Amid tensions across the Middle East, on May 3 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu postponed his previously scheduled visit to Baku, Azerbaijan. While Netanyahu’s office cited developments in Gaza and Syria as the cause of the change, Israeli media reported that the decision was made due to fears Türkiye would close its airspace to the Prime Minister’s flight. The episode underscores the ongoing contentious relationships among Jerusalem, Ankara, and Baku, with Azerbaijan attempting to retain positive relations with both Middle Eastern regional powers even as Turkish-Israeli ties continue to deteriorate. 

A more substantive development took place in early April, when Israeli and Turkish delegations met for rare diplomatic discussions in Baku on April 9. The talks focused on how to de-conflict the positions of Ankara and Jerusalem in Syria.  Azerbaijan, having positive relations with both Israel and Türkiye, has comparatively few direct interests in Syria, making it an obvious candidate as a go-between. 

The Turkish-Azerbaijani alliance is one of the defining geopolitical features of today’s Caspian region, with cultural, political, military, and economic ties undergirding the relationship. Türkiye supported Azerbaijan over the course of its decades-long conflict with Armenia, closing its border with Armenia and providing Baku with critical military hardware. Azerbaijan, in turn, provides Türkiye with a large share of Ankara’s energy resources and is a major gateway for goods moving along the Middle Corridor. 

Ties with Israel are likewise a major component of Azerbaijani foreign policy. Israel has sold Azerbaijan cutting-edge military technology, including missiles, mortars, and kamikaze and surveillance drones that were used to great effect in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Ties have continued to grow with Azerbaijani’s state-owned oil and gas company launching new projects in Israel’s Mediterranean gas fields this year. Israel and Azerbaijan share anxieties about Iranian expansionism, with a long-rumored agreement between Israel and Azerbaijan to allow Israel to use Azerbaijan as a staging ground in the event of war with Iran.  

In recent weeks, some advocates for Azerbaijan have begun shopping around the idea of Azerbaijan’s inclusion in the Abraham Accords platform. Although Azerbaijan has had diplomatic relations with Israel for decades, including Baku in the format would provide Azerbaijan opportunities to expand ties with both Jerusalem and Washington. 

Yet, these relationships also provide Baku with the potential for controversy. The past two years have seen an intense spike in hostility between Türkiye and Israel. Turkish President Recep-Tayyip Erdogan, who has sought to represent a more Middle Eastern and Islamic-infused Turkish identity, declared his sympathy for Hamas in the aftermath of the 10/07 attack on Israel and has gone on to label Israel's war on Gaza as a “genocide,” co-sponsoring South Africa’s International Court of Justice petition describing the war as such.  Beyond simple rhetoric, Erdogan has hosted Hamas officials since 10/07/2023 and moved to end much of Türkiye’s trade with Israel.

Israeli policy makers in turn have responded in kind, attacking Erdoğan and threatening to scrap Israel’s longstanding free-trade agreement with Türkiye. Now, Syria has become the most direct zone of confrontation between the two Middle Eastern powers, with diverging interests and ambitions. 

For Azerbaijan, there is seemingly a risk that maintaining ties with both Jerusalem and Ankara could seem to sour relations with one or both. Yet, for now, Baku seems to be well positioned to walk this diplomatic tightrope.  Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has, in recent months, called for a ceasefire in Gaza and for an independent Palestinian state, but he has not mirrored Türkiye’s rhetoric around the question of genocide in Gaza and instead used more apolitical language, referring to the situation in Gaza as a “tragedy.” 

It appears that for Ankara as well, Baku’s tolerance of Israel has yet to result in diplomatic confrontation. Ties between the two Turkic nations continue to grow, with construction projects having been launched in recent months of joint Azerbaijani-Turkish railroads and energy pipelines. If anything, the deterioration in Israeli-Turkish relations may be of use to Baku, making it an important intermediary between the two regional powers. Aliyev now appears to be actively positioning Azerbaijan, hoping to act as a reconciliatory player, publicly stating during a forum on Apil 9 in Azerbaijan that Baku has been a force for Turkish-Israel reconciliation in the past and is now "doing everything in its power to facilitate” detente between Israel and Türkiye.

Azerbaijan’s domestic population is more secular than Türkiye’s and less oriented toward the Middle East, meaning that the Palestinian question is far less central in Azerbaijan and has less potential to be utilized by elites to generate public support. While public opinion polling on this issue is scant, Azerbaijan stands out among Muslim-majority countries, including Türkiye, with no major protests of Israeli actions of boycotts of Israeli goods. 

Unlike Armenia, which has traditionally relied on Russia, Azerbaijan has had no global power as a political or military partner since independence. While Türkiye is undoubtedly the most important ally for Baku, Azerbaijan has been more able to pursue an independent and unique foreign policy. Ties with Israel are a core component of this. Azerbaijan now seems well positioned to maintain this uneasy diplomatic triangle, and quite possibly even benefit from its increased diplomatic importance.