Untangling Turkey’s Middle East allegiances
Turkey, in a sticky web of allegiances, shares mutual enemies with the Islamic State.
By
Behlül Özkan
12/19/15, 12:41 PM CET
ISTANBUL — The northwestern corner of Syria is home to a dizzying spectrum of anti-Assad forces. Weapons — and fighters — have amassed in the area in large part thanks to Turkey’s “open door” policy, which makes the passage relatively painless. When Turkey’s ethnic brethren, the Turkmen, recently became the targets of Russian air strikes — prompting, perhaps, Turkey’s decision to shoot down a Russian fighter jet on November 24 — the incident brought Turkey’s murky relationship with a tangled web of jihadist groups to the fore.
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