Turkey Has Announced They Will Send Another Flotilla to Gaza—Escorted by the Turkish Navy

Published on 06-01-2010
By Ian Welsh

If they actually do this, it is the very definition of throwing down.

Wow.

Does Israel want a war with Turkey?  They can’t win it, short of using nukes, and Turkey is a NATO member, if Israel attacks NATO ships, Turkey can invoke Article V (in fact, they can invoke it already, since the ships were attacked by a non NATO power on the high seas.)  If Turkey does so, of course NATO nations will refuse, but doing so will break NATO.

This is high stakes.

Update: I might add that in the case of a war between Turkey and Israel, if Turkey is serious, unless Israel uses nukes, my money is on the Turks.  They have a huge armored corp, and the nations between Israel and Turkey aren’t going to say no if Turkey asks for access (because if they do, Turkey will just roll right through them.)  Also if Turkey and Israel goes to war, it’s at least 50/50 the Egypt jumps in as well.

Israel is really playing with fire on this one.

Update 2: See Sean-Paul’s comments on the domestic reasons of Turkey’s reaction, and what the death of the Israeli/Turkish Entente means.

Update 3: See this analysis (h/t Pogge) for the legalities.  Short of it is that if the act wasn’t rogue, then this was an act of war, not an act of piracy.