Israel-Turkey tensions rise after Netanyahu orders strikes on Syrian airbase

Unannounced Israeli jets near the Turkish border could easily have triggered a clash, in a high-stakes ‘warning’ to Ankara

The eight strikes on the Abu Al-Duhur airbase in northwest Idlib province on Tuesday were characterised by Netanyahu as a warning to Turkey against expanding its military presence in Syria or helping rebuild the Syrian armed forces.

Netanyahu’s office claimed Israel and Syria had agreed to “a status quo in security matters”, which Damascus was “on the verge of breaching” by permitting Turkish troops to deploy at the airbase near Aleppo.

“Israel repeatedly warned Syria that such a deployment would pose a threat to Israel’s security. Syria chose to ignore these warnings,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement issued on Tuesday evening.

The following day, the Israeli leader reframed the strikes as a “message” that he would not tolerate a Turkish military entrenchment in Syria that “advances southward, because it threatens us”.

“We conveyed that message: don’t,” Netanyahu told Israeli Army Radio. “But apparently they didn’t hear it, so we made sure they understood it better”.

His comments followed a rare expression of “deep concern” from Washington at Israel’s “unnecessary escalation”.