Ofra Bengio: “The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is not the reason of all the trouble in the world. The terrorist attacks have causes and ways of their own”
During her visit to Istanbul, we had the chance to discuss recent events with Professor Ofra Bengio. She shared her views on the terrorist attacks in Paris, developments in Syria, Iraq and KRG, the future of Turkey-Kurdish peace process and Turkish-Israeli relations for Salom readers. Ms. Bengio is a Senior Research Fellow at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, and professor in the department of Middle Eastern History at Tel Aviv University Russia’s military intervention in Syria has dramatically changed the calculations of all involved in Syria. Why Russia wanted to become involved in Syria now? Russia felt that there is a certain vacuum in Syria that needs to be filled. The U.S. was not fulfilling its task of fighting ISIS. Furthermore, Obama put certain redlines but did not act on them so this emboldened the Russians to take this move. Secondly, the Assad regime was in a very shaky situation, almost on the verge of collapse while ISIS was gaining...