, though, a swift and sincere apology would have helped smooth things over.

Instead, the Israeli authorities became prickly and defensive, refusing to admit any fault and privately claiming that the other side was looking for an excuse to break off links. In the case of Egypt, these claims might have had an element of truth, though a more emollient attitude would none the less have strengthened the hand of Cairo moderates and attracted the goodwill of neutrals. In the case of Turkey, Israel’s reaction was incomprehensible. Turkey, the region’s chief military power, was the first Muslim country to recognise the Israeli state, and the armed forces of the two countries had long enjoyed close relations. It is true that, for some years before the flotilla incident in 2010, Ankara had been critical of Israeli policy in Gaza. All the more reason, then, not to vindicate the arguments of Turkey’s most anti-Israel elements.

Binyamin Netanyahu deserves credit for having had the generosity and wisdom to correct his mistake. As the civil war in Syria drags on, Israel and Turkey have more reason than ever to work together. His apology has, inevitably, led to some Western writers complaining that the Israeli commandos who stormed the ship were victims rather than aggressors, but it is more than a little eccentric to keep insisting that there is nothing to apologise for when the Likud-led government has already apologised. Most of these writers perfunctorily tell us that Israel “shouldn’t be beyond criticism”; but, in practice, they never seem to allow such criticism.

Few subjects create such with-us-or-against us sentiment. Simply taking the line I have – that Israel is entitled to defend itself, that it has every right to respond militarily to the Hamas rocket attacks, but that it was wrong to attack a Turkish-flagged vessel in international waters – will convince both sides that I am against them: watch the comment thread that follows.

Israel needs to engage constructively with democratic forces in the region. It’s true that, in the cacophony that followed the Arab Spring, some previously suppressed anti-Israel voices dominated. But it is equally true that democracies tend to be less bellicose than dictatorships.

In the long run, Israel’s security lies in cleaning up the neighbourhood – evicting the anti-social louts, so to speak, and replacing them with hard-working families. It won’t be easy. Some of those families will have awkward views, and conversations across the garden fence will often be fraught. But at least the teenagers will no longer be throwing bottles at your house.

To put it more prosaically, Israel – like the West – needs to develop a decent working relationship with democratic Muslim parties. Repairing relations with Turkey was a vital first step.

Tags: AK Parti, Bibi Netanyahu, Erdogan, flotilla, Gaza

via Israel is right to apologise to Turkey – though it leaves some Western commentators looking silly – Telegraph Blogs.

March 24, 2013