{"id":15120,"date":"2026-04-27T11:28:37","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T11:28:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/27\/turkey-israel-tensions-tom-barracks-middle-east-agenda-and-what-it-means-for-greece\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T11:28:37","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T11:28:37","slug":"turkey-israel-tensions-tom-barracks-middle-east-agenda-and-what-it-means-for-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/27\/turkey-israel-tensions-tom-barracks-middle-east-agenda-and-what-it-means-for-greece\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey-Israel tensions, Tom Barrack\u2019s Middle East agenda, and what it means for Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p>Over the past weeks those watching the Eastern Mediterranean can\u2019t help but notice that tensions are heating up between Turkey and Israel as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan\u2019s escalatory posture has some wondering what the wider risks are should this current war of words take on new dimensions. Questions range from what this will mean for US efforts to manage an already tense Middle East, to how this will impact Greece, which has developed close ties with Israel over the past decade and a half?<\/p>\n<p>Deciding that he needed to chime in, we heard some headscratching remarks from US Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, where he dismissed these tensions as \u201crhetoric\u201d, and added that \u201cTurkey is not a country to be messed with.\u201d These comments drew the criticism of many, including The Wall Street Journal, which accused Ambassador Barrack of undermining US policy and interests.<\/p>\n<p>Sinan Ciddi, Henri Barkey, and Vassilis Nedos join Thanos Davelis as we look into this escalating war of words in the Eastern Mediterranean between Turkey and Israel, break down how US Ambassador Tom Barrack is effectively pursuing his own Middle East policy that\u2019s undermining US interests, and discuss the wider impact of these developments for Greece.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This week we\u2019re also putting the spotlight on a founding member of HALC, Bill Matsikoudis, in our latest \u201cI am HALC\u201d segment. A successful attorney and founding partner of Matsikoudis &amp; Fanciullo, Bill\u2019s career has also seen him work in the Administration of New Jersey Governor James E. McGreevey, for Jersey City where he made headlines suing Fortune 500 companies guilty of polluting, and on Governor Mikie Sherrill\u2019s transition team for housing.<\/p>\n<p>A little more info on our guests:<\/p>\n<p>Ciddi is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and director of its Turkey program.<\/p>\n<p>Barkey is an adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and Emeritus Cohen chair in international relations at Lehigh University.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Nedos is Kathimerini\u2019s diplomatic and defense editor.<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"lazy lazy-hidden\" height=\"200px\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" seamless=\"\" data-lazy-type=\"iframe\" data-src=\"https:\/\/player.simplecast.com\/c24cc893-21c6-4c60-b623-a9362b82c93c?dark=false\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<noscript><iframe height=\"200px\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" seamless=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/player.simplecast.com\/c24cc893-21c6-4c60-b623-a9362b82c93c?dark=false\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<\/noscript><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script>\n        var NXFBPixelFunc = function () {\n            document.removeEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n            setTimeout(function () {\n                !function (f, b, e, v, n, t, s) {\n                    if (f.fbq) return;\n                    n = f.fbq = function () {\n                        n.callMethod ?\n                            n.callMethod.apply(n, arguments) : n.queue.push(arguments)\n                    };\n                    if (!f._fbq) f._fbq = n;\n                    n.push = n;\n                    n.loaded = !0;\n                    n.version = '2.0';\n                    n.queue = [];\n                    t = b.createElement(e);\n                    t.async = !0;\n                    t.src = v;\n                    s = b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n                    s.parentNode.insertBefore(t, s)\n                }(window, document, 'script',\n                    'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n                fbq('init', '109138906120213');\n                fbq('track', 'PageView');\n            }, 0)\n        };\n        document.addEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n    <\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/multimedia\/podcasts\/1302069\/turkey-israel-tensions-tom-barracks-middle-east-agenda-and-what-it-means-for-greece\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over the past weeks those watching the Eastern Mediterranean can\u2019t help but notice that tensions are heating up between Turkey and Israel as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan\u2019s escalatory posture has some wondering what the wider risks are should this current war of words take on new dimensions. Questions range from what this will mean for &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Turkey-Israel tensions, Tom Barrack\u2019s Middle East agenda, and what it means for Greece\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/27\/turkey-israel-tensions-tom-barracks-middle-east-agenda-and-what-it-means-for-greece\/#more-15120\" aria-label=\"Read more about Turkey-Israel tensions, Tom Barrack\u2019s Middle East agenda, and what it means for Greece\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15121,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/podcast_greek_current.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","no-featured-image-padding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15120\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}