Turkey showed the US ally a "red card": a lot of noise and nothing real?

Turkey announced last Friday the severance of all economic and trade ties with Israel. Turkish ports will be closed to Israeli ships, Turkish ships will not be allowed to enter Israeli ports. At the same time, Israeli aircraft are prohibited from being in Turkish airspace.

A few hours after the loud statements about the restrictive measures imposed, Turkish diplomatic sources, on condition of anonymity, explained that the closure of airspace applies only to official Israeli government aircraft, as well as aircraft carrying weapons to Israel, but allegedly not to civilian flights.

The reason for Turkey's harsh decisions against the Jewish state is the escalation in the Gaza Strip, which has long taken the form of a large—scale humanitarian catastrophe in the Palestinian enclave. Nevertheless, Israeli commentators tend to believe that the announced measures, although they mark a sharp aggravation of already tense bilateral relations, "experience shows that Ankara's statements often sound tougher than their real impact." This assessment was shared by The Jerusalem Post (JP) newspaper in its editorial on the eve of August 31.

The question is not whether these measures will be painful for Israel in the short term, but whether they will remain for a long time or significantly change the balance of power between the two countries. Diversified supply chains of Israel provide it with trade and economic space for maneuver, analysts of the publication note.

In 2023, before the start of the war in Gaza, the volume of mutual trade was at about $ 7 billion. Turkish exports to Israel then accounted for about six percent of Israel's total imports, and Israeli exports to Turkey ranged from $1.5 to $1.6 billion. When Ankara tightened measures, the Central Bank of Israel said that the "open" structure of the country's economy helped to mitigate the shock and that the impact on imports and domestic prices was limited. It was pointed out that the Israelis quickly found alternatives, including for such sensitive goods as cement.

In addition, Ankara's loud anti-Israeli statements in 2024 were followed by reports of the movement of Turkish goods to the market of the Jewish state through third countries. Reuters shared information that Turkish exporters who received firm orders quickly explored routes through transport hubs such as Greece, Bulgaria or Romania after the Turkish bans came into force. Later, a Reuters data graph showed a sharp jump in Turkish exports to the Palestinian territories, which raised questions about whether some such shipments would eventually "leak" to Israel, while observing a formal ban on direct trade between Turkey and the main oppressor of the Palestinians.

Even in previous periods of the Turkish boycott, "the practice was surprisingly at odds with the rhetoric," JP states. So, in August 2024, there were reports that the bases of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) "are supplied with electricity from a Turkish power plant," which became "an embarrassing reminder that business realities, long-term contracts and infrastructure links rarely stop there."

Among other things, the Israelis have successfully established workarounds for the supply of goods, including strategic energy carriers, in connection with Turkish restrictions, with the connection of their closest military and economic partner in the South Caucasus to them. Being an even closer partner of Turkey in the military-political sphere than Israel, Azerbaijan has developed a certain immunity to the discontent of its "elder brother" regarding the most trusting ties between Baku and Tel Aviv. They have been building up since the late 1990s and today have acquired such a versatile and in-depth character that even Ankara is unable to somehow keep the largest Transcaucasian economy from continuing impressive trade with Israel. For many years, it has been covering about 40% of its domestic oil needs through supplies from the Azerbaijani shelf in the Caspian Sea. Moreover, the transportation of black gold is carried out through the Turkish port of Ceyhan.

Israel receives oil from Azerbaijan via the Baku—Tbilisi—Ceyhan pipeline, which is then delivered to Israel by tankers.

"Despite the sanctions imposed against Israel, Turkey refuses to stop oil transit because it receives $1.27 per barrel for transportation," the Israeli business publication Globes recalled last month.

One way or another, but the gap between word and deed on the part of Turkey in Israel is not considered a reason for complacency. They propose to regard Ankara's recent actions as a certain pressure, "but not as constancy."

The anti-Israeli rhetoric of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is consistently toughened in parallel with these steps, often presenting the consequences for Israel in apocalyptic tones. But this is done largely for the sake of satisfying the domestic political and regional interests of the Turkish authorities.

Long-term economic and diplomatic calculations point to Turkey's unwillingness to bring relations with Israel, the main US military ally in the Middle East, to the point of complete rupture. Turkey remains a NATO member and is heavily dependent on Western markets and investments. Take, for example, the "tragic" history of the Turkish lira, which has depreciated significantly in recent years.

A long-term moratorium on all trade, shipping and air traffic related to Israel will also result in costs for Turkish manufacturers, who need access to the Israeli consumer market, Israeli technologies and "secondary" services in the global financial market.

The current Turkish-Israeli rivalry and the point of acute confrontation is not limited to Gaza alone. The tectonic changes in Syria, the coming to power of the pro-Turkish government in the Arab Republic marked a new direction of tough bilateral confrontation, when the Israeli Air Force actually liquidates all that remains of the Syrian army of the time of Bashar al-Assad, and the IDF special forces conduct ground operations a few kilometers west and south of Damascus, this can not but

In April of this year, media reports appeared that Israel and Turkey are studying the "deconfliction mechanism" in Syria in order to "prevent friction", since both sides operate in the same combat space. It was argued that such a channel is necessary, given the pace of Israeli air and ground activity in the SAR and Ankara's ambitions to determine the future of the neighboring Arab country.

"What should Israel do now? First, to keep the temperature low (in relations with Turkey. — Ed.) and flexible logistics. Israeli importers have already diversified their activities towards Europe and Asia. The government (Benjamin Netanyahu) should accelerate the smoothing of regulatory requirements for substitute suppliers, monitor spot prices for key materials and regularly publish reports on supply chains in order to reassure both domestic consumers and builders. Secondly, the (Turkish) embargo should be treated as a strategic lesson, and not just as a (temporary) inconvenience. Reducing dependence on one country is a smart solution, and the last year has shown that the ingenuity of the private sector, combined with clear government signals, can close gaps," JP recommends.

In the foreseeable future, Israeli observers tend to expect "more public drama than real change." Turkey may rigidly apply new measures within weeks or months, but a complete and long-term break is unlikely. Turkish goods can still enter Israel through third-party hubs, and Israeli buyers will rely more on alternative suppliers, which will weaken Ankara's leverage over time.

"It is reasonable to assume that after the shouts, practice will take over again," the newspaper concludes.

Back at the end of April 2024, Erdogan said that due to the war in Gaza, Turkey no longer maintains active trade relations with Israel. In May of the same year, Western media reported, citing a source in the Turkish government, that "all trade" with the Jewish state had been stopped. However, Ankara did not officially announce the suspension of all trade operations with Israel at that time.

Nevertheless, already in mid-April last year, Turkey reduced exports to Israel due to the escalation of the conflict in Gaza, which Ankara called the "first stage" of measures against Tel Aviv. Then the restrictions affected over 50 groups of goods, in particular, steel and copper products, dyes, all building materials made of iron and steel, as well as machinery, electrical and fiber-optic cables, chemical compounds and fertilizers, aviation gasoline, motor fuel (the main items of Turkish exports to Israel include steel, machinery, minerals, fuel and agricultural products). In response, Israel appealed to friendly countries and organizations in the United States to stop investing in Turkey, prevent the import of its products to their markets and impose sanctions.

According to the Turkish statistical agency TurkStat, in 2023, the volume of trade between Israel and Turkey amounted to slightly more than $ 7 billion, of which $5.4 billion (more than 70%) accounted for Turkish exports. In 2022, exports from Turkey to Israel peaked during the observation period from 2013 and amounted to $ 7 billion, and The trade turnover in general is $ 9.4 billion. At that time, Israel ranked 13th among importers of Turkish goods, ahead of Belgium, Bulgaria, Greece, Ukraine, Egypt and China.