‘We Believe We Can Achieve Something’

During the World Economic Forum at Davos, tensions that have been brewing for weeks between Israel and Turkey broke out into the open. After fiercely debating the Gaza offensive with Israeli President Shimon Peres, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan stalked offstage, vowing never to return to Davos. NEWSWEEK's Lally Weymouth spoke with Erdogan. Excerpts:

WEYMOUTH: You've been so critical of the recent Israeli operation into Gaza. Some say it's because Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert came to Turkey just before the operation started and didn't tell you it was about to start. Why have you pushed the Turkish-Israeli relationship to its limits?
ERDOGAN: If you're looking at it as pushing Turkish and Israeli relations to the edge, it's the wrong view.

What is the correct view?
At the request of Syria, we entered a phase of working together with Israel and Syria indirectly to get them to talk with each other. We are mediators in that process. This was an example of how much importance we put on peace in the Middle East. We had done this before with Pakistan and Israel.

I knew that Israel has a secret relationship with Pakistan but does it have an open one?
During the tenure of Mr. Pervez Musharraf, we brought them together in Istanbul: the foreign minister of Israel and the foreign minister of Pakistan.

And what happened?
In these talks, at least we started the process of coming together. The request came from Pakistan and Israel to bring them together, so we did. The meetings took place for two days in secret about two years ago. We also took part in the peace talks between Israel and Palestine.

Between Israel and Fatah, or Hamas?
I'm referring to the Palestinian Authority and President Mahmoud Abbas. On Dec. 23 we had a meeting with Prime Minister Olmert in Ankara. On that day we had the fifth round of the unofficial talks between Syria and Israel. That night we had very intense telephone diplomacy. I was talking on the phone to Syrian President Bashar Assad, and I was talking to Olmert in person and also to the Syrian Foreign Minister, so it was very intense diplomacy.

About what?
About the talks between Syria and Israel.