Two meetings, held almost simultaneously towards the end of December, offered a stark illustration of the competing strategic visions now shaping the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant.In Damascus, Turkiye’s foreign, defence and intelligence chiefs met Syrian officials on December 22 as Ankara continued to prioritise the consolidation of state authority and stabilisation after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of listOn the same day, Israel hosted Greece and Cyprus for the latest iteration of their trilateral framework. Two days before that meeting, Israel launched another air attack on Syria – one of more than 600 strikes in 2025 – a reminder to Ankara and Damascus that Israel is willing to disrupt Syria’s recovery from war.While officially framed around energy cooperation and regional connectivity, the trilateral agenda between Israel, Greece and Cyprus has steadily expanded to encompass security coordination and military alignment, signalling a shift from economic competition to strategic containment.For Cem Gurdeniz, a retired admiral and one of the architects of Turkiye’s “Blue Homeland” maritime doctrine that calls for Ankara to safeguard its interests across the surrounding seas – the Aegean, Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea – the meeting was an attempt “to exclude and encircle Turkiye”.Gurdeniz describes Israel’s approach as an indirect containment strategy aimed not at confrontation but at altering Ankara’s behaviour. “The objective is not war, but behavioural change – narrowing Turkiye’s strategic space to induce withdrawal without conflict,” …
