Inside Israel's intelligence room: The unfolding drama amid Turkey's secret military expansion in Syria

In July 2025, Ankara delivered an unusual present to Ahmed al-Sharaa’s Syrian army: a batch of four advanced, brand-new armored personnel carriers produced domestically.

This episode, unfolding more than a year ago, is merely a symptom of a far broader regional trend. Turkey has steadily cemented its military and diplomatic footprint in Syria, operating under Israel’s watchful gaze.

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The strike capabilities of the Turkish Air Force, which boasts an advanced fleet of F-16 fighter jets and may soon acquire F-35s, have similarly drawn intense scrutiny.

It stands to reason that over this prolonged period, the Intelligence Directorate detected far more than the initial four APCs. Yet, until last week, Israel gritted its teeth and exercised restraint. Whenever it did intervene, it maintained a strictly clandestine profile. Despite the occasional belligerent rhetoric and the inevitable back-channel messages passed through third parties, the sweeping Turkish initiative to funnel an endless stream of military hardware into Syria and cement its influence there had never encountered an Israeli bomb.

That paradigm shifted decisively this week following the Israeli strike on Abu al-Duhur Airbase in the Idlib region, explicitly targeting the Turkish military buildup in northern Syria. Israel’s top echelon appears to have recognized that abandoning the flawed containment strategy, a doctrine that dominated every front until Oct. 7, is equally applicable to the Turkish juggernaut.

As fate would have it, the strike unfolded mere hours before polls opened in the Likud Party primary. Critics immediately charged that this dramatic maneuver was orchestrated exclusively to benefit Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. While military and political clocks occasionally align, and ambitious actors frequently labor to synchronize them, the assertion that Israel carried out a strike in Syria purely for electoral gain is absurd. The military friction between Jerusalem and Ankara is hardly a new phenomenon, having simmered for over a year. Throughout this period, Israel steadily dedicated more intelligence resources to the Syrian theater.

Erdoğan’s expansionist appetite

Historically, Syria has consistently served as a testing ground for imperial rivalries, a dynamic unlikely to shift in the coming decades. The collapse of the Assad regime in December 2024, coupled with the subsequent degradation of Iran following successive clashes with Israel and crippling American economic sanctions, created a vacuum in Syria that Turkey eagerly filled. Addressing the nation days after the Assad regime fell, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan remarked, “The events that occurred recently in our region, especially in Syria, remind us of an important fact.” He elaborated, “Turkey is bigger than Turkey.”

Erdoğan’s expansionist appetite extends well beyond Syria. Highlighting this trend, a highly placed intelligence official recently told me, “Dramatic economic reforms have begun in Turkey; it has a large army and independent defense industries, it has planes, ships and submarines, and mostly it has a vision.” The official added, “This vision includes Syria, Kurdish lands and even investment in the Horn of Africa. In 15 years, there will be two regional powers in the Middle East—Israel and Turkey.”

The intelligence apparatus is not alone in its alarm. The Nagel Committee—tasked with evaluating Israel’s future defense budget amid shifting strategic realities—addressed the Turkish menace in its January 2025 report with razor-sharp clarity, warning, “The presence of Turkey’s proxies or Turkish forces in Syria could deepen the danger of a direct Turkish-Israeli conflict.”

A direct confrontation with Turkey may not materialize in the immediate future, but it could certainly evolve over the next decade. If Israel, backed by robust American support, topples the Islamist regime in Tehran or significantly curtails its maneuverability, the next major conflict on Israel’s horizon could very well involve Turkish aircraft, missiles and warships.

Erdoğan is forging an immense military machine armed with strategic capabilities and cutting-edge technology. Crucially, the lessons of Oct. 7 dictate that adversaries must be judged by their capabilities, not their perceived intentions. Turkey’s strategic alliances, industrial base and economic prowess easily dwarf those of Iran.

Israel acted wisely by delivering a kinetic message to Turkey’s expansionist project while it remains in its early stages.

Originally published by Israel Hayom.

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