Turkey ending military cooperation with Israel as exercise cancelled

The strategic defeat of Israel following its war on the people of Gaza is underlined this morning with news of Turkey refusing to allow Israel to overfly its airspace to participate in a NATO exercise. The Israeli leadership is very worried that their links with Turkey are being shredded.

Turkey's foreign minister publicly acknowledged for the first time on Monday that his country excluded Israel from a joint military exercise last week because of its criticism of Israel's winter offensive against Hamas in Gaza.

"We hope that the situation in Gaza will be improved, that the situation will be back to the diplomatic track," the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, told CNN in response to a question on why Turkey excluded Israel from the drill.

"And that will create a new atmosphere in Turkish-Israeli relations as well," he added. "But in the existing situation, of course, we are criticizing this approach, [the] Israeli approach."

Earlier, the Turkish foreign ministry said "a technical matter," not politics, prompted the delay of the drill, CNN reported.

The international aerial exercise, which was to include the IAF and aircraft and pilots from NATO, was due to be based at an air base in the central Anatolian city of Konya.

Officials at the Foreign Ministry called an emergency meeting Sunday to discuss the crisis between Israel and Turkey, marked by the cancellation.

A senior source at the ministry told Haaretz about concerns that strategic ties with Turkey are in jeopardy after Operation Lead Cast in the Gaza Strip earlier this year.
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Whether Turkey finally ends its military coopeartion with Israel will depend on the pressure mounted by Turkish people on the streets.

According to the Times the exercise involved bombing runs in air space near the Iranian, Syrian and Iraqi borders - a rather obvious attempt to intimidate Iran. Because Israel was barred from the exercise it has now been cancelled at the request of the US. They'll have to go and plan/practise their war someplace else.

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