Turkey: From Partnership to Imperialist Threat

Introduction

Turkey was the first Muslim state to recognize Israel, doing so in 1949. Kemal Atatürk’s republican state was looking for partners in the West, while Israel was seeking openings into the Muslim world. The relationship began cautiously and was largely confined to economic and diplomatic channels, but it grew stronger in the 1990s. Its high point came roughly between 1996 and 2008, when the relationship developed into a real partnership. The two countries signed military and security cooperation agreements: Israel supplied Turkey with advanced military technology, and Turkey allowed Israel to conduct training drills on its territory and in its airspace. Intelligence cooperation focused on shared threats—Hafez al-Assad’s Syria, Iran, and Kurdish separatism. Trade rose from $300 million a year in the 1990s to more than $1 billion in the early 2000s. Turkey viewed Israel as an essential partner against regional enemies, while Israel saw Turkey as an important bridge to Europe and the moderate Muslim world.

The change began after Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002. Erdoğan saw himself as a regional leader with an Islamic-Ottoman vision and began steering Turkish foreign policy toward support for the Palestinians and the Muslim Brotherhood. The first crisis came in 2008–2009, during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, when Erdoğan responded with harsh public condemnation of Israel. The crisis peaked on May 31, 2010, in the Mavi Marmara incident. Israeli naval commandos boarded a Turkish ship that was part of the Gaza flotilla. Armed activists from the Turkish IHH organization attacked the commandos, several of whom were wounded, while nine Turkish civilians and one American citizen were killed. Relations collapsed: ambassadors were recalled, military cooperation was almost completely halted, and Turkey became one of Israel’s fiercest critics at the United Nations and in international forums.

Repeated efforts to normalize relations did not restore a stable relationship. These included Israel’s apology in 2013, the reconciliation agreement in 2016, President Isaac Herzog’s visit to Ankara in 2022, and the renewed exchange of ambassadors. Turkey nevertheless continued to host Hamas figures, allow Hamas activity from its territory, and seek a deeper role in Jerusalem and in the Palestinian arena. The war in Gaza that followed the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, broke what remained of the relationship. Turkey became a refuge for Hamas leaders, provided the terrorist organization with logistical and political support, and accused Israel of genocide. Erdoğan compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Hitler, as Turkish rhetoric reached new levels of vitriol.

The Turkish threat intensified after the upheaval in Syria, Turkey’s entry into the country, and its efforts to extend its influence southward toward Israel. At the same time, Turkey is rapidly accelerating its force buildup, developing long-range ballistic missiles,[1] and working on plans for a civil nuclear program, [2] while also threatening Israel with direct military intervention. In April 2026, Erdoğan declared: “Just as we entered Karabakh and Libya, we will do the same to them [Israel].”[3] Turkey’s foreign minister described Israel as “a state that cannot live without an enemy”[4] and Turkish prosecutors filed indictments against Netanyahu and 34 other senior Israeli officials.[5]

This shift is not accidental. It reflects Erdoğan’s neo-Ottoman imperial ambitions, within which Israel is seen as a “foreign power” obstructing Turkish control in the eastern Mediterranean, Syria, Libya, and the Islamic sphere. Turkey ruled the Land of Israel for roughly 400 years as part of the Ottoman Empire and now views the establishment and rise of the State of Israel as a “historical distortion” that must be corrected. Inspired by former Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoğlu’s doctrine of “strategic depth,” Erdoğan and his advisers seek to make Turkey the “landlord” of the greater Middle East: a regional power controlling trade routes, energy resources, and the political-Islamic arena.

Turkey’s challenge to Israel is already reflected in policy, not only in rhetoric: it includes support for anti-Israel measures, an economic boycott (despite continued indirect trade), efforts to bring Israel before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, and military interventions in areas where Israel operates. Israel has tried to avoid unnecessary escalation but seeks to limit Turkish ambitions through regional partnerships with Greece and Cyprus and through a proposed India–Europe land trade corridor centered on Israel and excluding Turkey. The result is a new threat environment in which an industrialized, aggressive, radical Sunni power now threatens Israel’s security and regional stability.

Against this backdrop, the article traces the development of the Turkish threat through its force buildup, nuclear ambitions, and political activity in the regional and international arenas. Turkey’s conduct requires Israel to formulate a multilayered response focused on the intelligence, military, diplomatic, and economic dimensions, and to understand the process now driving the renewed Ottoman challenge in the twenty-first century.

Neo-Ottomanism as a Long-Term Driver

The Turkish threat to Israel is not rooted only in a temporary clash of interests or in political rhetoric. It rests on a deeper ideology: neo-Ottomanism. Since the early 2000s, scholars and critics of Turkish foreign policy have used the term to describe Ankara’s ambition to restore Turkey’s status as a dominant regional power drawing inspiration from the Ottoman Empire, which for more than 600 years ruled vast territories stretching from the Balkans through the Middle East and North Africa to the Caucasus.

Neo-Ottomanism does not seek classic territorial conquest in the manner of the sultans. Its aim is to project economic, cultural, religious, and military influence across the former spaces of the Ottoman Empire. The leading ideological architect of this vision was Ahmet Davutoğlu, a close adviser to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and a former foreign minister, who published Strategic Depth: Turkey’s International Position in 2001. Davutoğlu argued that Turkey should use its geography, historical legacy, and cultural-religious ties to become the hegemon of the Middle East. Erdoğan embraced the idea and turned it from a theoretical doctrine into active foreign policy. Where Kemal Atatürk saw Turkey as a secular, Western-oriented state that should break with its Ottoman-Islamic past, Erdoğan’s “New Turkey” fuses Turkish nationalism with political Islamism in pursuit of restoring “Ottoman glory”.[6]

Ankara’s neo-Ottoman ambitions have taken the form of broad, sustained military intervention, combined with the use of proxies and economic diplomacy. Since 2016, Turkey has invaded Syria several times, including in Operations Euphrates Shield, Olive Branch, and Peace Spring. It has established security zones in northern Syria, controls millions of Syrian refugees on its territory, and operates some 80 military bases in northwestern Syria with more than 20,000 troops.[7] After the Assad regime fell in December 2024, Turkey strengthened its presence in Syria and began promoting a maritime agreement with the new government, similar to its agreement with Libya.[8] These moves serve not only the campaign against the Kurds, but also a broader vision of controlling trade routes and territories once ruled by the Ottoman empire. Turkey is seeking to create a land route from the Persian Gulf to Europe that would serve as an alternative to the route Israel is trying to promote.

Turkey’s intervention in Libya began in 2019–2020, when it sent forces, military advisers, and air support to the Government of National Accord in Tripoli, rescuing it from the advance of Khalifa Haftar’s forces. In December 2025, the Turkish parliament extended the military mandate in Libya through 2028, including the deployment of air defense systems and training for local forces. Turkey uses this presence to control migration routes and energy resources and to advance its claims to maritime sovereign rights in the eastern Mediterranean. These claims are integral to the “Blue Homeland” doctrine (Mavi Vatan), which treats the Mediterranean as a Turkish space. Turkey rejects the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), declares broad maritime zones in the eastern Mediterranean to be its own, and threatens Israeli, Greek, and Cypriot gas exploration. The 2019 maritime agreement with Libya, and efforts to produce a similar agreement with Syria, reflect a view of the Mediterranean as “historic Turkish territory” that must be restored to its rightful owners.

Turkey is preparing legislation in the Turkish parliament (TBMM) that would anchor its maritime sovereignty claims in the Mediterranean and the Aegean within domestic law as part of the “Blue Homeland” doctrine. The proposed “Turkish Maritime Jurisdiction Areas Law” would regulate Turkey’s territorial waters and continental shelf, extending up to 200 nautical miles from the coast. It would also empower the president to declare maritime zones with special status, in which any economic, scientific, or environmental activity—including drilling, fishing, and research—would require Turkish approval.[9]

In the Caucasus, Turkey’s military and air support for Azerbaijan, alongside Israeli assistance, helped bring victory over Armenia in the Nagorno-Karabakh wars of 2020 and 2023 and weakened Russian influence in the region. Beyond its immediate military impact, the Azerbaijani victory also advanced Turkey’s vision of Turkic unity. The Organization of Turkic States gives that vision an institutional framework, with Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan promoting military cooperation that includes planned joint exercises, some of them already taking place in 2026.[10]

Turkey’s drive for expansion and influence extends well beyond the Middle East. It has built military bases in Somalia, where TURKSOM is its largest base outside Turkey, as well as in Qatar and Libya. It has also signed defense agreements with countries in Africa, including Chad, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Ghana; in the Balkans, including Albania; and even in Latin America. Somalia illustrates the model: under agreements signed in 2024–2025, Turkey manages an exclusive economic zone there, including revenue sharing from fishing and oil, with 30 percent going to Turkey, while also operating drilling vessels for oil and gas exploration and conducting maritime patrols.[11] In Albania, Turkey promotes Ottoman culture through the TİKA agency and the Directorate of Religious Affairs.

In relation to Israel, this outlook places the Jewish state at the center of Turkey’s threat perception. Israel is seen as a “foreign power” that obstructs Turkish control in the Mediterranean basin, Syria, and the Islamic sphere. Because the State of Israel was established on territory that once belonged to the historic Ottoman Empire, its very creation is viewed as a “historical distortion.” Turkey’s support for Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Muslim Brotherhood fits into this broader struggle against Israel. Erdoğan has described Israel’s policy as one of “expansionism” that is the “main security threat to the region.” He has even threatened military intervention against it.[12]

Turkey’s neo-Ottoman vision remains a central driver of its policy despite mounting economic pressure, tensions with NATO allies, and regional opposition. From Israel’s perspective, this poses a long-term threat. It is a threat that is not merely rhetorical; it seeks to alter the balance of power across the region. Before Operation Roaring Lion, Turkey joined Saudi Arabia and Qatar in an alignment with Iran designed to prevent a U.S. military operation against Tehran. That alignment reflected a Turkish interest in preventing both Israel’s further strengthening and any weakening of Iran severe enough to threaten the survival of the Islamic regime. The authors discuss this issue at length in their article on the Sunni-Shiite axis.[13]

Nuclear Ambitions and Accelerated Force Buildup

The most troubling aspect of Turkey’s imperial ambitions is the combination of its rapid force buildup and its increasingly open nuclear aspirations. Ankara continues to describe its nuclear program as purely civilian, but the rhetoric of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, together with major investments in nuclear infrastructure and long-range missiles, points to an effort to turn Turkey into a nuclear-threshold state similar to Iran: a country with the knowledge, infrastructure, and production capacity needed to develop nuclear weapons within a relatively short time. Erdoğan gave early expression to this ambition in 2019, when he said publicly: “Some countries have nuclear warheads, but we cannot have them. I cannot accept this.”[14] In July 2025, he repeated the message, this time directly referencing Israel: “I do not accept that Israel is the only country in the region with nuclear weapons.” In June 2025, Erdoğan issued a presidential decree expanding medium- and long-range missile production, a step that could support future integration between ballistic missile delivery systems and nuclear warhead capabilities. In February 2026, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan warned that if Iran obtains nuclear weapons, Turkey “could be dragged into a regional nuclear arms race”.[15] A poll published in Turkey in July 2025 showed that 71 percent of the Turkish public supports developing a national nuclear weapon.[16]

The technological base for these ambitions is the Akkuyu nuclear power plant, whose first unit is expected to begin commercial operation in 2026. Built with Russia’s Rosatom under a BOT (build, operate, transfer) model, the project gives Turkey broad technological knowledge in civilian nuclear energy, fuel-cycle activity, and the training of experts and engineers. That expertise could, of course, provide the human and technological infrastructure for a military nuclear program.

Turkey is also accelerating its force buildup across the board. Its combined defense and internal security budget for 2026 stands at approximately $27.34 billion, a 30 percent increase over the previous year.[17] TheStockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) put Turkish military spending in 2025 at $30 billion, making Turkey the world’s eighteenth-largest military spender.[18] This buildup is taking place despite Turkey’s severe economic difficulties with rising unemployment and inflation, the collapse of the Turkish lira, shrinking foreign currency reserves, and the flight of foreign investors.[19]

Domestic production is the most striking achievement in Turkey’s defense buildup, passing the 80 percent threshold in 2026. The defense industry now includes more than 3,500 companies, employs over 100,000 people directly, and generates annual revenues of more than $20 billion. Exports of weapons systems and aerospace products reached a record of more than $10 billion in 2025, 48 percent higher than in 2024. At the SAHA international defense and aerospace exhibition in Istanbul in May 2026, Turkish companies signed nearly $8 billion in contracts in the first three days alone. The target for 2026 is $11 billion, which would place Turkey among the world’s ten largest arms exporters.[20] Turkey’s main defense exports are UAVs, missiles and rockets, armored fighting vehicles, electronic warfare systems, radar, and communications systems, along with naval platforms.[21]

Turkey’s pursuit of defense autonomy is also evident in its purchase of S-400 systems from Russia despite U.S. sanctions and in its independent development of domestic air defense systems, including a Turkish “Steel Dome.” It has signed roughly 100 international defense agreements and markets weapons to 185 countries, including in Africa, Asia, and the Balkans, turning military power into a diplomatic lever.

For Israel, this buildup has direct strategic implications. Long-range missiles, advanced UAVs, and a potential nuclear infrastructure are turning Turkey into an industrialized, aggressive, radical Sunni power that threatens not only regional stability but also Israel’s military superiority in the Mediterranean basin. By May 2026, Turkey is no longer merely a former “strategic partner.” It is an emerging military power that views Israel as a central obstacle to the neo-Ottoman vision. Its accelerated force buildup and nuclear ambitions are not solely instruments of self-defense; they are tools for pursuing an imperial project for which Israel must prepare.

How Israel Should Respond

Israel’s updated security concept must account for developments in Turkey. The emerging Turkish threat calls for a multilayered response: diplomacy, stronger military and intelligence capabilities, competing regional alliances, and preparations for both direct and indirect conflict scenarios.

Israel has begun responding to Turkey’s inflammatory rhetoric. In a post on X, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wrote: “Israel under my leadership will continue to fight Iran’s terror regime and its proxies, unlike Erdoğan who accommodates them and massacred his own Kurdish citizens.” The defense minister, for his part, called Erdoğan a “paper tiger” and “a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, who massacres Kurds…”[22]

The main diplomatic channel for restraining Turkish ambition and rhetoric runs through Washington. Turkey is a NATO member with close, if tense, relations with the United States, and Washington’s leverage over Ankara is limited, especially given President Trump’s apparent esteem and personal warmth toward Erdoğan and the positive view of Turkey projected by the U.S. ambassador in Ankara. Even so, the U.S. administration has a strong interest in preventing Israeli-Turkish tensions, above all in averting a military confrontation between the two countries and ensuring that Turkish policy does not deepen instability in the region and beyond it.

The American lever is important but it is also limited. Israel also needs stronger alliances with Turkey’s neighbors, which view Ankara as a primary threat. The Israel-Greece-Cyprus trilateral alliance should therefore be deepened, including military cooperation among the three countries. In December 2025, Israel, Greece, and Cyprus signed a trilateral military work plan for 2026 that includes expanded joint air and naval exercises, knowledge-sharing, and the establishment of a 2,500-soldier rapid response force.[23] The Noble Dina maritime exercise, which in addition to Israel, Greece, and Cyprus, also included the United States and French navies, is an annual drill, and the three countries also regularly carry out joint activities in the Mediterranean basin.[24]

Israel should also deepen the Abraham Accords and the emerging trade agreements connected to IMEC, the India–Middle East–Europe Corridor, which is a central tool for bypassing Turkey. Although the War of Redemption, including the campaigns in Gaza and Iran, caused temporary delays, the project is moving forward in 2026 through plans for railways, ports, and energy infrastructure linking India, the Gulf states, Israel, and Europe. This will reduce dependence on Turkish routes and strengthen economic partnerships. Cooperation with Abraham Accords countries already includes intelligence sharing, arms procurement, and exercises, serving as a bulwark against Turkish influence in Africa and Asia. Israel is also strengthening ties with Kurdish actors and other anti-Turkish forces in the region. Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz during the war further underscores the need to advance the project and to include additional options for transporting oil from the Arabian Peninsula to Europe.

Turkey now needs to be incorporated into Israel’s benchmark threat scenarios, with force buildup adjusted accordingly. It also requires deeper intelligence collection and capabilities for dealing with a range of indirect and direct Turkish intervention scenarios, including, for example, possible intervention from Syria, as well as a response to Turkey’s force buildup in UAVs and drones. The central objective should be to preserve Israel’s air and technological superiority in the face of Turkey’s military buildup.

At the same time, tensions with Turkey should be seen as an opportunity to strengthen Israel’s standing and make it a regional magnet. A combination of power, diplomacy, and alliances can help ensure that the neo-Ottoman vision is not realized at Israel’s expense.

Conclusion

The deterioration in Israel–Turkey relations is not a temporary crisis, but part of a deeper historical process in which Turkey’s state identity has changed. A country that once viewed Israel as an ally against common enemies now sees it as a central obstacle to the restoration of Turkey’s regional-power status. The relationship has moved from “practical partnership” to “imperial competition.”

The article’s central insight is that the Turkish threat does not stem primarily from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but from a broader ambition to revise the geopolitical order created after World War I. Neo-Ottomanism is not empty nostalgia; it is a systematic program of action that combines military power, economics, culture, and religion. Its aim is to marginalize Israel by surrounding it with a ring of influence, cutting it off from energy routes, and preventing it from becoming a dominant player in the Middle East.

The most dramatic development may be the combination of Turkey’s accelerated force buildup and its nuclear ambitions. Turkey is no longer a developing country seeking security; it is an industrialized power that aspires to break what it sees as Israel’s regional nuclear monopoly. With 71 percent of the Turkish public supporting the acquisition of nuclear weapons, a new regional arms race is taking shape. Turkey in 2026 is not “Iran Two,” but something more dangerous: an Iran with a more advanced industrial base, a larger economy, and membership in NATO.

For Israel, Turkey has become a long-term threat that requires a rethinking of Israel’s security doctrine. In response, Israel must build a network of alliances that isolates Turkey. The opportunity lies within the crisis itself: tensions with Ankara are accelerating the formation of a “new Middle Eastern alliance”—a Greek-Cypriot-Israeli-Indian-Arab axis that could turn Israel into an essential regional hub. The state that seeks to become the “hegemon” of the Middle East may ultimately find itself left out, while Israel strengthens its position as a gateway to Europe and the West.

The Turkish threat ultimately requires Israel to reassess how it sees itself: not as a small state surrounded by enemies, but as a regional power that must use force, judgment, and long-term vision. The new Ottomanism is not inevitable. It is a challenge that, if handled properly, can become a catalyst for strengthening Israel’s power in the twenty-first century. That reassessment is necessary and should take place soon, because preparing for the emerging threat will require extensive diplomatic and military action. With its imperial ambitions, Turkey could become the new Iran: a power that surrounds Israel with a commercial and military stranglehold, replacing the Iranian “ring of fire” that Israel has been dismantling over the past two years.

[1] Agnes Helou, “Turkey Rolls Out Intercontinental Missile with Purported 6,000km Range,” Breaking Defense, May 6, 2026.

[2] Naama Lazimi, “Erdoğan Is Moving Rapidly Closer: The Nuclear Danger We Must Not Underestimate,” Israel Hayom, February 3, 2026 (Hebrew).

[3] Asbarez Staff, “‘Just Like We Entered Karabakh’: Erdoğan Threatens Military Action against Israel,” Asbarez, April 12, 2026.

[4] “Fidan: ‘Israel Cannot Live without an Enemy’ and Seeks to Declare Turkey as One,” PressTV, April 13, 2026.

[5] Nurbanu Tanrıkulu Kızıl, “Türkiye Completes Indictment over Israeli Raid on Gaza-Bound Aid Flotilla,” Daily Sabah, April 10, 2026.

[6] Nicholas Kitchen, ed., Special Report: Turkey’s Global Strategy, International Affairs, Diplomacy & Strategy, London School of Economics, May 2011.

[7] “Turkish Operations Stamp Out Terrorism to Near Extinction in N. Syria,” Daily Sabah, November 28, 2022.

[9] Firat Kozok and Selcan Hacaoglu, “Turkey Plan for Maritime Areas May Fuel Mediterranean Tensions,” Bloomberg, May 8, 2026.

[10] Organization of Turkic States, “Declaration of the Tenth Summit of the Organization of Turkic States,” Astana, Kazakhstan, 2023, https://www.turkicstates.org/assets/pdf/haberler/astana-declaration-3113-215.pdf

[11] Kiran Baez, “Turkey Signed Two Major Deals with Somalia. Will It Be Able to Implement Them?” Atlantic Council, June 18, 2024.

[12] Asbarez Staff, “‘Just Like We Entered Karabakh’: Erdoğan Threatens Military Action against Israel,” Asbarez, April 12, 2026.

[13] Gabi Siboni and Erez Winner, “The

Emerging Axis: Sunni and Shiite Alignment against Israel, and a ‘New Iran’” JISS, February 25, 2026 (Hebrew).

[15] Alestiklal, “Turkey’s Nuclear Weapons after Iran: Why They Alarm ‘Israel’s’ Far Right,” July 9, 2025.

[16] “Poll: 71% of Turks Want Nuclear Weapons as Security Concerns Mount,” Caliber, July 18, 2025.

[17] Cem Devrim Yaylali, “Turkey Begins 2026 with Defense-Spending Numbers Trending Up,” Defense News, January 8, 2026.

[18] SIPRI, “Global Military Spending Rise Continues as European and Asian Expenditures Surge,” April 27, 2026.

[19] “Turkey Is Collapsing: Flights Are Canceled, Citizens Cannot Afford Bread,” Maariv, May 2, 2026 (Hebrew).

[20] “Turkish Defense Firms Clinch $8B in Deals in First Days of SAHA Expo,” Daily Sabah, May 8, 2026.

[21] Mathew George, Katarina Djokic, Zain Hussain, Pieter D. Wezeman, and Siemon T. Wezeman, Trends in International Arms Transfers, 2025, SIPRI, March 2026.

[22] Roi Shusha, “Minister Katz against Hostile Erdoğan: ‘A Paper Tiger Who Massacres Kurds—He Should Sit Quietly,’” 0404, April 11, 2026 (Hebrew).

[23] Yoav Zitun, “IDF: Joint Work Plan Signed with the Greek and Cypriot Militaries,” Ynet, December 28, 2026 (Hebrew).

See also Tobias Holcman, “Greece, Israel, Cyprus Working on 2,500-Strong Force for Mediterranean Defense—Report,” The Jerusalem Post, December 18, 2025.

[24] “Cyprus, Greece and Israel Quietly Strengthen Their Mediterranean Alliance,” The Maritime Executive, December 31, 2025.

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