Tel Aviv (Somalia Today) – Israel and Turkey traded sharp accusations over the weekend, underscoring how a rupture driven by the war in Gaza is widening into a broader dispute over Syria and power in the eastern Mediterranean.
The exchange followed months of worsening relations between the two regional powers.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on X that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was “massacring his own Kurdish citizens” and “accommodating Iran’s terror regime and its proxies”.
The remarks came after Erdogan welcomed a fragile ceasefire involving Iran and warned against steps that could undermine it.
Ankara responded swiftly, with Turkish officials accusing Netanyahu of destabilising the region in an effort to secure his own political survival.
The dispute now extends beyond the war in Gaza.
It also overlaps with legal proceedings against Israeli leaders, rival interests in post-Assad Syria and new security alignments in the eastern Mediterranean.
Frozen diplomacy
The immediate political driver remains the war in Gaza.
Since the October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas killed around 1,200 people in Israel, Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 72,000 Palestinians, according to health authorities in the territory.
A US-backed ceasefire introduced in October 2025 reduced the scale of the fighting, but violence has continued, with hundreds reported killed since the truce began.
The war derailed a brief attempt at reconciliation between Ankara and Jerusalem in 2022.
Turkey recalled its ambassador from Israel in late 2023, while Israeli diplomats left Turkey amid security concerns and mass pro-Palestinian protests.
Ankara halted bilateral trade with Israel in May 2024 and tightened restrictions further in August 2025 by barring Israeli-linked vessels from its ports.
Turkish authorities have also informally required shipping agents to provide written assurances that vessels have no links to Israel and are not carrying military cargo.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has meanwhile called on Islamic countries to press for Israel’s suspension from activities at the United Nations General Assembly.
Legal pressure
As diplomatic ties remain frozen, the legal battle has also intensified.
Turkey’s foreign ministry said Netanyahu’s remarks were aimed at diverting attention from legal pressure at home and abroad.
His long-running corruption trial in Israel recently resumed after a wartime emergency was lifted.
“Netanyahu’s current objective is to undermine ongoing peace negotiations and continue his expansionist policies,” the Turkish foreign ministry said in a statement.
“Failing this, he risks being tried in his own country and is likely to be sentenced to imprisonment.”
Ankara formally joined South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice in August 2024.
The International Criminal Court also issued arrest warrants in November 2024 for Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. Israel rejects the court’s jurisdiction and denies the accusations.
Senior Turkish officials, including communications chief Burhanettin Duran, said Netanyahu was “a criminal with arrest warrants to his name”.
Israeli officials responded in kind.
Defence Minister Israel Katz described Erdogan as a “Muslim Brotherhood man” and a “paper tiger”, accusing him of failing to respond to Iranian missile fire crossing Turkish territory.
“Turkish President Erdogan… is fleeing to the realms of antisemitism and declaring field trials in Turkey against Israel’s political and military leadership,” Katz said on X.
Syria fault line
The most dangerous strategic fault line between the two countries now runs through Syria.
After the fall of Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, Turkey sought to expand its influence with Syria’s new leadership.
Israel, meanwhile, stepped up air strikes and established what it has described as a security buffer in southern Syria.
In April 2025, Turkish military teams were reported to have visited at least three Syrian air bases shortly before Israel struck those same sites.
Analysts and regional observers saw the strikes as a warning against any broader Turkish military presence in Syria.
Israeli officials have said openly that Turkish bases in Syria would pose a threat to Israel.
The tension became serious enough that Ankara and Jerusalem opened deconfliction talks later that month to avoid accidental clashes between their forces.
The Syrian file has long been a source of friction between the two sides, but Assad’s fall has given it greater urgency.
Turkey sees itself as a key player in shaping the country’s political future, while Israel has focused on preventing hostile forces from gaining ground near its borders.
Mediterranean rivalry
The rivalry is also spilling into the eastern Mediterranean.
Netanyahu drew criticism over the weekend after a televised address in which he appeared before a map of the Middle East that critics said suggested an expanded view of Israeli territorial control, particularly over Palestinian areas.
At the same time, Israel has moved closer to some of Turkey’s longstanding regional rivals.
Israel, Greece and Cyprus have agreed to intensify joint air and naval exercises in 2026 and deepen maritime security cooperation.
The moves are being closely watched in Ankara, which has long been at odds with Athens and Nicosia over maritime boundaries, energy exploration and gas routes.
The diplomatic freeze has also carried security risks inside Turkey.
On April 7, a gun battle broke out outside the building housing Israel’s consulate in Istanbul, leaving one attacker dead and two others wounded.
No Israeli staff were present, but the incident underlined how the wider tensions surrounding Gaza continue to reverberate across the region.
For now, neither side appears to be seeking de-escalation.
Erdogan has sought to present Turkey as a central regional power and a leading defender of the Palestinian cause.
Netanyahu, meanwhile, faces legal pressure at home and abroad as Israel confronts threats and tensions stretching from Gaza to Iran, Lebanon and Syria.
