by Burak Bekdil
Like most moments in the passionate Turkish-Persian relationship, incidents of Muslim-to-Muslim fraternity are misleading.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at Saadabad Palace, photo by Mohammad Hassanzadeh via Wikimedia Commons
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 739, February 13, 2018
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Like
most moments in the passionate Turkish-Persian relationship, incidents
of Muslim-to-Muslim fraternity are misleading. For the mullahs in
Tehran, Turkey remains too western, too treacherous, and too Sunni. For
the neo-Ottomans in Ankara, Iran remains too discreetly hostile, too
ambitious, too untrustworthy, and too Shiite.
After having fought several inconclusive wars, the
Ottoman Turks and the Safavid Persians decided, in 1639, to embrace a
new code of conduct that would last for centuries: cold peace. After
Iran’s Islamic Revolution in 1979, that cold peace was tested: the then
staunchly secular Turkish establishment feared that the mullahs in
Tehran might wish to undermine Turkey by exporting its “pervert
Islamism” to Turkish soil.
The 21st century iteration of the cold
peace took a different turn after Turkey swerved from staunch state
secularism to elected Islamism. Theoretically, the cold peace should
have moved from “cold” to just “peace.” It did not, because Turkey’s
Islamism was too Sunni and Iran’s too Shiite.
The cold war was here to stay, with its golden
rule respected by both Ankara and Tehran: pretend to respect your rival;
do not openly confront one another; and cooperate against common
enemies – there are, after all, plenty of them.
Trade between the cold peace partners would
prosper. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan once said, during his time as
the Turkish prime minister, that he felt Tehran was his second home. In
return, then Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad praised his good
friend Erdoğan “for his clear stance against the Zionist regime.” The
“Passage to Persia” was in perfect progress, at least in theory.
When, in the summer of 2009, Tehran’s streets
erupted in flames and thousands of angry young Iranians rose up under
the Green Movement banner against Ahmedinejad’s corrupt sharia rule, the
Turkish government exchanged diplomatic niceties with Tehran. “It is
not right to interfere in the domestic affairs of a big country like
Iran,” then President Abdullah Gül commented on the Iranian protests.
“Iran’s stability is very important for us. We want Iran’s problems to
get resolved without disturbing internal peace.”
Four summers later, in 2013, millions of Turks
took to the streets to stand against a government they thought was
moving in an increasingly “Iranian direction;” i.e., towards an
unpleasant blend of autocracy and Islamism. As the Turkish protests
gained strength, the Iranian government reciprocated for 2009 by staying
mute. Puzzlingly, Iranian youth, too, were largely indifferent to the
Turkish riots, though some watched them with excitement and curiosity.
At the peak of the Turkish protests, Erdoğan and his senior officials blamed the unrest on a rich menu of culprits, from telekenesis
to Jewish lobby groups to Zionists, western governments, western media,
and western airliners – all of which had apparently united with the
sole purpose of stopping the rise of a new Turkish empire.
At the end of 2017, the unrest moved back to the
Persian street. The golden rule underpinning the Turkish-Iranian cold
peace remained unchanged. Ankara voiced concern over the protests in
Iranian cities, and then the foreign ministers of the “brotherly
countries” exchanged diplomatic pleasantries over the phone.
Erdoğan stated how deeply Turkey values Iran’s
stability and generously praised Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani.
Iranian officials, meanwhile, blamed “enemies” for the protests in the
country – though they displayed less ingenuity on this score than their
Turkish friends, who blamed esoteric creatures like the “ulterior mind”
(a Turkish invention that Ankara officials have yet to define).
Turkey warned those who might wish to interfere in
Iranian politics, with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu
explicitly accusing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US
President Donald Trump of supporting the Iranian protesters. Among the
protesters, groups of Azeri-Turkish pan-Turkic youth were spotted making
racist signs, prompting Ankara to task ultra-nationalist Turkish
politicians with getting the Turkic protesters to “withdraw … from the
scenes of protest.” Another brotherly gesture.
As is so often the case in the Turkish-Persian
relationship, moments of Muslim-to-Muslim fraternity are misleading. For
the Iranian mullahs of various conservative stripes, Turkey remains too
western, too treacherous, and too Sunni. And for the neo-Ottomans in
Ankara, Iran remains too discreetly hostile, too ambitious, too
untrustworthy, and too Shiite. Turkish neo-Ottoman ambitions are simply
not wanted in Tehran, Damascus, or the underground office rooms of
Beirut.
For many years, Ankara thought it could win hearts
and minds in Tehran by emphasizing convergences over divergences. The
Turks opposed sanctions on Iran and later helped Iranians evade them.
There was also the common enemy – Israel – but as it turns out, even
Israel can divide rather than unite Sunni Turkey and Shiite Iran.
When Erdoğan spearheaded the recent international
effort to recognize east Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian
state, Tehran shrugged off the effort, calling it “too little, too
late.” According to Iran, the Turks should have gone so far as to
recognize the whole of Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital, not just
the eastern section. Sunni mullahs in Ankara took this as the Shiite
mullahs trying to spoil their game.
In December, Erdoğan reiterated that Syrian
President Bashar Assad was a “state terrorist and must go.” Assad is the
Tehran mullahs’ staunchest ally in this part of the world. Thinking he
will go simply because Erdoğan wants him to is likely to provoke little
more than laughter in Tehran (and Moscow).
In a rare moment of clarity, Erdoğan in 2012 put
the Turkish-Persian game in a relatively realistic light. “We cannot
comfortably work with Iran,” he said. “They highlight a sectarian
approach too much. I have repeatedly told prominent Iranians: let’s put
aside the Alevi-Sunni [divide]. Before everything, we are Muslims. Let’s
view this matter [Syria] like Muslims. When we have bilateral meetings
with them, they tell us ‘Let’s resolve this matter together.’ When it
comes to taking steps [for a solution], they unfortunately have working
methods that are particular to them. This is, of course, very sad.”
The Turks are smart, but not always smart enough.
They have finally noticed that the Iranians “highlight a sectarian
approach too much.” They have not, however, grasped what the Iranians
can clearly see: that the Turks do exactly the same thing. It is
childish to think that unconvincing “let’s-sort-this-out-like-Muslims”
rhetoric can end a 14-century-long war that has lasted since the days of
Quraysh.
BESA Center Perspectives Papers are published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family
Source: https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/turkey-iran-friendship/
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Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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