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The lessons of Turkey’s role
By Roula Khalaf
Financial Times
The Middle East has been gripped by Erdogan mania. From Gaza to Tehran, Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been the man to admire, emulate and try to overtake.
Since Turkey’s prime
minister launched a verbal assault on Israel after the killing of nine Turkish pro-Palestinian activists in the Israeli raid on the Gaza-bound aid flotilla, he has captured the hearts and minds of people in the region. Mr
Erdogan has also thrust himself deep into the Middle East’s most intractable problems. Having been upstaged by Turkey, suddenly Iran also wants to organise a convoy of aid ships to Gaza. So, it seems, do its Lebanese allies in
Hizbollah.
The more cautious Syria, meanwhile, has tried to trade on non-Arab Turkey’s success, with Bashar al-Assad, its president, declaring on a trip to Turkey that “Arab blood and Turkish blood is the same”.
Egypt, which has been imposing its own blockade on Gaza, has been forced to loosen its grip, opening indefinitely the Rafah crossing into the isolated strip. The Muslim Brotherhood, the Egyptian Islamist group, wasted no time
in sending in a delegation.
It does not take much to be hailed as a hero in the Middle East – all one has to do is challenge Israel and stand up to the US. Mr Erdogan did both passionately: before the dust had settled on
its row with Israel, Ankara voted against imposing a new round of sanctions on Iran at the United Nations Security Council. Even Lebanon, where Hizbollah is a partner in the national unity government, abstained in the vote.
But it would be useful for those enamoured with Mr Erdogan to consider why he can afford to go where many of their own leaders fear to tread. Turkey is to be admired for its independence, its dynamic economy and its
thriving democracy, all of which most of the Arab world and Iran lack.
Indeed, Mr Erdogan’s Justice and Development party, whose Islamist heritage has brought it closer to its Arab neighbours, represents a model of how
Islamist parties can evolve into more moderate forces and integrate within modern political systems.
It is true that Mr Erdogan’s anti-Israeli stance in the wake of the flotilla disaster plays well to a domestic audience
and furthers his foreign policy agenda, consolidating Turkey’s newly established power status in the Middle East.
But Turkey’s ability to assert itself partly stems from its diversified relationships – close relations
with the US and strong military ties to Israel included – as much as on a willingness to offer itself as a mediator rather than a spoiler.
Unlike Iran and Syria, it has powerfully elevated the plight of Gaza on the
international stage without engaging in mischief. Some of those on the Mavi Marmara, the ship attacked by Israeli commandos, may have been hot-headed but they were not carrying weapons to Hamas, the Islamist group that controls
Gaza.
Moreover, Ankara does not depend on US aid, nor does its government need the comfort of American political and military support that help prop up some of its Arab neighbours.
For officials in the US and
Europe, watching Turkey’s independence complicate some of the most important problems on their agenda is disquieting. (In fact, Turkey’s attitude must give them a frightening taste of what the rest of the Middle East might look
like in the unlikely event of democratisation.)
Yet Mr Erdogan no doubt knows that he has to move carefully, and not allow the deterioration in relations with Israel and the US to undermine his broader ambitions,
including the ability to mediate in regional crises.
Surely his objective is to bring some accountability to Israeli actions, not to become the Jewish state’s enemy. That would be useful for the Middle East, and the Arab
world in particular. The region badly needs role models, but its people should want to look to Turkey for all the right reasons.
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