Together against the Sultan: Israel creates an anti-Turkish coalition with Greece and Cyprus

A meeting of the Israeli, Greek and Cypriot leaders was held in Jerusalem. The main topic was the containment of Ankara, which, according to its neighbors, is increasing its military activity in the Eastern Mediterranean. The parties considered the creation of a joint rapid reaction force to enhance military coordination between the states. Meanwhile, Turkey also makes it clear that it does not intend to give in to this "troika". Details can be found in the Izvestia article.

To spite Ankara

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Cypriot leader Nikos Christodoulides have decided to expand security cooperation. At the summit, which took place on December 22, they announced that their "trilateral alliance has no borders." And the head of the Israeli government explained that the cooperation is directed against Turkey's presence in the Mediterranean.

In particular, the parties are concerned about the strengthening of Ankara's position in the Middle East due to the coming to power of pro-Turkish forces in Damascus. In order to prevent possible aggressive actions by Turkey, the leaders considered creating a joint rapid reaction force.

In particular, we are talking about a military contingent of up to 2.5 thousand people: one thousand each from Greece and Israel, another 500 from Cyprus.

According to Israeli media, the discussion is ongoing, and the parties have not yet agreed on anything. They also noted that Athens is more active than others due to the rapid build-up of Turkey's military power in the air and at sea.

The day before, the Republic of Turkey began construction of its own 300-meter-long aircraft carrier, which should strengthen its navy. Speaking at a shipyard in Istanbul, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that the country would continue to build up its military power through its own production.

He added that Ankara would not allow its rights to be infringed, while stressing that all these steps were not aimed at war at all, but "at protecting peace and independence."

Greece, however, does not really believe such peaceful statements and continues to increase arms purchases from Israel.

In early December, Athens agreed to purchase 36 PULS missile systems for almost 700 million euros, and they plan to deploy them near the land and sea borders with Turkey. These systems are capable of delivering strategic strikes against important targets — for example, air bases, radars or power facilities — at a great distance.

According to one senior Israeli official, the level of coordination between Israel and Greece has been incredibly high for many years, with the two sides holding about 40 joint events annually, including joint exercises and intelligence sharing.

In addition, the troika cooperates in the energy sector. One of the initiatives being discussed is to connect all three countries with a common electric grid using an underwater cable. Greece is already building a power transmission line between Crete and Cyprus. If Israel joins the project, the country will be connected to the European energy grid for the first time.

In addition, the countries are actively cooperating in the gas sector. Cyprus, for example, is considering the possibility of building its own gas processing plant, which will allow it to compete with Egypt in the region.

How the alliance was formed

Trilateral cooperation between Israel, Greece and the Republic of Cyprus began to take shape in the early 2000s after the discovery of hydrocarbon reserves in the Eastern Mediterranean. Israel and Cyprus have signed maritime delimitation agreements defining their exclusive economic zones in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Subsequently, this cooperation developed into a forum called EastMed, which brought together all the coastal countries of the Eastern Mediterranean, with the exception of Turkey. The purpose of the forum was to transport produced natural gas through pipelines across the Mediterranean Sea to European markets, completely excluding Ankara and Turkish Cyprus from this process.

Between 2008 and 2020, tensions between Turkey and Greece increased because of this. Against the background of deteriorating relations between the Republic of Turkey and Israel, a trilateral alliance against Ankara began to form.

In recent years, military cooperation between Israel and Greece has intensified. In 2015, the parties signed an agreement allowing Israeli military units to operate in Greece. Israeli pilots, for example, can use Greek airspace for training.

According to Turkish media, Ankara is concerned that Greece and Cyprus are going to deploy medium- and long-range missiles, which they decided to purchase from Israel, along the Aegean islands and the Evros River (Maritsa). They are planned to be commissioned by mid-2026.

Turkey is particularly concerned that the United States may join this alliance. "The continued activities of American oil companies in the Eastern Mediterranean and Washington's general support for energy cooperation processes are likely to become an important trump card that these three countries will want to use against Ankara," the Turkish NTV channel reports.

Old and new fault lines

Kamran Hasanov, a senior lecturer at RUDN University, Doctor of Political Science at the University of Salzburg, explained in a conversation with Izvestia that there is a lot of talk about the trilateral alliance of Greece, Cyprus and Israel.

"This alliance is not really new, it began to form when the Leviathan gas field was found in the Mediterranean Sea, and Egypt participated there," the expert explained.

The political scientist added that after Turkey began to develop a field near Cyprus, and then signed an agreement during the civil war in Libya with the Government of National Accord Fayez Saraj, the situation became more complicated.

— Israel, Cyprus, Greece and Egypt opposed this, but then Cairo dropped out of this coalition because its relations with Ankara normalized, Erdogan recognized al-Sisi, although he had previously supported the Muslim Brotherhood (the organization is recognized as a terrorist and banned in the Russian Federation), — said the expert.

According to him, the Turkish leader accepted the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood was out of business in Egypt.

Meanwhile, Greece, Israel and Cyprus still remain in this alliance. Israel and Turkey are in a standoff due to many geopolitical factors. In addition to Gaza, it's also because of Syria and the Mediterranean in general," the analyst noted.

Hasanov added that Greece and Turkey have disputed islands, Cyprus still has the problem of Northern Cyprus, which Ankara supports.

— Separately, these countries do not have the power, but together they expect to contain Turkey. And each of these countries also operates separately. For example, Greece and Cyprus are trying to block Turkey's participation in the European defense program SAFE (Security Action for Europe), while Israel continues to launch strikes in Syria, where a pro—Turkish government has been established, the political scientist said.

According to him, the confrontation has intensified, and Israel is the main trigger of the alliance, taking advantage of the fact that Cyprus and Greece have tense relations with Turkey.

— There are old fault lines, to which new ones are being added, — the specialist summarized.

Erdogan is not sitting idly by

Turkish political analyst Bulent Erandac, in turn, notes that Turkey is also creating an alliance in the Eastern Mediterranean. In his opinion, Erdogan is "rebuilding the Mediterranean equation of power."

In particular, the expert draws attention to the recent meeting in Istanbul of the Turkish, Libyan and Italian leaders. "It has become Ankara's key step in shaping the new architecture of the Eastern Mediterranean. The summit was actually the third blow to the EastMed project, a pipeline that was supposed to bypass Turkey," the expert believes.

The analyst calls the maritime agreement with Libya in 2019 the first blow. The second was the failure of the project itself, and the third was Rome's joining the alliance.

This strategy is linked to the policy of the "Blue Motherland", which has been implemented since 2016, the expert believes. Erandac added that Ankara has already signed an energy agreement with the new government, and it is possible that in the future the parties will sign a maritime agreement. According to the expert, this would give the two states advantages in the struggle for maritime zones and resources, as well as weaken the positions of Greece, Cyprus and Israel.