Why Benjamin Netanyahu’s Trip to Azerbaijan Matters

Early next month Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to travel to Azerbaijan, marking his first visit to a Muslim country since the start of the war against Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023.

Netanyahu has not traveled much since the war started, visiting only the United States and Hungary. A wartime leader can only afford to leave when necessary—and visiting Azerbaijan is a necessity.

The Times of Israel reported that Netanyahu will focus on two key issues—mediation with Turkey to avoid conflict in Syria and expanding the 2020 Abraham Accords with Israel to Azerbaijan.

Citizens laid flowers in remembrance of the victims in Israel on October 9, 2023, in Baku, Azerbaijan, two days after Hamas’ attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people. AZIZ KARIMOV/GETTY IMAGES

Unlike the other Abraham Accords nations—the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Sudan and Bahrain—Azerbaijan has not only established relations with Israel but may be its closest ally after the United States.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has described the two nations’ relations as an iceberg with “nine-tenths under the surface.” Neither side advertises that Israel helped Baku defeat Armenia in the 2020 Karbakh War by exporting high-tech weaponry—and Azerbaijan is one of Israel’s top energy exporters. Recently, Azerbaijan’s government energy company, SOCAR, bought a large stake in the Tamar natural gas fields off the coast of Israel and was awarded rights for gas exploration in Israeli waters.

Moreover, the Oct. 7 war initiated by the terrorist group Hamas has only brought both sides closer.

Baku has increased oil exports to Israel and is mediating talks between Israel and Turkey to keep tensions to a minimum.

Thus, the addition of Azerbaijan to the Abraham Accords would serve the opposite role as in the past. Instead of the United States bringing Israel closer to its Muslim allies, in this case Israel would be strengthening ties between its Muslim allies and the United States.

Ties between Washington and Baku have been frayed over the former’s backing of Armenia in its 30-year conflict with Azerbaijan over the Armenian separatist territory of Nagorno-Karabakh. However, with the conflict all but settled, cooperation has become possible. In an open letter to the Knesset, Netanyahu’s office recently announced that Israel was in talks with the Trump administration to form a trilateral relationship with Israel and Azerbaijan.

Israel’s efforts have borne fruit. In March, U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff flew to Baku to discuss trilateral cooperation. Earlier this month, President Donald Trump wrote a letter to Aliyev in support of future cooperation with Azerbaijan and thanking Baku for its “support and friendship” with Israel. Last week, a U.S. State Department official told Azerbaijani media that the U.S. wants to strengthen energy cooperation with Baku.

And as Israel mediates between the United States and Azerbaijan, Azerbaijan is mediating between its two closest allies—Israel and Turkey.

Relations between Jerusalem and Ankara have reached a nadir since the start of the Oct. 7 war. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has escalated by cutting off trade, leading international initiatives against Israel and threatening to invade the Jewish state over the latter’s war in Gaza. Recently, he called on Allah to “destroy Zionist Israel” during Eid al-Fitr prayers.

Tensions with Israel have increased after the fall of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. While Turkey has supported Syria’s new president and former jihadist Ahmed al-Sharaa, Israel has attacked military targets previously belonging to the Assad regime throughout the country to neutralize a potential threat from Damascus. It has also indefinitely occupied the border area of Mt. Hermon and possibly supported autonomy for the Druze minority in Southern Syria. Some experts have suggested a Turkish-Israeli military confrontation is possible.

Yet neither side is interested in an armed conflict. Israel would rather focus on Gaza, the Iranian nuclear program and Iran’s web of proxies. For Turkey, a conflict with Israel would isolate it from the U.S. and NATO, turn Syria—which it wants to rebuild—into the prime theater of battle and get Ankara kicked out of the F-35 fighter jet program. It could also risk heightened Israeli and U.S. support for Syrian and Turkish Kurdish groups, which Turkey sees as a separatist threat.

Enter Azerbaijan. In the past Azerbaijan has used its close relations with both Turkey and Israel to mediate between the two nations. Baku was one of the prime architects of the Turkish Israeli détentes in both 2016 and 2021. After the fall of the Assad regime, Azerbaijani top diplomat Hikmet Hajiyev shuttled between Jerusalem and Ankara to prevent any accidental clashes between Turkish and Israeli troops.

Likewise, Azerbaijan hosted talks earlier this month between Turkish and Israeli officials. Both sides may have found a solution.

Last week, al-Sharaa told U.S. officials that Syria would be interested in joining the Abraham Accords if Israel would stop its military incursions into the country’s south and Washington would commit to Syria’s unification. He likely would not have been able to make such a statement without tacit Turkish support.

While there are reasons to be skeptical about the possibility, peace between Syria and Israel could theoretically dispel tensions.

Meanwhile, Iran is following these developments with great unease.

The last thing Tehran needs is for Israel and Turkey to come to an understanding. Both Ankara and Jerusalem are the only Middle Eastern countries outside of Iran—and maybe Egypt—capable of effectively projecting power outside their borders. While Iran does not have the same animus to Turkey as it does to Israel, it distrusts Turkish regional ambitions and worries that a strong Turkey could foment separatism among Iran’s large Turkic minority populations.

Moreover, Iran fears Turkey’s growing influence after Ankara replaced Tehran as chief powerbroker in Syria. Such fears are well informed. As of now, a Turkish presence in the north of Syria and an Israeli presence in the south has cut off Iran’s key supply route to Hezbollah.

Even worse for Iran is the possibility of Azerbaijani cooperation with the United States and Israel. Iranian observers see such cooperation as a way of encircling Iran and some—such as Iranian Caucasus expert Ehsan Movahedian—see it as the preparation for war against Iran.

Like Israel and the United States, Azerbaijan has been at the receiving end of Iranian aggression. Iran has formed a proxy militia targeting Azerbaijan, held large-scale military exercises on its border and attempted to assassinate anti-Iran Azerbaijani politicians and prominent Azerbaijani Jews. Azerbaijan has cooperated with Israel in the past against Iran. Adding Washington to the mix would compound the threat to Tehran on its northern border.

The success of these Israeli and Azerbaijani initiatives and the alliance overall comes from a simple realization—a win for one is a win for both.