Escalating tensions between Israel and Turkey over military influence in Syria have reached new heights following Israeli airstrikes on strategic targets in the Palmyra and Homs regions late last week. The strikes on 21–22 March targeted Syrian military bases and left multiple Syrian Ministry of Defence personnel wounded, underscoring a brewing proxy conflict between two regional powers now openly vying for influence in post-war Syria.
Israeli airstrikes in Palmyra ignite new tensions
Israeli fighter jets conducted two rounds of intense air raids near the historic city of Palmyra in central Syria’s Homs province on the night of 21 March, hitting the Palmyra military airport and the nearby Tiyas (T4) Airbase. The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) said the targets “still had strategic military capabilities” and that the strikes were intended to neutralise remaining threats and maintain Israeli air superiority in the region.
Syrian state media reported that at least two Syrian defence personnel were wounded in the strikes, while the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) documented 12 members of Syria’s Ministry of Defence injured in the Palmyra and T4 strikes. The bombardment also caused significant material damage to the installations, which prior to the fall of President Bashar al-Assad had hosted Iranian-aligned militias.
Syrian military sources indicated the Israeli warplanes struck a watchtower, a missile battalion, and an arms depot at the T4 airbase, as well as sites around Palmyra’s outskirts. These facilities had reportedly been taken over by Syria’s new transitional authorities after Assad’s ouster in late 2024, and their targeting sent a clear signal to Damascus and Ankara alike.
“Whoever attacks us or plans to attack us, we attack them,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, defending Israel’s freedom of action in Syria. The Syrian government in Damascus – now led by interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa (better known as former jihadist leader Abu Mohammad al-Julani) – condemned the strikes as a violation of sovereignty. However, Israeli officials insist they will continue striking strategic sites as needed to prevent hostile forces from consolidating power on Syrian soil .
Israel’s post-Assad doctrine: Fragmentation and ‘Jihadist’ threat
The power vacuum left by Assad’s collapse has prompted Israel to recalibrate its security doctrine in Syria. Jerusalem has effectively expanded its military footprint in southern Syria, seizing a buffer zone along the Golan Heights frontier in an stated effort to keep hostile militias away from its borders. Israeli warplanes have carried out dozens of strikes across Syria in recent months, targeting weapons depots, radar sites, and remnants of the Assad regime’s military infrastructure that could be used by Iran or other adversaries.
Israeli officials remain deeply suspicious of Syria’s new interim government under Ahmad al-Sharaa, pointing to his past leadership of an al-Qaida-linked faction. “Israel is concerned about al-Sharaa and his Islamist ties, and fears that his consolidated strength could pose what Israel has called a ‘jihadist threat’ along its northern border,” said Nimrod Goren, president of the Israeli Mitvim Institute.
Although al-Sharaa’s coalition ousted Assad in Damascus, Israel views the new regime as ideologically extreme. Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel recently described Syria’s interim rulers as “a jihadist Islamist terror group that took Damascus by force and was supported by Turkey”, warning that Israel is working to prevent the emergence of a hostile Islamist stronghold on its doorstep.
Under what Israeli analysts call a “post-Assad doctrine”, Israel appears to prefer Syria fragmented rather than unified under a potentially unfriendly Islamist authority. “Unlike Turkey, which supports a strong, centralised and stable Syria, Israel at the moment appears to prefer Syria fragmented, with the belief that could better bolster Israel’s security,” Goren noted.
In practice, this has meant quietly coordinating with the United States – which maintains troops in eastern Syria alongside Kurdish-led forces – and seeking understanding with Arab states like Saudi Arabia that likewise oppose jihadist movements. Saudi Arabia’s warming ties with Syria’s new leadership are viewed in Israel as an opportunity to peel Damascus away from Iranian influence.
Al-Sharaa’s first diplomatic trip was notably to Riyadh, in what observers called a Saudi-Israeli “signal to Iran” that Tehran’s foothold in Syria is over. Still, Israel remains wary that the new Damascus-Ankara partnership could empower anti-Israel elements, and has kept up close intelligence coordination with Washington and regional allies to monitor the fast-evolving landscape.
Turkey’s expanding role: Ambitions in Syria and Kurdish concerns
For Turkey, Assad’s downfall and the rise of a Sunni Islamist-led government in Damascus have created an opening to expand its influence deep into Syria. Ankara, which had long backed rebels opposed to Assad, has emerged as a key patron of the new interim authorities, advocating for a stable and reunified Syria under friendly governance. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan quickly threw his support behind al-Sharaa’s administration, welcoming a recent “breakthrough agreement” that saw the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) integrate under the Damascus government and army.
Turkish defence officials say Turkey and Syria are now cooperating to strengthen the country’s defence and security, with joint military committees and training missions already in the works.
Ankara’s motive is two-fold. First, Turkey seeks to prevent any resurgence of Kurdish autonomy in Syria. By embedding the SDF into a central command structure in Damascus – an arrangement Turkey helped broker – Erdoğan hopes to neutralise the semi-autonomous Kurdish zones that had emerged under US protection in the northeast. Turkish authorities are “increasingly concerned that Israel is supportive of autonomy demands from Kurds, the Druze and Alawites” in Syria, warns Aslı Aydıntaşbaş of the Brookings Institution. Any such decentralisation threatens Turkey’s longstanding goal of a unitary Syrian state (and, by extension, Turkey’s own fight against Kurdish self-rule movement).
Second, Turkey is capitalising on the new alignment in Damascus to extend its military reach. Since 2016, Turkey has maintained bases across northern Syria and backed an array of former rebel factions . Now, with Damascus inviting Turkish cooperation, Ankara’s footprint is expanding further south and east. Turkish troop convoys and technical units have been sighted moving toward central Syria.
According to Syrian and Israeli sources, Ankara is in advanced discussions with Damascus to assume control of a military field unit in the Palmyra region – in exchange for pledges of Turkish economic and military support to the fledgling Syrian government. Turkish officials have not confirmed specific deployments, but they tout the burgeoning alliance with Damascus as a step toward stabilising Syria.
These moves have set off alarm bells in Israel. Jerusalem views Turkey’s military foothold near Palmyra as a strategic red line, given Palmyra’s location at the crossroads of Syria’s centre and east. If Turkish forces were to establish a permanent base in eastern Homs, for example, at the large T4 Airbase or nearby energy fields, Israel fears it would tilt the balance of power and potentially give Turkey the ability to project force closer to Israel’s sphere of operations in Syria.
“Israeli officials are particularly alarmed by the potential expansion of Turkey’s military presence east of Homs,” reports Walla News, noting that such a foothold could bring Turkey “closer to direct friction with Israel” in southern Syria. In Israeli eyes, Turkish control of key Syrian infrastructure – air bases, oil and gas fields, or transportation hubs – would not only sideline Iran’s influence but also create a new, formidable rival on territory Israel has struck with impunity until now.
Warnings of a coming confrontation
Diplomatically, Israel and Turkey still maintain formal relations, but their rhetoric over Syria has grown increasingly pointed. What was once a covert rivalry is now being aired openly by officials and analysts on both sides. “Syria has become a theater for proxy warfare between Turkey and Israel, which clearly see each other as regional competitors,” says Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, a Turkish foreign policy expert at Brookings.
“This is a very dangerous dynamic because in all aspects of Syria’s transition, there is a clash of Turkish and Israeli positions,” Aydıntaşbaş told Associated Press, describing the situation as a collision course. Indeed, virtually every facet of Syria’s future – from the status of the Kurds and Alawites, to Iran’s role, to control of natural resources – has become a tug-of-war between Ankara and Jerusalem.
On the Turkish side, there is candid acknowledgement that a showdown may be looming. Veteran Kurdish journalist Amed Dicle remarked on his YouTube news program on 32 March that Turkey is intensifying its “hegemonial” military ambitions in Syria and that a direct confrontation with Israel may be unavoidable if both powers continue on their current path. Recent Turkish media commentary, including Dicle’s analysis, argues that Ankara cannot easily back down from asserting its influence across Syria – even if it risks angering Israel – because Erdoğan views a strong Syrian alliance as key to Turkey’s regional hegemony.
“Those who seek to provoke ethnic and religious divisions in Syria to exploit instability…will not achieve their goals,” President Erdoğan warned pointedly last week, in a message widely interpreted as directed at Israel. Turkish officials accuse Israel of arming or encouraging separatist forces (Kurdish, Druze, even Alawite) to undermine Damascus – a charge Israel denies.
Meanwhile in Israel, talk of an “inevitable” clash with Turkey is increasingly heard in security circles. During a high-level assessment meeting last week, an Israeli security source was blunt:
“A confrontation between Turkey and Israel in Syria is inevitable due to Erdoğan’s attempts to restrict Israel’s operational freedom in the region,” the source said, according to Israeli media.
Leaks have also emerged that Netanyahu’s inner cabinet is mapping out contingency plans. Channel 12 News reported that the Prime Minister’s advisors have even pushed Israeli media to emphasise that “a confrontation with Turkey on Syrian territory is inevitable”, perhaps as a way to prepare the public. Such rhetoric marks a striking shift – essentially signalling that Israel is now contemplating the prospect of direct hostilities with a fellow US ally.
Expert observers note that this is no longer unthinkable. In January, a confidential Israeli government study group known as the Nagel Committee delivered a stark warning about the Turkey-Syria alliance. The committee’s report, portions of which were later made public, urged Netanyahu to prepare for a potential war with Turkey in Syria. It argued that a Turkish-backed regime in Damascus could “create a new and significant threat to Israel’s security,” potentially even “more dangerous than the Iranian threat” that Israel has focused on for years.
The committee concluded Israel must urgently bolster its military posture in the north and forge understandings with other powers like Russia to check Turkey’s ambitions. While Ankara dismissed such statements as provocations, the fact that Israeli officials are drawing comparisons to Iran – historically Israel’s chief regional adversary – shows how seriously Israel views the potential Turkish challenge.
Regional implications and international response
The escalating Israel-Turkey rivalry in Syria carries profound implications for the Middle East and beyond. Unlike Israel’s past shadow wars in Syria against Iranian proxies, this confrontation involves two powerful states that are both partners of the West – raising delicate questions for NATO and the United States. Turkey is a member of NATO, and its growing friction with Israel, a major non-NATO ally of the US, places Washington in an awkward bind. Thus far, American officials have treaded carefully, supporting Israel’s right to self-defence and strikes against “terrorist targets” in Syria, while simultaneously urging restraint on all sides.
US diplomats worry that open conflict between Israel and Turkey would shatter the relative calm that has emerged in Syria’s decade-old war and could even trigger a broader regional crisis. Any direct clash inside Syrian territory would be unprecedented – effectively pitting NATO’s second-largest army of Turkey’s against the Middle East’s most advanced military as Israel. Western capitals are reportedly working behind the scenes to prevent a military collision, even as they remain divided in their sympathies. France and Greece, for instance, have quietly backed Israel’s hard line on curbing Turkey, whereas some NATO officials counsel de-escalation.
Within NATO, Ankara’s behaviour in Syria has already been a point of contention, and a showdown with Israel could further strain the alliance’s unity. There is no precedent for a NATO member and Israel coming to blows; such an outcome could force NATO to engage in urgent diplomacy or even consider its collective defence obligations if Turkey’s territory were threatened.
“This emerging crisis presents a policy dilemma: two of our important allies are at odds,” a Western diplomat observed, noting that Washington has vital security ties with both Jerusalem and Ankara.
So far, NATO as an institution has not been directly involved in the Syria issue, but the alliance is watching warily as the situation unfolds.
Israel’s regional relationships would also be tested. A conflict with Turkey could jeopardise the recent rapprochement Israel has enjoyed with some Muslim-majority nations. Conversely, it might strengthen Israel’s coordination with the Arab states most opposed to Turkish influence such as Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Saudi Arabia. Notably, Russia – which until last year was the dominant outside force in Syria – has been relatively sidelined after Assad’s fall, but could reassert itself as a stabilising broker.
In fact, Israeli officials have indicated they would prefer Moscow’s return over unchecked Turkish expansion; Israeli sources told Walla that they support Russia reactivating its base leases and peacekeeping roles in Syria to help counterbalance Turkey. This signals a remarkable realignment: Israel tacitly aligning with Russia, and perhaps even Iran’s interests, insofar as it restrains Turkey’s reach.
As of now, the Syrian theatre has become the stage for a high-stakes geopolitical contest between Israel and Turkey. What happens in the deserts of Palmyra or the skies over Homs could reverberate from Ankara to Tel Aviv, and from Washington to Brussels. Both countries insist they do not seek a direct war – Israeli officials stress that their focus remains on targeting terrorist threats, and Turkish officials reiterate that their presence in Syria aims to fight extremism and protect Syrian unity.
Yet with each Israeli airstrike near a Turkish-operational zone, and each new Turkish deployment deeper into Syria, the margin for error shrinks. “This is a powder keg,” Aydıntaşbaş said of the situation. The coming weeks will test whether cooler heads in Jerusalem and Ankara can avert a direct clash, or whether Syria’s proxy battles are about to erupt into an open confrontation between two of the region’s most formidable militaries.
