What is the effect of lobby groups on Turkish-Israeli relations?
Turkish-Israeli relations go back to the foundation of the Jewish state in 1948, when Turkey was the first Muslim-majority nation to recognize Israel. The two states have been partners in the region, and some scholars argue that Turkey and Israel are the most similar to each other in the Middle East, in terms of their relations with the West. Turkish-Israeli relations hit a highpoint after the 1997 Turkish “post-modern coup”, and the two countries signed billions of dollars in military contracts. But with the rise of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2002, the extreme right in Israel and the American neocons found themselves in a panic over fears that the AKP was secretly Islamist, anti-US, and anti-Israel. The extreme right wing of both countries teamed up and launched a smear campaign against the AKP, branding them as anti-Semitic. Despite this rocky start, however, Turkish-Israeli relations continued to prosper, and the annual volume of economic relations is over $10 billio
