The ink has barely dried on the October 2025 Gaza ceasefire agreement, yet its core architecture contains a catastrophic flaw: the structural inclusion of the Republic of Turkey as a co-guarantor.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s presence at the Sharm El-Sheikh summit, while hailed by some as a diplomatic necessity, is a clear geopolitical mistake. It is a strategic concession to a power whose vision for the Middle East is fundamentally anti-Western, anti-secular, and dedicated to the institutionalization of Muslim Brotherhood-aligned Islamism.
The idea that Ankara, the sustained patron of Hamas, can be a neutral arbiter of peace is a profound danger to long-term regional stability and the interests of every nation seeking a moderate, secular post-conflict future.
The Infiltration of Ideology
Turkey’s hard-won seat at the table is rooted in its relationship with Hamas, a fact that should immediately disqualify it as a non-ideological partner.
Turkey’s hard-won seat at the table is rooted in its relationship with Hamas, a fact that should immediately disqualify it as a non-ideological partner. Erdoğan, who previously dismissed the terrorist label for Hamas, instead referring to it as a legitimate “resistance movement,” only recently joined a declaration urging the militant group to disarm and surrender governance to the Palestinian Authority (PA). This tactical shift, however, is a transparent ploy to secure a long-term foothold in Gaza.
The most corrosive threat to any future moderate governance lies in Turkey’s plan to train Gaza’s post-war security sector. Ankara holds a Memorandum of Understanding with the PA to train law enforcement, a process entrusted to institutions whose senior leadership reportedly harbors “anti-Western and anti-Israel views” following internal purges.
This is not post-conflict reconstruction; it is a vector for ideological contagion.
Instead of fostering a professional, neutral police force essential for stability, Turkey risks implanting an ethos of hostility and anti-secular dogma directly into Gaza’s nascent security structures. This actively undermines the goal of establishing a reliable, non-extremist authority, ensuring that the next generation of Gazan security personnel remains inherently hostile to Western and moderate Arab interests.
The Iranian Sabotage Switch
The credibility of Turkey’s guarantee is further crippled by the fatal fragmentation of its influence over Hamas. Analysts point out that Ankara’s leverage over the political leadership does not extend to the “more autonomous, Tehran-linked military groups” within the organization.
This means that Iran, which retains deep ties to these armed factions, holds a “sabotage switch” over the entire peace arrangement. Should Tehran feel marginalized by the U.S./Egypt/Turkey deal, it can unilaterally undermine the ceasefire’s durability without requiring the explicit cooperation of the political wing. The entire peace agreement is thus structurally vulnerable, perpetually hostage to the machinations of the Islamic Republic, with Turkey acting as the willing, or perhaps incompetent, gatekeeper.
Undermining Regional Allies and Stability
By inserting itself into the core peace mechanism, Turkey has directly challenged Egypt, a traditional and indispensable partner in regional mediation. This relationship is already defined by profound ideological hostility, rooted in Turkey’s sustained support for the Muslim Brotherhood—a group viewed as an existential threat by the secular Egyptian government.
By inserting itself into the core peace mechanism, Turkey has directly challenged Egypt, a traditional and indispensable partner in regional mediation.
This rivalry has immediately weaponized the post-war recovery effort. While Egypt plans to host an international Gaza Recovery and Reconstruction Conference in Cairo, Turkey has aggressively offered its own resources for large-scale construction and rubble removal. This dual track risks creating parallel governance structures, allowing Turkey to establish patronage networks that bypass and undermine the PA-centric vision supported by Egypt and the Arab League.
The Gaza crisis has become a bargaining chip for Ankara’s unrelated strategic ambitions. Turkey’s assertive foreign policy has generated conflict across the Eastern Mediterranean, challenging alliances like the East Med Gas Forum (EMGF) that includes key partners like Egypt and Greece. Turkey will inevitably leverage its guarantee in Gaza to extract strategic concessions in these highly contentious areas, holding regional stability hostage to its vision of geopolitical expansion.
The peace achieved at Sharm El-Sheikh is a tactical pause, purchased at the cost of structural security. Until the role of ideological powers like Turkey is neutralized through rigorous, neutral international oversight, this agreement remains dangerously compromised and destined to collapse under the weight of regional rivalry and Islamist infiltration.
Published originally on October 16, 2025, under the title “Why Turkey’s ‘Peace’ Guarantee Is a Hostage to Islamism.”
