Officials from Türkiye and Israel have held their first meeting in Azerbaijan to avoid a conflict in Syria, according to the Turkish Defense Ministry.
“The first technical meeting was held on Wednesday in Azerbaijan to discuss a conflict prevention mechanism between Türkiye and Israel to avoid unwanted incidents in Syria,” the ministry said Thursday.
It added that Ankara urges Israel to “immediately halt provocative attacks that threaten Syria's territorial integrity and destabilize its security.”
“To ensure regional security, Israel must abandon its expansionist, occupying stance, and the international community must prevent this unlawfulness,” the ministry said.
The statement came a day after Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan assured that Türkiye had “no intention to enter into conflict with any countries, not with Israel or any other country” in Syria.
Since the fall of the Assad regime in Syria late last year, Israel and Türkiye have been trading barbs over their presence in the country.
Ankara has had troops in northern Syria backing anti-regime forces and fighting terrorist groups, while Israel fears that Syria's new leadership will pose a new threat along its border.
Ankara has since taken over a buffer zone in Syrian territory and said it will remain there indefinitely until new security arrangements are made. Israeli forces have struck the region for weeks now.
Türkiye has called the Israeli strikes an encroachment on Syrian territories, warning of “greater instability and insecurity” across the Middle East, while Israel has said it would not allow any “hostile” forces in Syria.
Israel claims the Turkish presence in Syria is a “danger to Israel.”
Turkish-Israeli ties have long been frosty and deteriorated further over the war in Gaza.
NATO member Türkiye has been a fierce critic of Israel over its attacks on Gaza since 2023, saying they amount to genocide against the Palestinians and has applied to join a case at the World Court against Israel while also halting all trade.
“Israel's activities in the West Bank and continued attacks on neighboring countries are harming regional stability and peace,” the ministry said Thursday.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has also branded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the “Butcher of Gaza,” prompting angry reactions from Israeli officials.
As he visited Washington earlier this week, Netanyahu sought to hear support from his stalwart ally, U.S. President Donald Trump, against a country Israel perceives as “hostile.”
Instead, Trump lavished praise on Erdoğan, positioned himself as a possible mediator between the countries and urged Netanyahu to be "reasonable" in his dealings with the country.
"If you have a problem with Turkey, I really think you're going to be able to work it out. You know, I have a very, very good relationship with Turkey and with their leader, and I think we'll be able to work it out. So I hope that's not going to be a problem,” Trump told Netanyahu.
Trump also described Erdoğan as "a tough guy, and he's very smart, and he did something that nobody was able to do," referring to earlier remarks in which he said he believes "it was Turkey" that orchestrated the downfall of Assad.
Speaking to a Turkish broadcaster on Wednesday, Fidan also warned Ankara “cannot remain a bystander if instability emerges in a neighboring country that will pose a threat” to Türkiye.
He said that trying to take preemptive measures based on speculative assumptions, as Israel is doing, only leads to provocation.
To prevent Israel from fueling greater insecurity in the region, Türkiye “must act proactively – through diplomacy and other measures – to contain this crisis before it escalates further," Fidan said.
Noting that Israel has been carrying out systematic military strikes since Dec. 8, targeting Syrian military infrastructure, Fidan said these strikes are part of a deliberate strategy to prevent the new Syrian administration and armed forces from inheriting any operational capability following the departure of Assad.
"Türkiye's sole purpose is to ensure Syria's territorial integrity, stability and security and to help cleanse it of terrorism,” Defense Ministry spokesperson Zeki Aktürk told reporters in Ankara.
He also announced that a total of 18 PKK/YPG terrorists were eliminated in northern Syria and Iraq in the past week.
Turkish security forces also seized a large number of weapons, munitions and living materials at terrorists' hideouts in the mountainous regions of Iraq, where the terrorist group has a stronghold.
In its nearly 40-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK, listed as a terror organization by Türkiye, the U.S., and the EU, has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 victims, including women, children and infants.
The YPG/PYD, which also uses the name SDF, is the PKK’s Syrian offshoot.
PKK terrorists often hide out in northern Iraq to plot cross-border attacks in Türkiye. At the same time, the YPG/PYD has tried to establish a terror corridor in northern Syria along Türkiye’s borders.
“A total of 555 PKK/YPG terrorists have been eliminated in northern Iraq and Syria since Jan. 1 this year,” Aktürk informed.
When asked about the claims that the PKK/YPG has withdrawn from Aleppo and Tishrin Dam, the ministry sources pointed out the “importance of the agreement made between the YPG and the Syrian government in the field."
“Türkiye is therefore meticulously following the issues regarding the withdrawal of the PKK/YPG from Aleppo and Tishrin Dam and their transfer to the Syrian government,” the sources said.
The first convoy of the PKK/YPG withdrew from the northern city of Aleppo toward the eastern Euphrates region last Friday under the supervision of the Syrian Defense Ministry, state-run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported.
Aleppo witnessed a prisoner exchange between internal security forces and the SDF, marking the beginning of "prison clearing," with approximately 250 prisoners released.
Earlier in March, the Syrian presidency announced the signing of an agreement to integrate the SDF into state institutions, reaffirming the country's territorial unity and rejecting any attempts at division.
The agreements also come as PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan last month called on his group to lay down arms and dissolve in what would mark the end of more than four decades of the PKK’s campaign of terrorism targeting Türkiye.
