Amichai Chikli juxtaposed an independent Kurdistan with a Turkish-ISIS alliance

By Canaan Lidor, JNS

Israeli cabinet minister Amichai Chikli on Wednesday endorsed an independent Kurdish entity, which he juxtaposed with Syrian jihadist rebels supported by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“Kurdistan must be granted independence, while Erdogan should be expelled from NATO and left to crown himself as the caliph of an Islamic state, ruling alongside his friends in ISIS [Islamic State] and Al-Qaeda,” wrote Chikli, Israel’s Minister for Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism. He was reacting to a news report about Turkey’s actions against Kurds in Syria.

Chikli did not say whether he meant independence in Syria, Iraq, or Turkey, all of which have heavily Kurdish regions. Chikli’s office did not immediately reply to a JNS request for clarification on this issue.

Israel in 2017 supported the right of Iraqi Kurds to hold an independence referendum. Kurdish forces in Syria are considered friendly to the United States and Israel. Many Kurds throughout the region are supportive of Israel.

Pressure and sanctions by Iran, Iraq and Turkey are widely thought to have prevented the establishment of an independent Kurdish state following the referendum. In 2019, Turkey launched a military incursion into northern Syria to curb Kurdish advances there. Kurdish forces in Syria have attempted to establish de facto sovereignty following the collapse of the regime of Bashar Assad on Dec. 8, fighting both rebels and regime forces.

Turkey, a Sunni Muslim-majority nation that has opposed and frustrated Kurdish national ambitions in the region for decades, has supported Syrian rebels—including religious radicals with ties to Al Qaeda. Turkey has fought ISIS at times, but at other times also demonstrated “seeming indifference to ISIS activities within its borders,” according to an analysis published last week in Foreign Policy.

Turkey was poised to expand its presence in Kurdish-held parts of Syria, unnamed senior U.S. officials told The Wall Street Journal this week.

Erdogan led a vehemently anti-Israel line even before the outbreak of war between Israel and Iran’s proxies in October 2023, and has escalated it considerably since then.

In July, Erdogan openly threatened to invade Israel. “We must be very strong so that Israel can’t do these things to Palestine. Just as we entered Karabakh, just as we entered Libya, we might do the same to them. There is nothing we cannot do,” he said.