In the 1930s the founder of the young Republic of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, was swinging back and forth between two worlds: the West (which literally meant Europe symbolizing modernization) and the East (which necessarily spelled the Soviet Union. The new leader of the regime, former President Ismet Inönü, managed to keep the country out of the second European war (which, like the first one, turned into a “world” war eventually) and took the side of the new representative of the West, the United States.
This move was not totally new for Turks; even during and after World War I, there were popular initiatives to ask former U.S. President Woodrow Wilson to accept Turkey under its protection, but Wilson had other plans for Turkey: dismembering it and creating a greater Armenia and a unified Kurdistan instead. Moreover, later Wilson would transport the Greek invasion army to Turkey.
Turkey's symbolic entrance into World War II on the side of the Allies in 1945 helped it to become a charter member of the United Nations. The Soviet demands for military bases in the Turkish Straits – which, by the way, had never been documented – provided the basis for the Truman Doctrine in 1947: The U.S. guaranteed the security of Turkey and Greece, and Turkey willingly rushed to Korea to help the American forces. As a result, Turkey joined NATO and became the first Muslim country to recognize the state of Israel in March 1949.
The Ottoman Empire had helped Jews to survive the Spanish massacres in the 14th and 15th centuries and helped them to migrate to the Balkans. Following the Russian persecutions of Jews in the early 20th century, Zionist leader Theodor Herzl even asked Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II to allow Jews to acquire Palestine, which resulted in a massive Jewish return to the Holy Land.
Jews, as well as Arabs and other ethnic and religious minorities of the empire, enjoyed their religious and judicial autonomy in the Balkans and Palestine. Thus, the Jews became passionately loyal to the Ottomans.
Enter Sir Lawrence of Arabia and his handler Gertrude Margaret Bell to the stage. With them not only Jews and Arabs but every other minority, no matter how minor they are, became passionately anti-Ottoman and pro-independence.
The British had skillfully managed to use the idea of a prospective “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine to garner the popular support “for involvement against isolationism” in the U.S. since 1917.
Despite the presence of several Jewish espionage spy networks fighting the Ottomans, the young Turkish republic didn’t have any other chance then to forgive the Jewish terrorism against the Ottomans. The country forgave but did it not forget: It voted against the U.N. Partition Plan for Palestine; however, Turkey recognized the state of Israel. Its first diplomatic mission was a legation, and even that was downgraded to the level of charge d’Affaires after the Suez Crisis in November 1956 when Israel invaded Egypt after it nationalized the Suez Canal.
Since then, Turkey-Israel relations had many ups and downs to say the least. After the Israeli occupation of Arab lands in 1967, almost all Turkish governments kept the relationship at a minimum.
Upon Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem and enunciation of Jerusalem as its eternal capital, the representation was relegated to the level of second secretary in 1980.
In 2005 then-Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited Israel offering to serve as a Middle East peace mediator and looking to build up trade and military ties.
Two years later, Israeli President Shimon Peres visited Turkey and addressed the Turkish Parliament. Another guest of Turkey at that time was the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas who was on the same podium the next day.
Turkey always hoped that those diplomatic initiatives would further Israeli-Palestinian dialogue and that Israel would start seeing Palestinians as their partners in peace.
But a couple of months later, Israel started what it calls the Operation Cast Lead and what the Muslim world calls the Gaza massacre. Two years later came the Gaza flotilla raid in which nine Turkish aid workers were killed by Israeli troops raiding the Mavi Marmara, a charity ship flying a Turkish flag.
There have been some reconciliation efforts since then. For instance, in 2013, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and apologized for the Gaza flotilla incident.
A reconciliation agreement was announced on June 27, 2016, to end the six-year rift in the relations between both countries. Yet, Israel, never heeding the meaning of that agreement with Turkey, killed 12 Palestinians on the Gaza border.
Erdoğan emphasized that last week, saying, the people-to-people relationship between the two countries would have no problems should the Israeli politicians see Turkey’s redlines regarding the rights of the Palestinian people.
One point where they should coordinate their policies is concerning the fact that Israel has moral obligations to the Palestinians.
Sometimes a strong message is the one given in confidence. Good ties with Israel, we learned, are not necessarily “good” or “bad” in themselves. But good ties are the only tool to build that confidence-inducing environment between the two countries.
