We've all seen this movie before. Every few months, some headline declares that Washington is finally ready to wash its hands of Israel.
Tom Barrack © Mena Today
We've all seen this movie before. Every few months, some headline declares that Washington is finally ready to wash its hands of Israel.
One week it's a leaked memo, the next it's a tense phone call over a rejected peace plan, and soon enough, pundits are solemnly pronouncing a moment of truth for the White House.
Yet, when the dust clears, the script remains unchanged: when push comes to shove, America sticks with Israel. Now, a fresh diplomatic storm brewing around the US ambassador to Turkey is giving us a rerun of this classic drama.
The Ambassador Who Forgot His Brief
Enter Tom Barrack, America's man in Ankara. Barrack appears to be suffering from a classic case of diplomatic capture, or clientitis, that peculiar affliction where envoys spend so much time immersed in their host capitals that they start viewing the world through the local ruler's eyes instead of Washington's.
Jerusalem has good reason to be sweating. Aside from a slip of the tongue regarding the Golan Heights that he quickly walked back, Barrack's footprint in the region has consistently favored Ankara's ledger.
He has quietly lobbied to bring Turkey back into the F-35 fighter program, shrugged off Turkish military expansionism in Syria, and pushed for sanctions relief on Damascus that effectively torpedoed nascent normalization talks between Syria and Israel.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's inner circle doesn't just see a rogue diplomat; they see the mastermind behind Washington's flirtation with Syrian leadership and a key enabler of Erdogan's regional ambitions.
Foggy Bottom vs. Ankara
The tension finally boiled over following a confrontation over Turkish troop deployments at a Syrian airfield. Rumor has it that Foggy Bottom has had enough, with reports suggesting Barrack was dragged back to Washington for a severe dressing down.
Yet, read the press in Ankara, and you get a completely different universe. Turkish outlets insist that the White House views the Barrack-Israel friction as mere background noise, a tactical speedbump rather than a strategic fracture. In this telling, Trump is backing his envoy to ensure Israeli friction doesn't wreck America's grand blueprint for the region.
It is a perennial favorite of regional critics to paint Israel as the sole obstacle to Middle Eastern harmony. But that narrative collapses under the weight of actual geopolitics. America and Israel are bound by hard, cold, shared interests: a neutralized Iran, a stable bloc of moderate Arab partners, and a clear eyed containment of Turkey's neo-Ottoman daydreams.
Let's be honest about modern Turkey. Despite its NATO badge, Ankara has a habit of cozying up to radical factions, hosting Hamas leadership, holding northern Cyprus under military lock, and buying Russian missile systems designed to undermine the very alliance it belongs to.
Turkey isn't an American force multiplier in the region; it's a rival center of gravity, as Riyadh proved when it anchored its alternative diplomatic pact squarely around Ankara.
The Default Setting
Will this time be different? Could Trump actually break script and throw Israel under the bus for his man in Ankara?
Maybe. But betting against the deeply entrenched alliance between Washington and Jerusalem has historically been a fool's errand. Leaders wander down detours, ambassadors get summoned home, and pundits get ahead of themselves, but when the rubber meets the road, Washington almost always takes the path that leads back to Israel.
Turkey's ruling AK Party welcomes the dissolution of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces as an important step towards strengthening Syrian unity, a spokesman for President Tayyip Erdogan's party said on Wednesday.
Political advertisements are a staple of Israeli elections, and arguably one of the best lenses through which to decode the country's shifting political currents. This time around, though, candidates seem to have left creativity at the door when it comes to campaign posters.
Turkey welcomed on Tuesday the United States' decision to remove Syria from its list of countries supporting terrorism.
To make this website run properly and to improve your experience, we use cookies. For more detailed information, please check our Cookie Policy.
Necessary cookies enable core functionality. The website cannot function properly without these cookies, and can only be disabled by changing your browser preferences.
