Israel's bombing of Syria's Abu al-Duhur airbase a few days ago has opened a new and unusually dangerous front in the Middle East. The immediate dispute is over whether Turkey was preparing to establish a military presence at the Syrian base, but the underlying contest is much larger. It is about who will shape the military and political order of Syria after the ouster of Bashar al-Assad?
Israel sees a Turkish-backed Syrian military as a potential strategic threat while Turkey sees Israeli attacks as an attempt to constrain Turkey's desire for a role in a neighboring country. Neither side appears to want a war, yet the possibility of a direct clash has become harder to dismiss because the two countries could now find their forces operating in the same battlespace.
