The release of last week’s UN Palmer Report, assessing Israel’s attack on the Mavi Marmara and five other ships carrying aid to Gaza, sparked outrage in Turkey. Many criticized the report’s alleged bias, and claimed it failed to provide a credible legal analysis of the Mavi Marmara incident in which nine Turkish citizens were shot to death by Israeli commandos, some at close range and from behind. Still angry with Israel’s refusal to apologize for its actions, Turkey expelled Israel’s ambassador, suspended all military agreements with Israel, and announced that the Turkish navy would strengthen its presence in the eastern Mediterranean. Turkey also stated it would work to mobilize the UN General Assembly to bring the issue before the International Court of Justice and would support legal action against Israel undertaken by the families of the Mavi Marmara victims.
At face value, Turkey’s reaction appears to be a reckless decision to throw a strategically beneficial relationship with Israel to the wind, abandoning “realpolitik” for “moralpolitik.” Turkey’s five-point strategy led to charges that Turkey’s ruling party is anti-Semitic, and also appeared to underscore a new Turkish policy priority - the protection of Muslim neighbors whom Ankara perceives as unjustly beleaguered. But Turkey’s actions in fact reveal a far more complex and pragmatic foreign policy strategy than its reaction to the Palmer Report suggests.
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