Israel and Turkey in talks to avoid conflict over Syria

Officials from the two countries met Wednesday in Azerbaijan to begin talks to set up a mechanism to avoid conflict between the Turkish and Israeli militaries in Syria, according to statements from both governments. Israeli National Security Council Director Tzachi Hanegbi led the talks with Turkish officials, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office.

The Israeli and Turkish militaries both operated in Syria for years during the country’s long civil war. Since the war ended with the fall of the Assad regime in December, tensions have risen between the two countries. Israel has launched an intensifying series of military strikes it says are intended to protect its long-term security, while Turkey has embraced the country’s new Islamist-led government that is headed by former rebel leaders.

“We have no intention of clashing with any country in Syria, not just Israel," said Turkey’s foreign minister Hakan Fidan in a televised interview earlier this week. He said recent Israeli military strikes in Syria were “unacceptable" and criticized what he said was Israel’s “expansionist ambitions in the region," according to a transcript of the comments from Turkey’s state news agency.

The collapse of the Assad regime in Syria radically altered the balance of power in the Middle East, dealing a stinging defeat to Russia and Iran and broadening the influence of Turkey which long supported the rebellion against the former regime that began in 2011.

Israel has been hostile to Syria’s new government, which is led by former members of a Sunni Islamist rebel group, Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham. The group was founded as an offshoot of Al-Qaeda but broke ties with the jihadist organization in 2016 and swore to give up attacks abroad, part of a yearslong effort to gain international acceptance.

The government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in green necktie, is entering talks with Israel over issues in Syria as he hopes to improve relations with Washington.

Turkey was among the first to embrace Syria’s new government, which is led by President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the former rebel leader who led the 11-day offensive that pushed Assad from power. Sharaa has vowed to govern Syria more inclusively and in late March appointed a new government that includes members of minority groups along with skilled technocrats and icons of Syrian civil society.

After the fall of Assad, Israel launched a series of military strikes aimed at preventing threats to its security, destroying former regime military equipment and sending its forces deeper into Syrian territory, further raising tensions with the new government in Damascus. In February, Netanyahu called for the demilitarization of all of southern Syria.

The talks are intended to recreate a line of communication between the Israeli and Turkish militaries known as a deconfliction mechanism, intended to avoid unintended clashes, experts said.

The new channel would be similar to one that Israel and Russia used for years to avoid a clash when both countries were launching airstrikes in the country, said Avner Golov, a former senior director at Israel’s National Security Council, who is now with MIND Israel, a national security advisory group. The U.S. and Russia also had a deconfliction line during the conflict in Syria.

Golov said Israel needed to enter into broader talks with Turkey about what it can tolerate from the Turkish presence in Syria and how the two regional powers—who are both allies of the U. S.—can help shape the region in the future.

“There’s a practical reality in Syria, in the sense that Turkey and Israel find themselves in a closest sort of operational setting," said Alper Coskun, a former head of international security affairs at the Turkish foreign ministry.

“The logic being, we’re not looking for confrontation in Syria," he said. “We have, as Turkey, some security considerations, and we will continue implementing what we need to be done there. But this is not directly against Israel."

The launch of the talks between security officials also comes at a crucial moment in Turkey’s relationship with the Trump administration. The government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is hoping to improve relations with Washington and is calling for the U.S. to remove sanctions imposed on its defense industry during President Trump’s first term over Turkey’s purchase of a Russian weapons system.

“What they’re doing in Syria is one of the safest ways for Ankara to tell Washington that it’s being a team player," said Gonul Tol, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington an expert on Turkish foreign policy.

Erdogan has been a critic of Israel’s war in Gaza since the launch of its military operation in October 2023 in response to the deadly Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, with the Turkish government recalling its ambassador from Tel Aviv in November 2023 and imposing trade sanctions on Israel in May 2024. The war interrupted a brief thaw in relations that included a visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Turkey earlier in 2023.

Israel’s air force launched an unusually intense wave of airstrikes on Syria on April 3 that underscored the risk of a confrontation with Turkey.

The strikes targeted airports as well as the T4 military base in western Syria, closer to Turkey than other Israeli strikes which have hit southern Syria. Syria’s foreign ministry said Israeli strikes that night almost destroyed a military airport and injured dozens of civilians.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the strikes were a signal to Syria’s new government not to let forces hostile to Israel into their country. “If you allow forces hostile to Israel to enter Syria and endanger Israeli security interests—you will pay a very heavy price," he said.

Turkey and Israel have engaged in military deconfliction in the past, including in October 2024 when Israeli and Turkish officials worked to avoid a clash when a Turkish military vessel sailed to Lebanon to evacuate thousands of Turkish citizens during Israel’s war with Hezbollah, according to Turkish officials.

Write to Jared Malsin at jared.malsin@wsj.com and Dov Lieber at dov.lieber@wsj.com