Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference in Ankara, Turkey, on March 12, 2025. [Necati Savas/EPA]
On March 29, the last day of Ramadan, at the Grand Camlica Mosque in the Uskudar district on the Asian side of Istanbul, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addressed the faithful and expressed a wish: “May Allah, for the sake of his name ‘Al-Qahhar,’ destroy and devastate Zionist Israel.” And the faithful responded, “Amen.”
Coincidentally, on the same day, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was visiting Jerusalem, where he held talks with his counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who described the relations between the two countries as “strategic.”
Late Wednesday night, Israeli fighter jets bombed three military bases in Syria, where Turkey plans to install Russian S-400 anti-aircraft missiles. This is happening in the shifting sands of the Middle East, where Mitsotakis is actively attempting, as much as possible, to strengthen his relations with Israel to offset Ankara’s pressure on Greece and the wider Eastern Mediterranean.
If this is indeed the “Great Game” of Greek diplomacy, in the current context of a general reversal of everything we know, which began with the return of US President Donald Trump to power, then it is worth noting that Ankara made no comment about Mitsotakis’ visit to Jerusalem.
President Erdogan would never discuss the possibility of transferring the S-400 to Syria with Israel, because he simply does not recognize Netanyahu as a premier with a hegemonic role in the region. But neither would any of the Arab leaders, despite the differences – historical and not only – with Ankara. It is an issue for Ankara to negotiate with Russia and the US.
In his invocation to the “Almighty,” during which Erdogan deemed it appropriate to use a word from the Quran, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar reacted by arguing that the Turkish president “has revealed his antisemitic face.” Except that the Ottomans or the Kemalists later on were never antisemites. It’s Netanyahu that Erdogan despises.
In times of chaotic fluidity, it is true that analysts abound. Some of them argue that Israel’s attack on Syrian air defense bases aims to control the airspace of the region with Iran as the ultimate goal. Except that such an undertaking is unthinkable without the involvement of the United States.
President Trump is a staunch supporter of Israel, but not Netanyahu’s puppet. And of course the Middle East is one of the issues that Moscow and Washington are discussing. It is an extremely complicated situation to engage in divination.