determined than ever to secure its southern border. what has caused the latest escalation, and who are the main players? this is "inside story." >> welcome to the program. tension has increased along turkey's -- turkiye's border

with syria. more than 500 targets have been hit in kurdish held area since sunday. the syrian democratic forces -- the strikes follow a bombing in istanbul 10 days ago for which turkiye blames the out log -- outlawed turkish group pkk. ankara says it is targeting bases of a kurdish group with links to the pkk. three ground operations have been conducted to clear ypg fighters from northern syria. now the president is promising to conduct another offensive. >> are operations are only the beginning. our determination to secure all of our southern border so as to remove the possibility of attacking our country's is

stronger today than ever before. >> here's a look at the areas of control. turkiye's targets in the border area, the region in yellow. syrian army fighters control the areas in green where they support turkish military offensives. turkish syrian forces also control the purple parts here. the government of basher al-assad has control of most of the country in red, althoughisil fighters are still present in the desert in the east. here is a report from the turkish border. >> turkiye continues to target with a widescale air campaign that was started on sunday morning. the decision to target the group came after the officials accused the ypg of planning and carrying out the istanbul bomb attack one week before. the widescale operation

continued with shelling on the turkish side toward theypg projections in northern syria. ypg has been shelling the turkish side as well. officers say they are not targeting civilian areas. however, civilian areas and rebel held regents in northern syria have been targeted, resulting in civilian deaths. president erdogan wants to clear -- wants to secure the countries borders, meaning he wants to get the arms kurdish fighting group out of the region to create a safe corridor. it's not only because on karen does not want a --nkara wants to pave the way for the millions of syrian refugees for their voluntary return back to their homes.

i'm at the turkish i've syria border crossing. >> washington began arming them shortly before an offensive to recapture a city from isil. it's made up of largely kurdish fighters from the ypg. it also includes armenian fighters amid concerns of u.s. support after the group launched support in error majority areas of northeastern syria. let's bring in our guest for today's discussion from oxford in the u.k. he is a nonresident senior fellow at the middle east council on global affairs. here indoha is director of the cove study center and from washington, d.c., the former u.s. secretary of defense. gentlemen, a warm welcome to you all.

what are turkiye's intentions in northern syria? is it going to launch a ground attack? >> i think turkiye's intention is exactly what president erdogan has been saying. his intention is clearly to do other military operations and airstrikes. i think the intention -- that has been the goal for quite some time. they will define the nature and depth of any such confrontation because the u.s. and russia are major players on the others out of the border. so for any ground operations,

the u.s. and russian fighters will feature inevitably in the conversations. >> turkiye if were to begin a ground offensive, would it be legal under international law? >> this is a conflict zone, and basically turkiye has indicated many times that it will not allow any kind of threat to its stability, regardless -- the issue here is not about international law, i think turkiye is looking at what happened earlier in istanbul two weeks ago as crossing the redline, and basically theypg are responsible for that and they're trying to send a clear message that this should not

happen and we will not allow this to happen again. this happens, as you know, in a context where the whole issue of syria is being put aside because basically the most important players, and here i talk about russia and iran, they have different issues there busy with, and turkiye does not want to be left alone with the crisis on their border. the turkish conception that the crisis is behind my backyard and i cannot leave it at that. >> how does washington view what president erdogan says, or is threatening to do? >> well basically, we do not agree with president erdogan that all of the kurds are terrorists. not everybody in the ypg is part of the pkk. the ypg who we are supporting to

deal with isis, that's how we first got involved when the iraqis ask us to come back, after we had withdrawn. we also want to protect the rebels who are fighting against assad, so we do not want to see turkiye have a ground invasion here. we want to keep our good relations because they are a very productive voice for us in dealing with putin over this horrible war in ukraine. >> does president erdogan care what it's ally u.s. thinks? >> the decision will be made in ankara. let's not forget it created a

major storm in the u.s. relationship. ankara will probably make the decision based on its own consideration and its own concerns. so yes, what the uss is affected. more important than the u.s. factor given the geographic location from which turkiye is planning to undertake an operation. i would say what russia thinks is also a major factor. if this is what it requires. >> we will come to russia and iran, another actor on the ground in syria, and just a moment. and also israel, which has an interest in what is going on. you wanted to come in there on that particular answer about whether president erdogan particularly cares about what the u.s. thinks about what is

going on in its on backyard. >> i don't think he does, because he has shown that he can act independently of us. he bought russian air defense missiles, and the war between azerbaijan and armenia, he didn't care what we thought. i think he sees this as an existential threat, particularly after the november 13 bombing. >>? what about the timing? lawrence mentioned the bombing. is this purely to do with the bombing in istanbul, or is there more to this? does president erdogan have one i on his hopes for reelection next year? is the president perhaps calculating that there is an opportunity here because his allies, his western allies are distracted by what is going on in ukraine? >> it's the trigger. if you look at it in the wider

context, you see that in recent months, turkiye is playing a major role in a major conflict with what's happening between russia and ukraine. actually turkiye is becoming the main access point to russia to the west and the main communicator between the west and russia. so i think turkiye is playing a major role now. i think what happened was a trigger just to push for action. for months now, in the recent 18 months, turkiye was not happy what happened in the north of syria, and turkiye is planning actually to send back a number of syrian refugees to syria, and the one to make sure that it is stable and secure. i think these kind of things will continue, i think turkiye

would not be able to go on with their plan to return some of the syrians to their own country. there are two things you have to consider, one is basically what is happen when it comes to russia and ukraine and the role of turkiye, and also what happens inside turkiye and the future, your and the election in turkiye and what the president is looking for from all those opportunities. >> but is it too cynical to say that president erdogan has an eye on reelection next year? is projected to be a tight race, so course and operation of this scale on the border with syria would do him good, wouldn't it, electorally? >> no question, certainly, so in

this regard, yes. that will be popular electorally, but you can look at a number of previous operations, -- yes, it probably would serve him well for elections. >> what are the implications for the nato alliance in this? >> basically, we also are concerned about iran's role. here we still haven't been able to get the nuclear talks back on track. iran announced it is close at a second site now to getting a nuclear weapon. we are concerned about russia, obviously what they are doing in ukraine, and basically we would

like them to in this horrible war. we are also concerned about stability in the government in iraq, because if this thing gets out of hand in northern syria, and isis is able to reconstitute itself because nobody is paying attention to them, that would obviously undermine the government in iraq. so all of these things are interrelated. you got russia, you got turkey, you've got syria, and don't forget you still have the syrian civil war where russia is working with syria and iran to keep in power. assad >> -- to keep assad in power. russia was the only country to

have a significant presence in syria. israel is concerned about that, as lawrence was just telling us. it has continued to carry out air raids in syria. what are the implications of this potential turkish grand offensive in syria for both iran and for israel? >> it's obvious the more this kind of operation continues, it means basically there is -- basically a country like syria is becoming a state where many players are playing on the ground and none of them are actually the government of syria. today a major general of iran was killed in damascus and iran is accusing israel of that. this is added to a number of iranians who were killed in the last 5-7 years in syria.

so actually there is an ongoing, i would say, confrontation or actually war between iran and israel in syria come in the land of syria, basically. that is a major conflict between both sides. i think israel never dreamed of it because iran has been on the border. russia did offer israel -- without any kind of regret. basically what is happening now may complicate the relations between russia and iran, and russia -- on the other site it may improve relations between russia and israel. >> russia is pretty distracted with the roar -- war in ukraine. if turkiye did go into northern

syria, how would russia react? it would be very vocal and disapproving, but there is very little it could do. >> absolutely, they have nothing actually to stop it. let's remember the point i raised already, russia wants to have good ties with turkiye, especially at the moment where turkiye is securing a good communication line bush -- between russia and the west, especially when it comes to the issue of energy. they hope this kind of line will continue as long as the conflict is going on. just the minimum of communication that russia has with the international community. >> how does syria and iran and i suppose iraq fit into turkeys worldview and its view of its own backyard? do you see a situation in which there could be any sort of reset

or rapprochement between turkey and -- between turkiye and syria? >> i think you ask a very important question. what are you seeing at the regional level, and normalization to be the order of the day. when you come closer to home, meaning turkiye and their relation with syria and iran, look at rn. -- look atiran. it is expanding, you see a multiple crisis at the same time. one is the turkish pkk, the

competition taking place in iran , that has implications in iraq. on the one hand president erdogan talking about -- as a result of russia pushing it as well. we see the escalation in northern syria. i think the contrasting image will be the order of the day for some parts, but the new narrative will be normalization and de-escalation with the central government, while at the same time, trying to send back some of the syrian refugees, and they will undermine and push back as much in syria.

i think that is the goal. >> the u.s. are not at all happy of a turkish ground offensive in syria we would there are u.s. forces operating on the ground there. how would the u.s. pressure president erdogan then not to go ahead with his plans? would it be done through diplomatic channels, or given that turkiye's economy is still in a bit of a mess right now, could introduce sanctions against turkiye? >> i think it could use everything that it has, short of military force. it does not want to see a turkish invasion of syria because that would create all kinds of problems. it could lead to war between iran and syria. obviously the israelis would get

involved. the united states made a decision under the obama administration not to get involved in syria's civil war. if turkiye goes ahead, it will be hard for us to stay out of it. we already got american troops there. to not get involved in the civil war, they are still trying to deal with isis and the threat to our back. as i mentioned before, were turkiye turkiye hoping that can play a constructive role -- were hoping that turkiye can play a constructive role. at the height of the ukrainian war, basically russia and moscow had the turks and syrians together to try and come up with some sort of solution. but their position is weakened because of what is happening in ukraine. >> lawrence, a brief answer if you would. the alliance founded by the u.s., does the u.s. have any turkiye turkiye sympathy at all with over the fact that it's not happy with the sdf?

does it understand its beef? >> i think it understands the problem as my colleague pointed out with the syrian refugees. the ypg and thepkk have done some terrible things to turkiye, but by larger ones we are working with are not responsible for that. their main goal is to protect a wreck, not to go into turkiye. turkiye lumps them all together and the pkk is not the same as the ypg. they have different goals and different tactics and different standards they use. >> i fear this will be the last question, you have about a minute and have to answer. one thing we haven't discussed of course is that these aren't empty tracts of land we are

talking about here. people live in this area, and if there is a military offensive going on, despite all the other things happening in that particular part of the world, people once again are going to suffer and be displaced. where are they going to go and who is going to look after them? >> that's the human side of any conflict. my expectation that the turkish government -- what is being done so far is a message that they are determined, i'm not sure they have an interest to escalate or have any kind of operation which may affect their image. they are determined and decisive they will not allow people to influence or affect or threaten their security. however also they are worried of

any kind of action would lead to attack their image. any kind of operation may attack specific targets and try to avoid a mass impact, and also keep it open. meaning there is no time limit for them. they may attack today, they may stop for a week and then target another attack. it will not be systematic at one time, in one period. >> we have to end it, the news is next, and as we know, the news waits for no one. many thanks for being with us, our guests. thank you also for watching. don't forget you can see the program again at any time for visiting our website at al jazeera.com. join us at our facebook page for inside story, and of course you

can join the conversation on twitter. for the team here in doha, thanks for being with us. we will see you again. goodbye for now. ♪

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