By Barçın Yinanç
When the AKP came to power it had to prove to the outside world that it was not an Islamist party. The way to convince Western capitals went through luring in Israel and the Jewish lobby. By 2008, the party had consolidated power internally and received a high degree of acceptance from the Western capitals, which led to overconfidence.
When the Arab Spring began, the AKP did not have to hide its true ideological leaning. Convinced that the moment for political Islam had finally come, the AKPs ruling elites did not hide their ambition to lead Muslim Brotherhood to power in Middle Eastern countries.
HAMAS IN, PA OUT
It was by the end of the AKP’s first decade in government that Ankara started to prioritize Hamas, its ideological brother, over the Palestinian Authority, which remained a secular force.
The Palestinian issue was also framed for the first time as an “issue of national interest” which was not the case until the AKP came to power.
Then Benjamin Netanyahu took office. The political trajectories of Netanyahu and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan started to resemble each other: both were perceived as politicians who would do whatever is necessary to stay in power. But the more their political lives followed the same path, the more the gap between Turkey and Israel started to widen. For both, foreign policy became less of an issue of national interest but more an instrument for domestic survival. The more the need to rely on radical groups to stay in power grew, the more the two countries' stance against each other became radicalized and entrenched.
Therefore, the pragmatism, flexibility, and policy agility attributed to the AKP’s leadership were not in evidence for some time when it came to Hamas and Israel.
One has to recall however that had it not been for Hamas’ deadly October attack, Netanyahu was supposed to come to Turkey for an official visit. And the distancing from the Muslim Brotherhood had already started when the normalization with Egypt started.
HAMAS HAD TO PLAN FOR THE DAY AFTER
When October 7 happened, a group from Hamas’ political leadership was in Ankara inside the National Intelligence Agency’s (MIT) facilities.
The visitors appeared uninformed of the attack, according to journalist Ertuğrul Özkök. When they were asked about it the day after, none could give a proper answer, wrote Özkök, who seems to get his information from the horse’s mouth.
When a high-level MIT official asked, “The operation is significant, and you’ve made the score 1–0 against Israel. But do you have a second goal, another move planned?” the Hamas delegation kept silent.
The MIT official continued: “Now you’ve made it 1–0. But know this — Israel won’t make it 1–1. They won’t make it 2–1, or 3–1, or 4–1. We know Netanyahu and Israel. They’ll make it 10–1, even 12–1. Do you have a second move, a plan for that?”
By then it was apparent Hamas had no plan B. At least not their political leadership which was left in the dark about the attack.
In the immediate aftermath of October 7, some experts had foreseen that Hamas had inflicted on itself a suicidal blow.
“Whatever the post-war arrangements for Gaza will be, Hamas does not seem to have a future there. There is an emerging consensus in this direction in the Arab fold….And Hamas will be left to content itself with its political role in the wider Palestinian framework. After all, it was Hamas which brought the question of Palestine back to international attention. In the haze of this partial success, the Hamas leadership in Gaza and its remaining fighters may be evacuated to a third country,” wrote retired Ambassador Şafak Göktürk a month and a half after the attack.
Before Donald Trump came to power, the AKP leadership made several attempts to convince Hamas to provide a roadmap to pledge to lay down arms, and continue as a political movement which would indirectly mean accepting Israel’s right to exist.
But Trump’s entry to the White House provided an additional incentive for the AKP to strong-arm Hamas into compromise: the need to please Trump to secure another electoral victory in Ankara.
The pro-government media was overjoyed when Trump got President Erdoğan seated on his right together with other Arab leaders in New York. For opposition pundits however, that picture represented curbing Ankara’s anti-Israeli stance and making it align with other Arab countries whose inaction for decades has left Palestinians defenseless against Israel.
“I’ve done a lot for you now, I need you to do this,” Trump reportedly told Erdoğan after he visited the White House. Shortly after, Qatar and Turkey were said to give an ultimatum to Hamas: “accept ... or else.”
This was like putting the last nail in Hamas’ coffin. Hamas will continue its existence within the Palestine cause but once it loses its military strength, its political strength will also diminish, Göktürk told me.
And while the AKP will get “legitimacy” from Washington, in the words of the U.S. envoy to Ankara, its “Islamist militant activism” will be curbed thanks to Trump.
