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Hezbollah losses strengthen Turkey against Iran: analysts

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Israel’s onslaught against Hezbollah in Lebanon is reassuring for Turkey, which could seize the opportunity to strengthen its regional influence in the face of its rival Iran, analysts told Agence France-Presse.

Despite being one of Israel’s fiercest critics, Turkey has been measured in its response to the blows struck against the Shiite militant group, armed and financed by Tehran, including the killing of its leader Hassan Nasrallah.

“Hezbollah’s decapitation diminishes the influence of Turkey’s topmost regional rival, Iran, and is not something Turkey would cry over,” said Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, a Turkey expert at the Brookings Institution, a US think tank.

Erdoğan lukewarm on Hezbollah

Turkey’s Sunni President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been unsparing in denouncing Israel since the start of its devastating assault on Gaza last year following a deadly attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas.

But he has not directly reacted to Hezbollah’s recent losses in public — though his foreign minister Hakan Fidan hailed Nasrallah after his killing.

“If it translates into a longer-term weakening of Iran and allied Shiite groups, including Hezbollah, that will really pave the way for Turkey to play a more dominant role” in Syria and Iraq, said Gönül Tol, Turkey director for the Middle East Institute, a research center in Washington.

Turkey’s influence in Syria

Analysts suggest Turkey is satisfied by the setback for Hezbollah and, by extension, Iran, largely because of their support for Bashar al-Assad, leader of neighboring Syria.

Turkey and Hezbollah “are hardly on the same page when it comes to regional issues, particularly in Syria where the latter supports the regime and is complicit in the war crimes Assad has committed,” said Özgür Ünlühisarcıklı of the German Marshall Fund, a US think tank.

The civil war between Assad and his rivals has destabilized Turkey’s southern border, thrusting millions of refugees onto its territory.

“From a Turkish perspective, Iran and Hezbollah are the reasons Syria is in the mess that it is,” Aydıntaşbaş said.

Pro-Palestinian, not pro-Hezbollah

Erdoğan has accused Israel of “genocide” of Palestinians in its assault on Gaza and branded Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal.

Netanyahu has rejected the claim, saying Israel must crush the Islamist group Hamas in the territory to prevent further attacks and free hostages seized by the militants.

Analysts say Turkey’s sympathy for the Palestinians — who like Erdoğan are Sunni Muslims — does not extend to support for Iran, Hezbollah and their other Shiite allies in the region, such as the Huthis in Yemen and factions in Iraq.

“Though opinions in Türkiye vary on Nasrallah’s death and Hezbollah’s losses, it’s evident that Türkiye is less concerned about these losses compared to those of Hamas,” said Ünlühisarcıklı, using the country’s official Turkish name.

Gaza security prospects

Observers say Erdoğan wants to cast himself as a leader among Sunni states — notably where the future security of Gaza is concerned.

He hosted Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in September and likely discussed “a wider coordinating role” for their countries in Gaza after the conflict, said Sinan Ciddi, a Turkish politics expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based nonprofit.

Analysts say Erdoğan’s tirades against Israel may have compromised his potential role as a mediator in the region.

But on other fronts, “Ankara is very cautious in what it says and does as its relations with Iran are always sensitive,” Aydıntaşbaş said.

“Turkey is clearly worried about even greater regional escalation and an all-out war between Iran and Israel, with unpredictable implications. It would do all it can to stay out.”

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