With a steady drip of grisly leaks, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğanhas turned Turkey’s investigation into the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi into a geopolitical gamble.
The stakes are high. Get it right and Erdoğan could deal a blow to Saudi influence, boosting Turkey’s chances of becoming the Middle East’s leading Sunni power.
Get it wrong and Ankara could shatter its vital relationship with Riyadh — and face a vengeful Saudi leader for decades to come.
Erdoğan seems keenly aware of the risks.
On one hand, unofficial sources are continuously feeding incriminating details about the murder investigation to Turkish and Western news media. Given Erdoğan’s control over state institutions and security forces, such leaks are likely sanctioned by the president himself.
Publicly, however, Erdoğan has tried to strike a diplomatic tone. While he has had no qualms about lashing out at Western leaders — calling Dutch and German officials “fascists” and “Nazis” last year — he has addressed the Saudis only in the most respectful terms.
“I do not doubt the sincerity of the custodian of the two mosques,” he said in a speech in the Turkish parliament on Tuesday, referring to Saudi King Salman’s jurisdiction over the Muslim holy sites of Mecca and Medina.
Significantly, Erdoğan avoided mentioning the king’s son, Mohammad bin Salman (known as MBS), Saudi Arabia’s powerful crown prince and de facto ruler.
Since Khashoggi entered the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul three weeks ago, never to be seen again, suspicion has grown that the crown prince ordered or approved the dissident journalist’s murder.
After issuing a series of implausible denials, Riyadh acknowledged that Khashoggi had been killed inside the consulate, but maintains that he died at the hands of rogue operatives. His body has not been found.
When Erdoğan spoke about Khashoggi on Tuesday, he challenged the Saudis’ account but stopped short of pointing the finger at the court or MBS.
“It’s an indication that Erdoğan is trying to undermine MBS but retain the relationship between Ankara and Riyadh. It’s a very difficult balancing act,” said Gönül Tol, director of Turkish studies at the Middle East Institute in Washington.
Regional rivals
Turkey and Saudi Arabia have long clashed over rival interests and competed for influence in the region. Ankara supports Qatar and retains close ties with Iran, countries Riyadh considers enemies.
Turkey has therefore watched with unease as the United States, under Donald Trump, has centered its Middle East policy around Saudi Arabia and MBS, who has been lauded as a reformer in Washington and beyond.
The relationship between Turkey and Saudi Arabia has become considerably more tense since King Salman named MBS as his successor in June last year, analysts say. The crown prince named Turkey part of a “triangle of evil” alongside Iran and religious extremists earlier this year.
“There’s been a long-running rivalry but neither country targeted the other directly until Mohammad bin Salman took over,” Tol said. “In the last few years we’ve seen more hostile statements and policies against Ankara.”
Those include Saudi Arabia and its allies placing an economic blockade on Qatar last year, and Saudi support for areas of Syria held by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The U.S.-backed SDF is dominated by the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG, which Turkey considers a terror organization and a major threat.
Erdoğan would like to see MBS replaced, analysts say. But few expect 82-year-old King Salman to remove his son as crown prince — at least not without considerable pressure from Washington.
The Trump administration was initially reluctant to criticize Riyadh over Khashoggi’s murder. But the U.S. president’s tone has changed since CIA Director Gina Haspel’s visit to Ankara this week, during which she reportedly listened to a tape recording said to have captured Khashoggi’s torture and murder.
“Washington and the Trump administration have started taking a harder line. That will make Turkey more encouraged and emboldened in terms of going after MBS,” said Asli Aydıntaşbaş, a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.
“But don’t forget about Turkey’s economic vulnerability,” she added. “It’s not a country Turkey wants to get into an outright battle with.”
Saudi citizens make significant investments in Turkey’s property sector and more than half a million Saudi tourists traveled to Turkey last year. Turkey, meanwhile, has been grappling with an economic downturn brought about by a currency crisis and high inflation.
A global problem
To avoid a bilateral conflict with Riyadh, Ankara has been working hard to turn the Khashoggi murder into an international affair, keeping attention focused on the case with its drip feed of leaks.
“Turkey doesn’t want this to become a bilateral Turkey-Saudi crisis with Erdoğan on one side and MBS on the other,” said Galip Dalay, a visiting scholar at the University of Oxford.
“Turkey has every reason to create a framework in which the West will ask for an alternative to MBS, or that MBS is dramatically weakened. Anything less than this and MBS will try to seek revenge on Turkey.”
But Dalay, a friend of Khashoggi, also warned that attention is bound to wane sooner or later and that Ankara has to be careful not to withhold crucial information for strategic purposes.
“Turkey’s intentions would be questioned,” he said. “And that will shift the focus from the murder of a journalist by the Saudi regime to geopolitical bickering.”
While many have interpreted Erdoğan’s speech this week as a signal to Riyadh that Turkey will not stop investigating, some observers see signs that Turkey is ready to wrap up the affair.
Suat Kınıklıoğlu, a visiting academic at Oxford University’s Middle East Center, cited a phone call between Erdoğan and the crown prince on Wednesday as a sign that Riyadh and Ankara are working on a deal.
“The signs we get are indicating that Turkey will not be pushing any further, but we will probably not know what the price tag for that was,” said Kınıklıoğlu, who was an MP in Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) before they parted ways in 2012.
Tol of the Middle East Institute also considers the phone call a sign of de-escalation, but said that Turkey’s next move depends largely on the Trump administration. With the backing of Trump, she added, Ankara would likely continue leaking incriminating details.
Ultimately, the fate of Mohammad bin Salman and the Saudi throne are decided in Washington and Riyadh, not in Ankara.
“Turkey can help tip the balance but it’s not going to be calling the shots,” said Aydıntaşbaş of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “And it will have to live with the consequences if MBS ends up staying in power.”