Analyses Turkish-Israeli Cooperation in the Context of Turkey’s “Zero Problem” Foreign Policy

After the cold war era in 1990’s, Turkey was in a position of seeking a partner in the Middle East that could provide cooperation in grooving security challenges from its Middle Eastern neighbours. Because of its geo-strategic importance in the regionshe has done the threat assessments again and has taken the necessary decisions to modernize her armed forces since the second half of 1990’s. However, refrained contributions with the pretext of human rights violations of U.S.A. and western countries has led Turkey to put Israeli military and defence industry cooperation in the agenda. Turkish-Israeli relations that continued in a particular order since 1994 abruptly reached a braking point with a series of events after Israeli attack in Gazza at the end of 2008. What has changed in the situation to deteriorate the bilateral relations? This article analyses the changing trends in military and security relations between Turkey and Israel in regard to Justice and Development Party government new foreign policy “zero problem with neighbours”. It identifies factors that influence the deterioration of relations between two countries and puts forward the overall picture of the current situation.