Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a ceremony for the handover of new vehicles to the gendarmerie and police forces in Istanbul, Turkey, Nov. 28, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Murad Sezer

Israeli Prime Minister Benjaman Netanyahu’s office on Friday lambasted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as an “antisemitic dictator” hours after Turkey said it would seek an international arrest warrant for Netanyahu.

The latest developments further escalated already high tensions between the two countries following Israel’s strike earlier this week on a Syrian airbase over Israeli concerns regarding the potential deployment of Turkish troops there.

In the Israeli statement, Netanyahu’s office vowed to combat Erdogan’s “aggression” in the Middle East and described the Turkish effort to get him arrested as a “pathetic” way to try to intimidate Israel.

“Erdogan is an antisemitic dictator who has massacred Kurds, harbors Hamas terrorists, occupies half of Cyprus, and jails record numbers of journalists and politicians who oppose him,” the statement said. “He now seeks to extend his aggression against Israel into Syria. Israel will not tolerate it.”

Netanyahu’s office added, “Erdogan’s pathetic attempt to intimidate the leaders and soldiers of Israel, the only true democracy in the Middle East, will go nowhere.”

The statement came after Turkey earlier on Friday said it would seek an Interpol red notice for the arrest of Netanyahu as part of a domestic criminal case linked to Israel’s interception of an activist flotilla bound for Gaza.

An Interpol red notice is a global alert to police forces worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a person, but it does not legally compel any country to make an arrest. Instead, the measure relies on a national arrest warrant or court order issued by a specific country or international tribunal.

Turkish Justice Minister Akin Gurlek announced the move on social media, saying that arrest warrants had been issued for Netanyahu and another suspect on charges that included “genocide” and “crimes against humanity” as part of a case before an Istanbul court against 35 people concerning Israel’s interception of the Gaza-bound flotilla.

“A request has been made to our Ministry of Interior for the issuance of a red notice at the international level for their search, and the relevant documents have been forwarded to our Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” Gurlek posted.

As part of the Global Sumud Flotilla, anti-Israel activists have tried multiple times to break Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza, claiming they aim to deliver humanitarian aid to the enclave. Israeli authorities have noted that the amount of aid on the flotillas have been tiny in comparison to the humanitarian aid entering Gaza, calling the activist effort a “PR stunt.” Each time Israeli forces have intercepted the ships.

Israel launched its blockade to prevent Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that ruled Gaza before the war and currently controls about 40 percent of its territory, from getting weapons and other supplies to attack the Jewish state.

Since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza in October 2023, Erdogan has emerged as one of Israel’s fiercest critics on the global stage, comparing the country to Nazi Germany and even threatening to invade.

However, tensions skyrocketed even further earlier this week over Syria.

Israel warned Turkey on Thursday against “dangerous adventures” in Syria, two days after striking an airbase where it said Ankara was preparing to deploy troops.

Erdogan is “dragging Turkey into dangerous adventures in Syria. Israel will not allow any actor to threaten its security,” Defense Minister Israel Katz wrote on X. “He would be better off continuing to deliver empty, fantastical speeches against Israel in the Turkish parliament rather than testing Israel’s determination to defend itself.”

Turkey’s Defense Ministry hit back, saying Ankara would continue supporting Syria’s efforts to develop its military capabilities and infrastructure. “It is essential for the peace and stability of both Syria and the region that Israel ceases such reckless attacks and complies with the requirements of international law,” the ministry said.

The exchange followed Israel’s strike on Tuesday on the Abu al-Duhur airbase in northwestern Syria, where Israeli officials said Turkey was preparing to establish a military presence. The attack damaged runways and hangars at the base, which had recently undergone reconstruction.

Netanyahu said Israel had warned Ankara against moving forces into the area before the strike. “We made it clear to Turkey: Don’t,” he said Wednesday. “Apparently they didn’t hear the message, so we made sure they understood it better.”

Syrian officials disputed Israel’s account, saying there had been no plan to establish a Turkish base or permanent troop presence at Abu al-Duhur. Turkey’s Defense Ministry also denied that a Turkish military delegation was at the base before or during the Israeli strike.

Four days before the attack, Mossad chief Roman Gofman spoke with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani in one of the highest-level known contacts between Israel and Syria’s new government, Reuters reported Wednesday, citing three people familiar with the matter. Turkey’s military role was a central subject of the call, with Gofman raising Israeli concerns about Turkish troop deployments, weapons sales, and drones supplied to the Syrian military, according to the report. 

The strike was the clearest sign yet that Israel is prepared to use force to prevent Ankara from establishing military capabilities there that could threaten Israel or restrict its freedom of action, an approach Eitan Shamir, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, said was based on “similar logic” to Israel’s years-long campaign against Iran’s military entrenchment in Syria.

Shamir drew a distinction, however, between Turkey’s role today and the much deeper relationship Iran had with Syria under former President Bashar al-Assad.

“It was a kind of exchange,” he told The Algemeiner. The Iranians “guaranteed the regime’s survival, and the [Assad] regime opened the door to them completely. The idea was to build a front directly against Israel.”

From Israel’s point of view, the response is essentially the same, he said.

“We don’t like either of them. We’re telling everyone that there is a red line, and if you cross it, we will act. We will destroy everything you are building and everything you are doing.”

However, Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak, a Turkey expert at Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Dayan Center, said Israel was careful not to jeopardize longstanding ties with Turkey, which date back to Turkey’s recognition of Israel in 1949 and, unlike its relations with many regional neighbors, did not require a formal peace treaty. 

“Turning Turkey into an active enemy would be contrary to Israel’s national security interests,” he told The Algemeiner. “The main objective of the latest strike was precisely to prevent a more serious confrontation with Turkey in Syria and to reduce the potential for further friction between the two countries.”

According to Shamir, Turkey views Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s government as a client state after helping him in his fight against Assad. 

“The Turks see Syria completely as their backyard,” he said. 

Ankara, Shamir added, views northern Syria as an area under “quasi-Turkish sovereignty,” with Turkish forces already deployed there and a de facto security zone along the Turkish border.

Turkey has become one of al-Sharaa’s closest foreign backers since Assad was ousted in December 2024. Ankara and Damascus signed a military cooperation accord in 2025, under which Turkey agreed to provide training, weapons systems, and logistical equipment to Syria’s military. Shamir described al-Sharaa as “a kind of protégé or even a proxy” for Turkey.

The growing ties have also extended to the Mediterranean. Turkish Naval Forces Commander Adm. Ercument Tatlioglu traveled to Syria’s Latakia port aboard the TCG Istanbul frigate in July, the first visit by Turkish naval vessels to the port since the Syrian civil war began. Turkish and Syrian commanders held talks on expanding military cooperation and inspected Latakia’s military port as part of Ankara’s support for the restructuring of Syria’s armed forces.

From Israel’s perspective, Shamir said, the concern is that Turkey could expand its military presence farther south, closer to Israel, a development he described as “very, very bad.”

Israel faced a similar problem when Russia intervened militarily in Syria in 2015. Nine days before Russian combat operations began, Netanyahu flew to Moscow with then-IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot and military intelligence chief Herzi Halevi to establish a deconfliction mechanism with President Vladimir Putin. The arrangement lasted nearly a decade, allowing Israel to carry out hundreds of strikes against Iran and Hezbollah in Syria without directly confronting Russian forces. 

Washington, meanwhile, has sought to keep the escalating tensions from turning into a direct clash between two of its regional partners.  

“Erdogan has Trump’s ear,” Shamir said, referring to US President Donald Trump. 

US special envoy for Syria Tom Barrack called Israel’s strike an “unnecessary escalation” and said the Trump administration was working on a deconfliction mechanism among Israel, Turkey, and Syria to allow the sides to exchange information and reduce the risk of an accidental confrontation.