Baby steps and a phone call

President Obama made his first visit to Israel this week, and the timing couldn’t have been more important. (Yes, I think it’s weird that Obama didn’t visit one of the U.S.’s most important allies in the region during his first term.) His remarks about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict got the most attention, but a short meeting and phone call right before the president left might turn out to be more impactful in the long run.

In 2010, a group of Turkish boats carrying supplies to Gaza tried to break Israel’s blockade, and the Israeli military raided it; eight Turkish civilians were killed. Ever since, Israel’s government has refused to apologize. The two countries called back their envoys in 2011, which is basically the diplomatic equivalent of yelling “I AM NOW GIVING YOU THE SILENT TREATMENT.”

This was awful for the U.S. because our other most important ally in the Middle East is Turkey. It’s a large, strategically located country with a secular government that, until recently, had gotten along with Israel. Their current administrations weren’t aligned philosophically even before the 2010 raid. It would be a tense situation regardless, but when you factor in the fact that our other other most important ally in the Middle East, Jordan, is dealing with a Syrian civil war on its doorstep, you can understand why the U.S. position has been that we REALLY need you guys to work out your stuff and get along.

I’m not sure what Jedi mind meld Obama worked on BenjaminNetanyahu, but the Israeli prime minister called Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and apologized for the raid, offered compensation for the victims and agreed to restore diplomatic relations. They’re not holding hands and signing kumbaya, but at least they’re talking, and that’s more than they were doing last week.

Right now the conflict in Syria is a mess, with refugees spilling into Jordan. Iran is, well, still Iran. Who knows what’s going on in Egypt. It’s an enormous development for the region that two of its most stable democracies are now back on speaking terms. Both Netanyahu and Erdogan are going to get a lot of criticism from their own citizens – especially Netanyahu, who’ll probably be accused of “caving.” (Well, that didn’t take long.)

It’s also important for the U.S. During the last election there was a lot of speculation about America’s “standing” in the world, which I guess means how much other countries respect us. President Obama asked Netanyahu to apologize to Turkey. It would’ve been very easy for Netanyahu to wait until the president had left before making that phone call, just to prove a point (like Iran releasing the hostages the day of President Reagan’s inauguration, just as a “screw you” to Jimmy Carter). But he didn’t. In fact, Erdogan asked to speak to Obama before Netanyahu got on the phone. Yes, diplomacy is 90 percent symbolism, but I think it matters that this unfolded the way it did. For instance, Erdogan called Palestinian officials to give them a heads-up about the apology – before Netanyahu called. It seems to have been very scheduled… which means that it all could’ve been scheduled differently.

Both sides wanted the president there. Both sides wanted America at the table. And that still means something.