As relations warm between Turkey and Israel, the ‘Mavi Marmara’ incident is fading but not erased. We go back to examine how and why the event unfolded.
Twelve years after the Mavi Marmara incident caused an unprecedented diplomatic crisis between former allies Israel and Turkey, the ties between the two countries are warming up again.
Ankara broke off relations with Jerusalem following a raid by Israeli commandos on a Gaza-bound ship trying to break the naval blockade of the Hamas-run enclave. Ten pro-Palestinian Turks who were part of Turkey’s Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH) were killed after they attacked the commandos.
The Mavi Marmara was part of a flotilla heading to the blocked Gaza Strip to deliver humanitarian aid.
It was the largest in a six-vessel convoy that tried to break the siege imposed by both Israel and Egypt that was designed to prevent Hamas and other terror groups from importing weapons and other goods that could help their military build-up.
The blockade was imposed in 2007 after Hamas took over the coastal enclave, making all goods that enter Gaza be imported under Israeli supervision through land crossings. Several ships had, over the years, attempted to break the blockade, but were stopped by the Israeli Navy and those board deported from Israel.
“We can’t let anyone in. If we let one in, we will lose control and if we did that, within three months, we would see Iranian ships in Gaza,” said V.-Adm. (ret.) Eliezer Marom, commander of the Israeli Navy from 2007–2011.
Marom was commander at the time of the Mavi Marmara and, now part of Habithonistim, a movement of Israeli defense officials who advocate for the country’s future security needs, he sat with the Magazine to tell his story.
“I spoke with the Turkish, Greek, and Italian navy chiefs and warned that there could be blood,” he said. “A military operation was our last resort. Violating our maritime borders violates our sovereignty.”
“Whoever wants to bring aid to Gaza, that’s OK. But it must be by land,” he said. “We won’t let anyone into Gaza by sea. A land and sea border are the same, even though there is no physical barrier.”
But those aboard the Mavi Marmara were different.
“All of them were terrorists who belonged to IHH, and wanted to kill Israeli soldiers.”
V.-Adm. Eliezer Marom
Israel’s largest Navy operation
“WE UNDERSTOOD that it was a different story and needed to be treated seriously,” noted Marom. “It was a civilian ship that decided that it wanted to provoke and challenge Israel.”
He explained that following diplomatic and legal measures taken by Israel to stop the flotilla, the IDF and other security bodies prepared a military operation.
The operation to stop the flotilla, he said, “was the largest Navy operation” with thousands of soldiers at sea, a thousand more in Ashdod and 30 maritime vessels.
“The operation was to take over all the ships simultaneously,” he said. “I wanted to do it at night, when it’s more comfortable to act. And we wanted it to be fast” he added, explaining that Israel knew that the ships had antennas to broadcast what was happening aboard.
The navy initially made contact with the ships in the flotilla late on Sunday evening, going ship to ship and ordering them to follow them to Ashdod Port or be boarded at dawn.
The boarding of the ships started at 2 a.m. the next morning and at 4 a.m. Israeli commandos descended on ropes from helicopters onto the Mavi Marmara and were immediately attacked with clubs, knives, and metal rods. Three soldiers were taken captive.
Troops opened fire after a protester, later identified as Ken O’Keefe, a former US marine aboard the Mavi Marmara, seized a gun from one of them. By 8 a.m. when it was all over, nine of the flotilla activists were killed and dozens more were wounded, including Israeli troops. Another activist died in hospital, four years later.
“All of them were terrorists who belonged to IHH, and wanted to kill Israeli soldiers,” said Marom, adding that “they planned to do it.”
According to the former navy chief, “we didn’t have enough intelligence. If we knew that they were IHH, we would have acted differently.”
And just like Israel wasn’t expecting such violence, neither was Turkey, said Dr. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak, an expert on Turkey and Turkish history at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, and Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, “In hindsight, Turkey did not expect casualties, physical damage like during a street fight maybe, but in my opinion, they didn’t expect casualties and the incident forced them to downgrade relations.”
“None of the organizers want to take responsibility. After seeing 10 people killed, none of the organizers can do such an initiative because they can be accused of leading people to their death. These flotillas were departing from European countries, it’s not easy to take such an initiative because they have to face the consequences of the act.”
Dr. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak
Was it a success?
Following the incident, “Turkey adopted a unified nationalistic approach and protested the incident,” he said, adding that Ankara “tagged it as an aggressive Israeli policy in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea and as piracy since Israel conducted the attack in international waters.”
According to Yanarocak, Israel advocacy does not exist in the Turkish language and it was clear that there was a need for it following the incident.
“We have a great and strong army, but we suck at explaining ourselves in international media. We should explain ourselves in the Turkish language,” he said.
“The IDF Spokesperson’s Unit and the Foreign Ministry have to act in the Turkish language. The Turkish social media is huge and we are not explaining ourselves in their own language, making the Turkish people get their news on Israel from anti-Israel media.”
Nevertheless, Marom viewed the operation as a great success.
“We stopped all the ships and it was all done in two hours. Over 700 people were arrested. Whoever was killed or injured were IHH terrorists and the eight soldiers who were injured returned to service.”
He stressed that the operation created maritime deterrence.
“Twelve years later, there are no flotillas,” he said.
According to Yanarocak, the fact that new flotillas weren’t launched was because of the casualties.
“None of the organizers want to take responsibility. After seeing 10 people killed, none of the organizers can do such an initiative because they can be accused of leading people to their death. These flotillas were departing from European countries, it’s not easy to take such an initiative because they have to face the consequences of the act.”
Unlike Marom, Yanarocak is skeptical that the operation could be considered a success because of the casualties.
“I would wish we could have stopped it before it happened,” he said.
But, “we had an intelligence problem. Israel was not expecting to receive such a hostile and violent flotilla from Turkey. Turkey was viewed as an ally, and Israel was therefore surprised. Israel had a weakness in intelligence and we had no clue who was on board and if they had any intentions to confront Israeli soldiers with steel and pistols.”
The close Israel-Turkey military and security ties
TURKEY AND Israel had for years been close allies in the defense industry, security cooperation, intelligence sharing, and military training. The relationship began in the 1960s and peaked in the 1990s, with the 1994 Defense Cooperation Agreement and 1996 Military Training Cooperation Agreement.
With those two agreements, the military-security ties became one of the closest in the Middle East, with Israel even, if foreign reports are true, having provided intelligence to Turkey in its ongoing fight against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and Ankara cooperating with Israel on Iran by providing intelligence it had gathered.
In addition, Turkey used to be one of Israel’s primary arms customers with Israeli firms upgrading Turkish M60 tanks and F-4E planes, as well as supplying Turkey with armed Heron drones, electronic reconnaissance and surveillance systems. Additionally supplying advanced missile systems and smart ammunition.
The two countries used to participate in annual joint navy and air force drills, but following the downgrading of ties, Jerusalem turned instead to Turkey’s adversary, Greece and the Greek Cypriots, instead for military exercises of air, sea and ground forces. One such exercise took place in mid-July between the Israeli Air Force and Hellenic Air Force, where pilots practiced aerial refueling and dog fights.
Following the Mavi Marmara crisis, Ankara froze all defense industry projects and military cooperation with Jerusalem. After the breakdown of ties, Turkey also exerted efforts to isolate Jerusalem from military cooperation with NATO. Following a 2016 reconciliation deal, Ankara withdrew its longstanding veto against Jerusalem being accepted as a partner nation to the organization (not a member).
The boat used in the flotilla, which has since changed its name to the Anatolien, was also put up for auction due to financial difficulties last year. The company that had owned the ship applied for bankruptcy protection, as the ship was sailing to Somalia.
The insurance value of the ship is $2 million and it will cost $320,222 to bring the ship from Mogadishu Port in Somalia to Turkey.
It’s been docked in Mogadishu as recently as June 26th of this year.
Has the memory of the Mavi Marmara faded?
SIX YEARS after Ankara broke off relations with Jerusalem following the 2010 incident, Turkey and Israel normalized ties and sent ambassadors to respective capitals, but the ties once again cooled after the United States moved its embassy to Jerusalem, in 2018. Ambassadors were sent home and have not yet returned.
According to Yanarocak, following the brokerage of the 2016 normalizing of ties, the memory of the Mavi Marama has faded.
“It’s not forgotten but it’s not as popular as it was before. The government isn’t embracing it as it did before and it is not constituting an obstacle between the two nations,” he explained. “We can’t reset people like we reset computers. They care about the Palestinian issue, but care less than the last decade because the economic situation isn’t great, and they are busy with their own survival.”
In recent years, Turkey has again sought to rebuild ties with Israel, and Erdogan has met with Prime Minister Yair Lapid, President Isaac Herzog and Alternate Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. The two countries also cooperated at levels, unseen since the incident, to stop Iranian-backed cells to kidnap and kill Israelis in Istanbul.
Following intense work by Israeli security forces along with Turkish security forces, Turkish authorities arrested five Iranians suspected of planning attacks on Israelis and seized two pistols and two silencers from the suspects.
In a call to reporters after Israel lowered the travel warning back to a level three, a senior defense official said that there remains the potential for Iran to act in Turkey in the future.
“They have the cells and therefore we need to be aware of that with the Turks,” he said.
Just days after the warning was lowered, Turkey hosted the Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian paid a visit to Ankara, meeting with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
During the visit, which had been canceled twice over the terrorist plots, said during a press conference with Cavusoglu, “We consider the fake Israeli regime as the number one enemy of Muslims and the Islamic world.”
According to Yanarocak, “we have to do everything to create a positive relationship with turkey. Turkey is a very important and strong country and there is no intention to turn such a country into an adversary or enemy.
But, despite the rapprochement, the presence of Hamas in Turkey remains the most important obstacle to reinstating ambassadors.
Nevertheless, one of the important reasons behind the renewed relations is “because we are speaking of a new Middle East, a joint initiative of Arab States with Israel to confront Iran, and Turkey doesn’t want to miss this venture.”
Nevertheless, “Turkey prefers not to confront Iran,” Yanarocak explained, referencing the 1639 Treaty of Kasri Shirin.
“It’s a chess game that they are playing and the most important line is that their borders-which is a holy line. The borders were drawn by them, and not colonial powers. They are very proud of it and we can’t expect a confrontation between them. They may sit at a table with a smile yet kick each other under the table.”
“So, even if Turkey is trying to become part of this new venture, we can’t expect them to take action against Iran,” he said.
Israel does not plan to restart military cooperation, yet, with Turkey.
“Turkey is an important country and it would be great if we can come to agreements with them in various areas. Doing so makes our relationship stronger,” Marom said, adding that Israel “needs to have good relations with neighboring countries.”
“The Middle East is a very dynamic area, and there are times where ties with Turkey have been better than with the Greeks. But time goes on, leaders change, in every country,” Marom said. “Israel has to take advantage of the right opportunities, but does not give everything all at once.”