Israel’s Shifting Alliances in China’s Battle for World Dominance

The Jewish Home | SEPTEMBER 8, 2022

Israel's shIftIng allIances In chIna's Battle for World domInance

By SHAMMAI SISKIND

In the early morning hours of September 3, a Turkish warship quietly sailed into the port of Haifa.

The TCG Kemalreis, a Barbaros-class frigate, is one of the most advanced in Turkey’s navy, armed with advanced rocket batteries, cutting-edge anti-missile systems, and aircraft launchpads.

According to an IDF spokesman, the Kemalreis would dock in the port for several days in order to “demonstrate presence.” The official added that the visit to Haifa was part of Turkey’s involvement in joint maritime missions in concert with other navies operating in the region. In fact, Kemalreis did not arrive in Israel alone. It was accompanied by the USS Forrest

Sherman destroyer which it had joined for “NATO-related” drills in the Middle East. In many ways, the arrival of Kemalreis in Israel was routine. Israel hosts foreign forces – especially NATO alliance troops – regularly in many capacities. But far from being a run-of-the-mill incident, the

Kemalreis’ visit was actually a milestone in regional geopolitics – in more ways than one. At the micro level, the visit by Kemalreis marked the final stage in Turkey’s slow but now basically complete reconciliation with Israel. The two countries had banished each other’s ambassadors back in 2018 during a spat of escalated violence in Gaza. The incident had been the final straw in years of diplomatic tensions going back to the Mavi Marmara incident in which ships originating from Turkey attempted to break Israel’s blockade on the

Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. From a broader perspective, the docking of Kemalreis and the Sherman at Haifa, the headquarters of the IDF’s navy, is the latest event to highlight Israel’s growing strategic importance at the international level.

It’s an indication of the solidification and reshuffling of important alliances, all taking place right now across the globe. And, as has been the case in many times past, Israel is finding itself, to a large extent, in the middle of it all.

PosItIonIng In the Indo-PacIfIc

When conflict is discussed in the layman’s realm (i.e., the media), people are often discussing the immediate causes of the tensions. Which event “triggered” a war, or what incident “started” the shooting. In other words, the conversation tends to revolve around catalysts.

But people who deal with global security for a living don’t spend too much time thinking about catalysts. Rather, they think about conditions.

Anyone who has even a faint memory of high school history knows that it was the assassination Astro-Hungarian Duke Ferdinand that started the First World War. But the same novice could also tell you that Ferdinand’s killing was not the reason behind the conflict – that credit goes to the seething tensions and century-old rivalries between European powers that had reached a fever pitch by the early 20th century.

Catalysts happen all the time. The question is, are the conditions set for any one of those matches to ignite a conflagration?

From that perspective, nations (the ones with savvy leadership, that is) are constantly on the lookout for these emerging conditions and, more importantly, where they fit into that interconnected web.

The most important geopolitical development in recent years has been the growing conflict between what can be broadly described as the Atlantic-Western states and Indo-Pacific eastern nations. These are the conditions being set up for international conflict, which in many ways has already been seen in the context of the war in Ukraine.

It could be argued that all the roots of this development go back decades, and many of them clearly do. However, much clarity on this issue can be gained by assessing just the very recent period.

the chInese alternatIve

The Chinese have been yearning for global dominance for a long time. By now, everyone knows this.

However, there’s often some confusion on how China is going about this exactly.

Beijing’s strategy is not limited to out-producing the United States in its thousands of slave-driven factories or hacking the Pentagon for secret files. Those methods play important roles. But the main objective of China is to create a whole new global commercial system that can function as an alternative to the one currently controlled and dominated by the West. Projects like the much-lauded Belt Road Initiative (BRI) and the Pakistan Economic Corridor all form the staples of this plan.

But like any plan of this scale and geographic scope, China needs allies. And what better place to turn than the countries disenchanted with, and now blinded by hatred toward, the United States?

The strategic partnership signed with Russia during the last Winter Olympics and the so-called national Cooperation Agreement penned with Iran last year are both important examples of this trend. These nations are assets both militarily and economically and are looking for ways to maximize their national power in spite of the U.S.-centric system. China’s significant foothold in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, a country rich in natural resources and critical to the BRI network, is an ongoing instance of a country rejected from U.S. policy favor that turned to the Chinese alternative.

Not all countries cooperating with Beijing are doing so due to a fallout with Washington.

Some, perhaps the majority, chose that path out of pure pragmatism.

This is the story of the African states the likes of Botswana, Burundi, Rwanda, Cameroon, the DRC, and Mozambique that sold their souls to the CCP in return for promises of infrastructural development and business loans.

However, states that deal closely with China do not necessarily do this out of desperation. Many are simply making a rational economic choice. After all, China is the second largest economy in the world.

This was, and has been, the gist of Israel’s relationship with Beijing.

Israel’s forced realIgnment

Trade between Israel and China exploded in the 1990s and reached the $10 billion mark over a decade ago.

From Beijing’s perspective, the most important aspect of its commercial relationship with Israel is in the sphere of technological development. This means both assisting China on that front, as well as incorporating Chinese components into Israel’s infrastructure. Israel’s Innovation Authority currently runs a program dubbed the China-Israel Industrial R&D Cooperation Framework. The initiative works on areas spanning from medical technology to autonomous drones.

All of this has made the United States uneasy.

In Washington, this is not even a partisan concern. During their visits to Israel, then-U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton in 2019 and then-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2020, both of whom worked for the most pro-Israel president in recent memory, issued stern warnings that China’s growing role in strategic sectors of Israel’s economy risked harming U.S.-Israel security ties.

This issue came to a head during Israel’s previous government led by Naftali Bennett. Interactions between Bennett and U.S. President Biden were strongly marked by the China issue. Whereas Israel wanted to approach China primarily as an economic partner and increase its ties with the country, the consensus view in Washington increasingly sees China as a global strategic rival— mili-

tarily, economically, and technologically.

Policymakers in Jerusalem had for years succeeded in playing both sides – capitalizing on Chinese cooperation, while maintaining its favorable status visa vie Washington. That time is over.

During the past year, there have been several escalations in the conflict between the U.S. and China as it pertains to Indo-Pacific dominance. Biden sent his defense secretary to strategize with Indonesia, the Philippines, and Japan all over the span of 12 months. There are strong indications that deals have been, or are in the process of being, brokered for mutual defense cooperation with all of those countries. Visits to the region by State Secretary Blinken and House Speaker Pelosi last month were without a doubt meant to facilitate and advance these dealings. All of this culminated in recent news of Washington authorizing yet another massive weapons sale to Taiwan. America is essentially telling its allies it is ramping up the pressure on China and that leaders need to choose sides. This message has not been lost on Israel.

Back in July, the United States and Israel announced the launch of a Strategic High-Level Dialogue on Technology, designed to enhance bilateral technology cooperation, especially in the fields of artificial intelligence. This announcement was a thinly veiled signal that Israel was pulling back from its innovation program with China in favor of a similar deal with the U.S. China, as would be expected, responded harshly to this news. According to Jerusalem officials, the Israeli ambassador to Beijing, Irit Ben-Abba, was summoned in early August by Liu Jianchao, head of CCP’s international affairs department, to “remind” Ben-Abba of the value of Israel’s cooperation in Chinese technological development and the “importance” this cooperation had for the two country’s future relations.

Israel, however, has not backed down from its anti-China direction.

In late July, outlets reported that Israel had awarded a tender to the Indian firm Adani Group to privatize the commercial port of Haifa, despite competing bids from Chinese companies. The $1.2 billion deal strongly signaled Israel’s intentional movement away from Chinese cooperation on major infrastructural projects, which, in many ways, is an about-face from its earlier policy.

But perhaps the strongest indication of Israel’s decision to go ‘all in’ with the anti-China stream occurred last week in Tokyo.

On August 30, Defense Minister Benny Gantz signed a defense cooperation pact with his Japanese counterpart.

“Our countries share [a] common goal,” said Gantz at

China's foreign minister met with the Taliban last summer

america is essentially telling its allies it is ramping up the pressure on china and that leaders need to choose sides.

Israel's Benny Gantz signed a defense exchange memorandum with his Japanese counterpart last week

the signing ceremony, “defending our homes [and] seeking peace and stability.” Gantz concluded his remarks by emphasizing that the new pact will enable “cooperation between Israel and Japan in developing military technology and knowledge sharing.”

Japan is, of course, China’s oldest traditional rival in the region. Tokyo has been keeping a close watch on Beijing’s territorial grabs in the South China Sea and aggression toward Taiwan in recent years. Four years ago, concerns over China forced hyper-pacifist Japan to take a complete shift on defense policy. The military expansion that has taken place since then has been the largest in the country since World War II. Israel’s decision to enter such a pact with Japan has immense symbolic significance and could have practical ramifications in the event of a Pacific war involving China.

Israel In the mIddle

Far from being a mere reactionary player in this ongoing global alignment, Israel is actually a very important motivating factor for other nations involved with a stake in the conflict.

The U.S. throwing around its weight is always an important factor for anything geopolitically related. But at the end of the day, people who live in these regions have to deal with the other people living next door.

Consider Turkey’s rollercoaster of political allyship in recent years. Just a few years ago, Ankara hosted a summit with Russian and Iranian leaders to discuss how they would jointly undermine U.S. policy in the Middle East. Shortly afterward, Turkey decided to flagrantly disregard its NATO membership and purchase high-tech weapons systems from Russia. It is no coincidence this period coincided with Turkey’s diplomatic break from Israel.

What is different today that Turkey is willing to switch course? Well, a few things have changed.

First off is Turkey’s realization that its ties to the Russian-Sino axis are going to have costs – costs it will likely have to pay for in the near future as the Indo-Pacific conflict escalates. For a country already reeling from economic instability, Turkey needs to make sure it isn’t betting on the losing team.

Second, and a factor closer to home, over the summer, Israel demonstrated with undeniable evidence that its alleged friend, Iran, was running assassin cells in its territory. The resultant joint operations between Turkey and Israel not only helped uncover those cells but also saved the lives of several targeted Israelis. It is for this reason that Turkey allowed one of its premier warships to sail along with a U.S. destroyer and to dock in a country it had severed relations with just four years ago.

Turkey's Kemalreis warship docked in Haifa earlier this month This pattern of Israel strengthening its ties with Indo-Pacific stakeholders can be seen now across several regions, from Turkey, to India, to Japan, and is expanding by the day. Israel has firmly become a central player for security on the global stage, affecting conflicts far beyond its immediate regional concerns. Let us hope that role isn’t tested more than it has already been.