The history and future of Turkey–Gulf cooperation

After a relatively long cold spell between Turkey and the Gulf countries that lasted from 2010, the new relations entered over the past two years, most recently with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's visit, have created a very serious atmosphere of optimism in the region.

In fact, for this optimism there is no need for any development elsewhere in the world. Every rapprochement, every high-level contact between Turkey and the Gulf countries in particular, and the whole Arab world in general, produces great goodwill and excitement in this geography. Whatever the cause of the tensions since 2010, when they have caused distance to open between the two worlds, all their negative effects are felt far more strongly, especially in Arab societies. The goodwill and warmth Erdoğan most recently encountered in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, and the scale of the cooperation and joint investment plans announced afterwards, resembled the reunion of kin who had long been kept apart. I think it would not be an exaggeration to say this: when Turkey takes one step toward the Arab world, the Arab world is ready to take at least 5 steps toward it.

It is well known that Western countries have always taken a very close interest in the Gulf countries in particular because of their great investment capacity. To attract these investments, and to hold on to those they have already attracted, they conduct a very meticulous political, economic and cultural diplomacy. It is certain that the volume of investments that came onto the agenda with Erdoğan's visit has drawn attention in Europe as well.

Let us repeat: in seeking opportunities for rapprochement and cooperation between Turkey and the Gulf countries, no justification is needed beyond the most natural, historical, cultural, unbreakable bonds between them. These historical and cultural bonds in fact required Turkey and the Gulf countries to be in a far more intense and stronger cooperation among themselves than now. But, again perhaps because of recent and well-known historical conditions, relations have always followed an ebb and flow.

After the First World War, as a result of having been defeated, what was placed between us, almost as a punishment, was more than geographical borders, and worse: borders and barriers sown in our minds. It is not possible for the people of either country to defend these mental barriers. Neither a Turk who knows himself nor an Arab who knows himself can advocate Turks and Arabs growing apart from one another. A hundred years ago the two peoples were already one, a single whole, inseparable. Now, with the borders placed between us a hundred years ago, we have become two peoples. This is a de facto situation, and of course these historical de facto situations cannot be ignored.

Yet these de facto situations are still not a fate, and in a situation in which everyone in the world seeks their own interests on every occasion and at every opportunity, the great opportunities created by the historical bonds between us cannot be ignored either. The anti-Arab rhetoric that flares up among us at every attempt at rapprochement can have no national side. Whoever brought down the Ottoman Empire, whoever wanted to impose Sèvres on Turkey, this rhetoric too is their handiwork. Those who voice it today are not far from that betrayal either.

At a time when the United States, Russia, China and the EU countries are seeking new balances all over the world, it does not befit the great Islamic world for its different countries or alliances to remain a passive choice among all these balances. With populations approaching 2 billion, the Muslim world has certainly had repeated opportunities to be more active in these quests for balance. In past quests for balance, the Islamic world's not aspiring to either side of the balance may have stemmed from its own internal divisions. The borders placed mentally between them worked in favor of the owners of the balances. Today there is a very different conjuncture, and both the Gulf countries are each a balancing element on their own, and so is Turkey. That together they would form a far greater balancing element is a much nearer possibility.

Such discussions and assessments are also being conducted by Arab intellectuals and political circles, especially after Erdoğan's visit. Mahmoud Allouch, who writes on aljazeera.net, asks, for instance, in the atmosphere created by this visit, "How can the Gulf and Turkey change the Middle East?" Allouch asks his question expressing an expectation that has awakened in Arab public opinion and is frequently voiced.

That is, relations between Turkey and the Gulf countries will not remain limited to an increase in the volume of trade between them; Ankara-Gulf cooperation can lead to comprehensive economic, social and political changes across the Middle East. When the dialogue that has so far been missing between them takes place, it may become possible to establish an order in which everyone wins, in areas where they have been in competition with one another and where, because of this competition, everyone has needlessly lost. The instabilities experienced in Syria, Libya, Yemen, the Mediterranean, and many regions of North and Central Africa, which have resulted in everyone's loss, can in this way, through a joint search for solutions and cooperation, enter a path in which first their peoples and then the whole Islamic world will emerge as winners. In essence there is no problem that cannot be solved through good-faith dialogue. The Arab and Turkish worlds have more than enough reasons to bear this mutual good faith.

As Turkey draws closer to the Gulf, the new alliances formed in this way do not actually require it to break from its engagements with Europe or the United States, or even with Russia. If what is essentially demanded is stability, it is important to be able to provide it without having to choose between the two, and Turkey is a rare country that can do so. Having won such a historic and exceptional position under Erdoğan's leadership, Turkey is in this respect a great opportunity for a strong and alternative alliance as well.

At precisely this point, the "xenophobia" and "anti-Arab" rhetoric we have encountered in Turkey recently, which is probably being watched closely and with concern from the Arab world as well, should be regarded as a treacherous attempt at sabotage against this very alliance.

Sabotaging assassinations against these rapprochement efforts should not be considered a surprise. These are actions or rhetoric approved neither by the Turkish people nor by the Turkish government. The Turkish people are familiar with the reality of the terror operations that are set against Turkey at every breakthrough and every opening.

These too should be seen as of that kind.