Syria’s new president Ahmed al-Sharaa met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday, a momentous meeting. It is the second trip Sharaa has taken abroad since he was declared the new president of Syria, after he toppled the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad on December 8. It took a month and a half to decide that he would serve as official president in the transition. Sharaa focused until now on meetings with foreign delegations; now that he is president, he is traveling abroad.
While Syria-Turkey ties have many facets, any new Turkish initiative in Syria could raise eyebrows in Israel and across the region. If Turkey does sign some kind of defense agreement with Damascus in which Ankara receives more use of Syria’s airspace, or deploys air defenses and moves more forces into Syria, this will extend Ankara’s sphere of influence.
It could even put that influence closer to the Golan Heights, which could lead to friction with Israel. Turkey is already one of the most hostile countries to Israel – in public statements and its backing of Hamas, while Qatar, which also backs and hosts Hamas, is a close ally of Ankara, all while being a mediator in the Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal.
Sharaa met the Emir of Qatar before traveling to Saudi Arabia over the weekend; now comes Turkey. These are key meetings that reflect the powerful countries in the region. The previous Syrian regime was allied with Iran and Russia; this new one is close to Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia.
Relationship could be deeper
A Reuters report on Tuesday indicated that there may be more to the Syria-Turkey relationship than what is on the surface. Turkey has backed the Syrian rebels, but it didn’t always back the Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham group, which Sharaa led to toppling the Assad regime. Ankara played a complex role in Syria, claiming to back the rebels, while coopting them into a group called the Syrian National Army (SNA) to use them to fight the Kurdish YPG. Ankara considers the YPG as part of the PKK, which it views as a terrorist group.
Turkey now has many reasons to see Syria as a potential opportunity. It invaded northern Syria between 2015 and 2019, claiming to be fighting ISIS, but fighting the Kurdish YPG. Since the collapse of the Assad regime, Turkey has backed the SNA’s fight against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a US-backed group that fighting ISIS. Ankara would like nothing more than to make its presence in Syria official, but it must find a way through the new Syrian government, having already secured small bases and posts in northern Syria.
According to Reuters, Sharaa and Erdogan are expected to discuss a defense agreement and potential new Turkish bases in central Syria. Turkey could use Syrian airspace and might train Syria’s armed forces.
When the Assad regime collapsed, Israel carried out extensive airstrikes, destroying much of the previous Syrian regime’s key defenses, and stripping Syria of air defenses, warplanes, naval ships, and other assets. Now, Syria needs an army and will need new equipment, and since Western countries are probably reticent to arm Damascus, Turkey is a logical and natural choice.
The Reuters report indicates that Turkey could also establish bases, and may even place them in the “Syrian desert” or at the strategic T-4 air base near Palmyra. This base was previously used by Iran, which tried to send its 3rd Khordad air defense system to T-4 in 2018. Turkey could end up backfilling the facilities abandoned by Iran and Russia.
If this Turkish defense pact or new Ankara initiative comes to fruition, it will have major strategic implications in the region: Syria will essentially have replaced Russia and Iran with Turkey as an ally and benefactor. Turkey, in some ways, has even more influence than Iran and Russia, because it has a foot in both camps – in both NATO and in ties with Russia, Iran, China and the emerging multi-polar world order.
This means that once Turkey is in Syria, it can play many roles, starting with targeting the SDF. However, it will give Turkey much more of a role in Lebanon, which could mean that Turkey and Qatar could cooperate more on the backing of Hamas.
It could give Hamas the ability to fly from Doha to Ankara and Damascus to coordinate strategy against Israel, which could even give Turkey and Qatar more power over Hamas’s role in the West Bank to weaken the PA. If Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia, the UAE and others who have opposed the Muslim Brotherhood don’t step up to stop the trend, Hamas and its backers could get wind in the sails thanks to Ankara’s Syria role. Hamas has roots in the Muslim Brotherhood, and Turkey and Qatar have historically backed Brotherhood-linked parties in the region over the last two decades.
If Turkey moves into Syria more than it already has, it will have implications for NATO, which Turkey is a member of. If Ankara tries to leverage these connections against Israel in the future, that could have major ramifications. During the first Trump administration, Ankara sought out tensions with Greece and Cyprus and signed a deal with Libya to increase Ankara’s influence over the eastern Mediterranean. Ankara also increased tensions with France and encouraged Azerbaijan to fight Armenia.
Turkey may feel that it has a new opportunity to exploit the situation in the region. If this puts Turkey on Israel’s northern Golan border, even in terms of air defenses and air bases that have more of a role there, it could pose a challenge for Israel. This could impact Israel-Iran tensions, and Jerusalem’s freedom of action in the region could be curtailed.