Foreign affairs writer Lily Lynch discusses the shifting political landscape of Central Europe and the Balkans in this interview with Harici. Lynch, whose work frequently appears in the New Statesman, New Left Review, and The Baffler, addresses a range of topics from Hungary’s recent elections to Serbia’s complex foreign policy maneuvers. A recipient of a 2025 LA Press Club award, she examines the “clarifying effect” of the Ukraine war on regional leadership and the evolving nature of right-wing populism across the continent. The conversation offers a detailed analysis of the challenges facing the European right and the persistent geopolitical tensions in the region.

I would like to begin with Hungary, specifically with the recent electoral victory of the right-wing populist Tisza Party, much like Viktor Orbán and Fidesz, and of its leader, Péter Magyar. What does this victory signify for Hungary’s future? The deep corruption and abuses of power involving Orbán’s circle had also received coverage in the international press. The fact that the country’s three major parties at the top of the electoral list are all right-wing paints a rather bleak picture.

I think that Magyar’s victory demonstrates several things. One is that right-wing ideas are still broadly popular in Hungary. The fact that Magyar is not so different from Orban on issues like immigration demonstrates that. So right-wing politics were not defeated in this election; instead, it is clear now that they are very much entrenched in Hungary and do reflect the sentiments of the public.

At the same time, I think there’s a particular brand of right-wing populism that is starting to cause some fatigue. This is a sort of clownish, personality-driven Trumpian populism that is wedded to Zionism, and which Orban embodied as well. I think Magyar’s success hints at a desire for a more sober and serious right-wing politics, decoupled from MAGA populism, and perhaps somewhat less revisionist: a politics that are anti-immigration and conservative but also more content with the status quo.

The electoral result also suggests that Trump’s brand has grown increasingly toxic, and that Orban’s choice to embrace Trump–going so far as having JD Vance campaign for him ahead of the election–hurt more than it helped. Trump is becoming a burden for the right, particularly in Europe. After Trump’s threats towards Greenland, no one in Europe can say they support Trump and also support respect for sovereignty. Of course, this is exactly what Orban once preached, as he fashioned himself a sovereigntist. In the end, it appeared that he only opposed encroachments from Brussels, but gave Trump’s America a pass.

At the same time, Orban’s deliberate stoking of the culture war ended up producing diminishing returns for him. Without decent economic performance, and with so much perceived corruption, his culture war crusades on issues such as gender simply were not enough to keep him afloat. In addition, Orban’s re-traditionalization efforts failed. The pro-natality policies he put in place were expensive but did little to boost the birth rate. Church attendance under Orban was even lower than it was during the socialist period, when religion was frowned upon by the authorities.

It may also be useful to touch on Serbia. The government led by Aleksandar Vučić appears to be pursuing what is often described as a “multi-vector foreign policy.” On the one hand, there is the prospect of EU membership; on the other, there are Serbia’s historically rooted ties with Russia. Yet in the course of the war in Ukraine, how should we interpret the statements coming from Moscow, particularly the strong reaction led by the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) to alleged arms deliveries to Kyiv via third parties? How sustainable is this condition of being a “swing state”?

There was a time when Vučić managed Serbia’s complex geopolitical position relatively well. At the height of the Vučić era, which was already a decade ago now, Serbia had relations with Russia, China, Turkey, the US, and many countries of the Global South that are members of the Non-aligned Movement–all while remaining a candidate for EU membership. But February 2022 changed everything for him. A major war in Europe–no longer confined to Donbass–meant that he was suddenly under much more pressure to harmonize Serbia’s policy with that of other European countries. In practice this meant things like imposing sanctions on Russia, and by voting in lockstep with EU and NATO member countries on resolutions on Ukraine in UN General Assembly votes.

It is true of course that Vucic was permitting indirect Serbian arms sales to Ukraine, which bought him a lot of credibility in Western capitals. With the Russians, meanwhile, he made excuses: He claimed that he was under a tremendous amount of pressure, and basically could not tell the West “no”. For a while I think the Russians accepted this, if grudgingly. But then as the arms sales to Ukraine didn’t stop after Vucic said they would, there were strong reactions in Russia.

I don’t think any of these actors, with the possible exception of China, trust Vucic anymore. For a long time, Vucic was all things to all people. A great example was in a UNGA vote Serbia voted in favor of a resolution on Ukraine, then Vucic immediately issued a statement saying that it had been “a mistake” and that they’d meant to vote against it. This was a deliberate strategy of ambiguity: which message to believe? The actual vote or Vucic’s statement to the press. He was masterful at this, for years: give one message to Washington, one to Moscow, and one to Brussels. I think you can sustain that kind of ambiguity for a time, and perhaps even a long time, but war has a clarifying effect. At a certain point, you just have to choose.

Vucic has also been one of the losers of the second Trump administration. This is the exact opposite of what he had hoped: he expected Serbia to be a natural ally to Trump. Instead, Vucic has been rebuffed by the administration, and repeatedly. Vucic stayed faithful to his mutli-vector foreign policy with the expectation that Trump would come to power and immediately end the war in Ukraine. I think he really believed that would happen–that Trump would end the war in Ukraine immediately. If that happened, Vucic’s job would have been a lot easier: there would be far less pressure on him from the EU, for one. So long story short, two recent developments have imperiled his multi-vector approach. First, the full-scale war in Ukraine in February 2022, and second, Trump winning a second term, and subsequent ambivalent relations with the White House.

It may also be worthwhile here to address the issue of Kosovo, which, as is well known, has in recent years become a fault line that periodically simmers and boils over. In the December elections in Kosovo, Albin Kurti once again returned to the office of prime minister. Would it be possible for you to share some information on this, or perhaps your observations and/or firsthand impressions? It seems likely that this is a place we will be discussing in the years ahead.

Albin Kurti has staked his career in part on his opposition to the creation of something called “the Association of Serbian Municipalities” of “Community of Serbian Municipalities” in northern Kosovo. Northern Kosovo is home to a Serbian-majority population who absolutely do not recognize Kurti’s government as legitimate and largely answer to Belgrade, though they often feel left on their own by the Serbian government as well. According to the 2013 Brussels Agreement between Kosovo and Serbia, the government of Kosovo has to create something called the Association/Community of Serbian Municipalities, a sort of thin layer of sovereignty or self-government that is nonetheless subordinate to Prishtina. Meanwhile, Serbia would extract itself from the north, ceding control of it to the government of Kosovo.

This has always been hugely controversial in Kosovo, as some believe it will create the conditions for eventual Serbian secession. Kurti remaining in office effectively means that there will be little progress made on this front. This is something that has made Western capitals very frustrated with Kurti, and he was under EU sanctions until last year.

However tense the current status quo is, I disagree with those who say a return to full-scale war is imminent or inevitable. There are something like 4,500 peacekeeping troops in Kosovo as a part of KFOR, NATO’s Kosovo peacekeeping force. That said, I am sure there will be the occasional flare up of localized violence. This currently happens every 1-2 years. But I highly doubt that these spasms of violence will lead to a full-scale war. Despite all the acrimonious feelings and distrust, there is little appetite for another big war in the Balkans by any side.

Finally, I am curious about your assessment, in broader terms, of what has given rise to the right-wing populist wave across Europe and/or how it is likely to shape Europe’s future overall. The supposedly “anti-establishment” profile, as in the case of Giorgia Meloni, either ends up directly submitting to the establishment, that is, to the Brussels bureaucracy, or produces state structures of astonishing corruption. This is a genuinely compelling issue, and I would be very interested in your views.

My answer about what has given rise to the right-wing populist wave is not at all original. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this wave was preceded by the 2007-2008 financial crisis, which led to an overall crisis in faith in institutions, experts, and in liberalism. This was fertile ground for a populist backlash against “elites”. Of course, these anti-establishment politicians ride to power on promises to “drain the swamp” or fight the powers that be, and then turn around and adopt very conventional policies once in office. Or, in Orban’s case, they may actually break with established consensus, but turn out even more corrupt than the liberal “elites” they rail against. There is always a rhetoric-policy gap in politics, but it’s especially pronounced on the populist right.

In this extensive interview with Harici Medya at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, Swiss journalist, Editor-in-chief of Die Weltwoche Roger Köppel provides a piercing diagnostic of the fracturing global order. Analyzing the downfall of the so-called “rule-based international system” through the cold lens of realism, Köppel articulates the inherent fragility of modern alliances when confronted by the supremacy of national interests. From the volatile Iran-Israel axis to the internal schisms within NATO, and from China’s emergence as a strategic alternative to the complex interplay between theology and power, each pivotal issue is reshaped by Köppel’s distinct and uncompromising perspective.

The dialogue further explores the friction between the Vatican and the American populist right, interrogating the resurgence of religion as a potent geopolitical instrument. Placing significant emphasis on Türkiye’s central role as a mediator within this “biblical” theater of conflict, Köppel champions the necessity of authentic diplomacy over moralizing rhetoric. Ultimately, this conversation offers a profound intellectual roadmap for navigating the sanctuary of pragmatism in an era redefined by the maneuvers of “great predator countries.”

I’d like to start with the ongoing talks about Iran. There is this current discussions between United States and Iran that they had an agreement about the Strait of Hormuz, but then things soured quite a bit and now Iran claims that they’re going to close the strait again because the American side also is not opening the blockade. So in a more general sense, what do you think about this ceasefire? How do you think it’s going to evolve in the upcoming days?

If I knew, I would have great qualified knowledge. Probably I could be a very rich man because I could foresee the stock market development. Unfortunately, we are in a very difficult situation where national interest, security concerns and even religious convictions are in the field of battle. And I can just hope that at the end of the day, goodwill prevails and that all sides find a way to settle this terrible situation. But how it can be achieved… I’m a Swiss. It’s very, very difficult to give here any kind of advice. I think I can understand all sides. I can understand the security concerns of Israel. I have a lot of sympathy with that. I can understand the American position, which was, since President Reagan, rather clear concerning Iran. And then you have Iran, this amazing civilization, which at least in European eyes, is also on a way, which can be—let’s be very cautious here—which can be considered a threat for other countries, building up ballistic arsenals, experimenting with nuclear explosives. It’s a very, very demanding issue. But somehow I’m still optimistic. I believe that they find a solution. But at the moment, it’s very hard to see how.

The United States and Europe had some sort of conflict between each other when it came to the Iran war. Donald Trump had certain expectations from its European allies, which already had a strained relationship after the Greenland debacle. When it comes to why Europe did not send any help, how do you describe that? Do you think Trump was right? Do you think Europe was right? What is the situation between the two parts of NATO?

I think what we see in the relationship between the EU and the United States is a symptom of the topic that has been discussed at this conference here in Antalya, which is the crumbling, which is the downfall of the so-called international order. And you can see it even on the level of military alliances such as NATO, that these alliances, they mean nothing in today’s world. We are in a world where national interest rules. And I believe that always national interest has ruled. But sometimes there was a lot of hypocrisy and the big talk about international order, rule-based order. But at the end of the day, it was only and always national interest. And we see it now with NATO: when it’s in the national interest that the Europeans can talk and use NATO, they say, “We are NATO members.” If the biggest NATO power, United States, says “Now you have to help us,” the Europeans say “No.” So I don’t want to judge this. I don’t want to say who is right and who is wrong. But I would like to say that this just indicates to us that these international rule-based systems, alliances such as NATO, they give no security today, they give no order today. The only thing that matters are national interest and the capacity of national leaders to sit together and find solutions for conflicts. And this is why this forum here in Antalya is very important. Because in such a world of national interest, where conflicts can pop up any second, any minute, it’s very important to bring back diplomacy, to talk, to create platforms such as these in order to interact. I think this is great that we have on one day the Ukrainian Foreign Minister and on the other day the Russian Foreign Minister. I wish we had more such forums also in Europe. And this is my critique of the European Union. We are too much… The European Union is too much moralizing, telling everybody who is the bad guy, who is the good guy, and is not engaging enough in finding common ground, common solutions via diplomacy.

When you look into the relationship between Europe and Russia or Europe and China, especially with the NATO meetings previously, before the second Trump administration, it was always claimed that these countries are adversaries to the Western order in general. But now, especially strained relations between Europe and the United States, we are seeing many members of the European Union trying to find alternatives to their security arrangements with the United States, which can be considered with China. Especially now we are seeing the Spanish Prime Minister going to China. Emmanuel Macron said something similar. And there were Keir Starmer’s meeting with Xi Jinping in China. So in general, do you see China being an alternative to United States? Do you think that Europe will change its course towards East?

Well, I’m from Switzerland, from a neutral country. And we try not to make enemies. We are too small; we have to be able to defend ourselves. And Switzerland is very much open to the world. We work with everybody. And even our neutrality has a bit suffered in the last years because the European Union has pushed Switzerland a lot in order to participate in the sanctions against Russia, even delivering weapons to Ukraine. Fortunately, we did never that. We were strictly neutral in the juristic sense. But with the sanctions, we have lost a bit our absolute impartiality. So Switzerland is totally open to the world. And I think many European countries should follow this path and should not talk themselves into these kind of confrontational views of the world. Of course, I mean, there might be other interests. If you look at the Baltic states, with their history with the Soviet Union, with Russia, it’s complicated. Poland has another tradition; they have to find out for themselves. But generally speaking, I would say in today’s world, we have to invest in great bilateral relationships. The European countries should cooperate with the United States, of course, with China, with Russia. I mean, Russia is a neighbor of Europe, but Europe, what is Europe? Europe is a group of small and middle countries with different histories and also different national interests. And somehow the EU is a structure which is too heavy-handed for this multiplicity of interests. So I would strongly argue from a Swiss perspective: make peace with Russia as soon as you can. Make no war, no conflict with China. Stop this moralizing attitude and patronizing of others. Just try to be a small bunch of countries who is not in big power politics anymore. Let the others be big powers. We can be big economic powers, big scientific powers, big powers of diplomacy and understanding and leave the rest to the big predator countries that are also on this planet. Of course, the big powers have big problems. We are smaller countries with smaller problems.

There’s a sentiment, there was a sentiment in the first Trump administration that if the European countries hang on tight for as long as possible, there will be eventually a leader that is willing to work together with Europe once again, which was Joe Biden in that. And when Joe Biden was elected, the Ukraine war started. And then we saw a reconsolidation of European countries under NATO umbrella in general. But now we are seeing the strain in the relationship is so hard that things may not go back as much as it can. But still, in the many international meetings, we are seeing figures like Gavin Newsom from California, which could be potentially the next president of the United States. And he was saying, “You need to once again hang on tight until 2028.” Do you think that if a Democrat president or a president that is someone that’s more close to American establishment… Do you think if someone like that gets into the presidency in United States, the concept of “collective West” will come back and Europe and United States will go back to their relationship like it was before?

Well, I hope not that we will go back in the time before Trump in that sense, because Donald Trump made—the American President made—something which was to me overdue: he said we have to talk with Russia again. We have to engage in diplomacy. Under Biden, there was no diplomacy. And if Gavin Newsom wants to be the second Biden—no diplomacy with Russia, the collective West meaning “we, the West, the best against the rest”—then I don’t think that this is a philosophy with which you can win the future. Of course, the United States is a big country; you could say a Godzilla country. And a Godzilla country has a lot of problems. They have a lot of alliances in the region of China, with Taiwan, with Japan, entanglements. It’s not easy. Of course, you have global interests. You have to see what you can do. And I think the reality, the dominating trend in the reality is—and I think Trump has realized this—the time of unilateral dominance of the United States of America is over. That was the case after the downfall of the Soviet Union in 1990. Then the Russians were lying on the ground. China was still very weak after Mao Zedong. I mean, they were starting to recover. Now we have a different world. We have China, which is basically number one economically. We have India, which is growing very fast. Russia has recovered. Russia doesn’t swallow a NATO enlargement to the east, you know, neglecting all the security concerns of Russia. I have great understanding. The Russians say “No, we don’t want this.” The Americans would never tolerate Russians or Chinese with their military structures in Canada or in Mexico. I mean, they wouldn’t wait as President Putin for eight years; they would intervene in eight hours if something like that happens. So Trump has realized America is not strong enough to be the dominant hegemon of the world. So he starts to focus, to concentrate on his prime spheres of influence, which is South America, which is the Middle East with all the oil. He has a rivalry with China. But I think Trump is, ultimately, he’s a pragmatist. Probably he was being overconfident with Iran. I can understand that. He didn’t want… I mean, he doesn’t want… He’s not interested in the interests of the United States and of Israel if Iran gets nuclear weapons. So they had to do something. But you know, they probably overestimated themselves. We will see. I don’t know, but we’re seeing this kind of multipolar world is in the making, and therefore, we need a lot of diplomacy and pragmatism. I think Trump is a pragmatist. I didn’t think that Biden was a pragmatist. I don’t think that Gavin Newsom seems like a pragmatist. I don’t know. So I hope that we see leaders, whoever it might be, who will not go back to the old times with no diplomacy, no talking, with this kind of Western supremacy attitude. This is not good. It’s not good for the West. It’s not good for the rest of the world. It’s not good for everybody.

In the first question, you mentioned a little bit of the religious conflicts. From what I understand, at least, you were talking about the Trump and Pope little fight maybe. So this situation in the last week has really gone out of control. The statements coming from both sides were pretty harsh. Donald Trump and especially a Catholic, J.D. Vance, was telling the Pope that he should be careful when he’s talking about theological matters, which was pretty interesting on its own. But when you look into this, do you think it is happening because Donald Trump saw someone that is critical of himself and he just didn’t want to take that, or you see a more sectarian conflict on the background of the situation? Because we have many figures like Peter Thiel of Palantir having meetings in Rome, talking about the Pope, talking about the Antichrist. And there was Steve Bannon who was mentioning we should overthrow Pope Francis and overthrow Vatican. There are plenty of figures in the American populist right that have a problem with Vatican. So in general, what do you say? Do you think that this is a sectarian issue?

In my first answer, I actually alluded to another biblical conflict, which is the conflict between the Israelites and the Ishmaelites, you know, going back to the great prophet Abraham and those great peoples which emerged from that great father, grandfather of civilization: the Israelites and the Ishmaelites. And Iran, you know, being one of the great empires, of course, also during the Islamic rule of the world. And then, of course, then you got the Jews, God’s chosen people. And I would say that religion is also a big part of Middle Eastern politics. But it’s great, it’s good you mentioned this dimension also in Western politics. Well, I would suggest, I mean, not to take Trump literally, but to take Trump seriously. And not every utterance of people from his camp or from other camps has to be taken totally seriously. I’m a Protestant, but I’m theologically interested. I saw with certain bewilderment these, you could say this wrestling, this verbal wrestling between the Vatican and then we saw these absurd pictures of Donald Trump, the American president, like posing as some kind of Jesus. But we have seen some similar stuff. I mean, there are people who think that Trump is losing his mind. Well, I don’t hope that’s a sign of that. I don’t know. That’s what the Americans have to find out for themselves. But I would say this is, for me, just an absurd indicator of probable—and I hope I’m wrong—nervousness on the side of the American leadership which realizes that things in the Middle East are not going according to plan. And I think that the American President has put himself under no less stress because he said he wants to finish the war in Ukraine. It’s still going on. He has his vision for Israel, he has his vision for the Middle East, he has his Abraham Accords, which is a great achievement. But now they are somehow not, you know, really, really in the spotlight anymore. You see this war in Iran, he doesn’t seem to find an end, an emergency exit. So probably these verbal entanglements are a symptom of stress. But on the other side, we have seen so many things Trump has said and strange stuff, you know, and I wouldn’t take it too seriously. Of course, the Pope, it’s his duty to criticize, to criticize war-making powers. I mean, this is his duty. And he is also… he’s right when he says it’s a crime to use God for politics, which is not only true for Christians; it’s also true for other religions today. Some powers use God to make politics. That’s always dangerous. And I think this is the ultimate sacrilege. As a Protestant, the people who speak about God meaning themselves… that’s a very dangerous species. We should be careful of these guys. So the Pope is right in saying this. And Trump, of course, he wants to present his point. I wouldn’t give too much attention to that. Peter Thiel… I have been to these lectures in Rome. I have listened to them. Yes, of course. I was there and it was confidential, so I shouldn’t say anything. But I’m smiling when I’m reading the newspapers about these lectures, what he was supposed to have said. My father was a Catholic too. Peter Thiel’s notion of the Vatican is not that the Vatican is the Antichrist. That’s not his position. I made an interview with him in my newspaper and he was explaining what he meant with Antichrist. He said the Antichrist is a worldwide bureaucracy which is grabbing power and putting sand into the eyes of the people, saying, “We save you from the apocalypse, we save you from Armageddon, from the climate catastrophe. We will bring eternal peace.” So Peter Thiel is not against the Vatican. Peter Thiel is not against whatever. You know, he’s concerned about the global bureaucratic state, which he identifies from his studies with that what the Bible called the Antichrist. But there are a lot of theologians who would not accept this description. They have a more narrow definition of the Antichrist. But it was a very interesting lecture and it was on a very high intellectual level. And I think not many politicians who criticize Peter Thiel are capable of having such a lecture themselves. So it was very interesting for me to listen to that.

Okay, one last question. It’s going to be about Türkiye. More specifically, the latest affairs that we’re seeing all around the region is bringing out a new situation where Türkiye and Israel are the new rivals in the region itself. Iran seems to be taking a little bit of a backside. And now that this is recognized by both sides, by both Türkiye and Israel, the rhetoric is getting stronger. Yesterday Mr. Tom Barrack was here and he was asked this very question and he said that it’s only rhetoric, it’s nothing more. These countries do not have to fight, are not on a path to fight. But he’s of course a side note in this situation and he obviously doesn’t want to see these two countries to get into a quarrel like that. But what do you say about this? Do you think in the near future of Middle East you expect a conflict between Israel and Türkiye?

Well, if I listen to certain statements of involved statesmen, there is not much diplomacy there. It’s very confrontational. We have listened yesterday to the Turkish President. Erdogan was very clear in his views. Also the Turkish Foreign Minister, Hakan Fidan, a very thoughtful person, but still with strong words. And I fear that now we are here in a still very serious conflict between Israel and probably Türkiye. I hope as a Swiss, that Türkiye—which under President Erdogan has in a… I’m not talking about interior politics; I don’t want to interfere, this Turks have to sort out themselves what they see appropriate. From outside, I see a very strong head of state, the President, in a smart way, who has positioned Türkiye as a key player of international diplomacy. And I hope that Türkiye can use this weight, this respect it has gained, in order to find a way also to accommodate the legitimate security concerns of Israel. Then I can understand Israel in this sense that Israel has had a lot of wars in the last eight years. It didn’t start these wars. Israel has been built out of a terrible catastrophe which is in the responsibility of the Europeans, especially the Germans, which is the Holocaust. They have created this state of Israel after the Second World War, which was not accepted by some of the nations in the Middle East. And so there were wars; Israel won these wars, they gained territory, they gave this territory back in the philosophy “land for peace.” So they gave the land, they didn’t get the peace. And there is now a new, you can say, more hardline political agenda which says, “Well, after the massacre of Hamas, we switch. We don’t believe in land for peace. Now land is peace.” It’s a bit, you could say, the Russian perspective. Russia was attacked many times. They said, “We need a cordon sanitaire in order to protect ourselves. We start to think in square kilometers.” Problem is, Israel, they start to think the same way. But at the core are legitimate security concerns. I don’t think that Israel is an imperialist power who wants to have an empire reaching from Pakistan to Portugal or, you know, a huge territorial player. But I think there are legitimate security concerns. And Türkiye, as this great moderator, has this great diplomatic force in the center of the world, of this world. I just hope that President Erdogan will find a way in order to bring Israel to the table. Now with Syria, which is very close to Türkiye, they have a great understanding, as far as I could see here, with other powers and the track record of President Erdogan, I think he’s in a unique position to bring here peace. But how this should be, I don’t know. In Switzerland, we say in the Middle East, “This is a biblical conflict.” It’s so hard to find a solution. We are glad that we are not living in this conflict field. We are living in the center of Europe. We had many wars there as well. But thanks God, they are behind us. Let’s hope they are not returning.

If it’s a biblical conflict, then we are all doomed. It’s not a thing.

No, then we are not doomed if it’s a biblical conflict, because then we can say we are all children of God and God didn’t create this world in order that human beings make war all the time. So we just have to find our… There must be a solution. We just haven’t found it yet.

Well, someone said we should be careful when talking about theology, so I should just stop here.

I agree.

Thank you.

Thank you.

In an exclusive exchange conducted by Harici Medya on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, former Israeli peace negotiator Daniel Levy offers a clinical dissection of the shifting tectonic plates in Middle Eastern geopolitics. Amidst the fog of ongoing negotiations between Washington and Tehran, Levy delineates a region caught between the unpredictable whims of the Trump administration and Israel’s ambitious pursuit of regional hegemony.

Daniel Levy, a senior adviser to the government of former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, was part of the Israeli team that attended the Taba summit with the Palestinians in 2001. He also participated in the second Oslo negotiations in 1995 with then Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Between 2012 and 2016, Mr Levy served as Director for the Middle East and North Africa at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He is currently president of the New York-based think tank US/Middle East Project.

The veteran diplomat provides a sobering analysis of the fragile ceasefires in Lebanon and the intrinsic link between Netanyahu’s political survival and the perpetuation of conflict. Crucially, Levy draws attention to a burgeoning sentiment within the Israeli establishment that increasingly frames Türkiye as a long-term strategic challenge, mirroring the rhetoric once reserved for Iran. This profound dialogue serves as a roadmap for understanding the complex interplay of personal egos, military-industrial interests, and the calculated destabilization of state structures across the Levant.

First of all, of course, the talks are going on right now with Iran and United States. There were certain news coming in the morning. First, Donald Trump claimed that everything is fine, the Strait of Hormuz is open. Then things didn’t go that way. It seems that the Americans didn’t open their own blockade and now the Iranians want to go back to closing the Strait themselves. So, so what do you expect from the ongoing talks right now? Which direction do you think that things will lead into?

I think there are three or four basic possibilities, scenarios. One is there is a deal of some kind. Second is there may be some quiet understandings or expectations, but there’s not something you could really announce as a deal. But the American President decides he’s had enough anyway. He declares victory and walks away. Of course, Iran, with equal, if not greater justification, will also declare victory and everyone will give their speeches. But essentially the ceasefire will hold, there’ll be an arrangement in Hormuz, etc. And that could transition later to negotiations. But, so that’s the second scenario. Third scenario is Trump decides that the way to get a deal is to do one big final strike just to show that he’s still the tough guy, he’s the warmongers. The Israelis and others, those inside his administration, convince him to strike again.

Like an amphibious assault. Like a what?

Well, it could be. What I’m saying is there’s another American-Israeli aggression, maybe from Trump. The goal is you escalate to de-escalate like he did in June of 2025. But once you do that, you’re no longer in control of events because Iran will respond. If that’s the third scenario, then either that segues towards a resumption of a prolonged conflict, or that segues towards walking away, declaring victory. Sorry, negotiation. We seem to be more in the non-escalation trajectory at the moment. Even though there are the things going on in Hormuz, which if the Americans are going to blockade, of course the Iranians are as well. So that’s where we are. The problem is in trying to decipher what will happen next. Of course, there are lots of moving parts, but the thing that makes this most difficult is you have an American president who is not only unpredictable, not only incompetent, but also incoherent. He has no strategy and therefore he doesn’t really know why he went to war, what he wants to get out of the war. I know there are people who think that’s naive to claim that; no, of course, there’s American geostrategy. You’re trying to take hold of an important choke point in world energy. It’s good for the American military-industrial complex. All those arguments are fine. There’s an element of that. But that’s not what’s defined this war. What’s defined this war is the fragile ego, the peculiar personality, easy to manipulate, as we saw with Netanyahu. The reports of how Netanyahu went to the White House, went to the Situation Room, told the American president a story which in any other American administration, the experts would say, “Mr. President, now that our guest, the Israeli Prime Minister, has left, here’s what’s really the story. We’re not doing this.” This president fell into the trap that no other president has before. The trap’s been laid before by the Israeli prime minister. So because of those things, it’s more hard to predict than it would otherwise be. And the president, President Trump, can lurch from, you know, one… he can wake up one morning, he’s spoken to someone, he’s heard an interview on Fox TV and make one decision, and then the next morning makes another one. So it seems that he is fed up with the war. He knows that the politics, the economics are difficult for him to manage. But maybe he thinks he’s Jesus again tomorrow and he carries on the war.

The Lebanon part of the war was really on the spotlight because Pakistan was saying one thing, Iran was saying one thing, then the United States and Israel were saying the complete opposite of what they were claiming. So what we have seen from the beginning of those talks with the ceasefire, it seems that the initial discussion was about actually involving Lebanon, too. And now we come to a point where Israel was reluctant to listen to what Donald Trump or the entirety of American systems tells them to do. But now, for some reason, Donald Trump managed to push Israel to hold a ceasefire on their own. So do you think that this is a failure by Israeli government to not be able to hit their war goals, which was reaching out to the Litani River? What do you think about it?

So, first of all, and this is playing out inside Israel, this doesn’t feel like a win on Lebanon. They’ve destroyed things. That’s their modus operandi. But being told, and especially the very particular language that President Trump uses in his Truth Social postings, “Enough.” This isn’t where Israel thought it would be. It also makes it quite clear that this was part of the deal, that it was the Iranians and the Pakistanis who were telling us the truth on Lebanon. It is also probably the clearest indication we have that Trump actually wants to close the escalatory logic of this war and to be in an ending this deal, de-escalation place because he’s imposed this ceasefire in Lebanon on Israel. It also shows us that if the Americans want to impose something on Israel, they can. Not that we needed any proof of that. Because it’s obvious America has the leverage. America gives them the weapons, America gives them the political support. If America says stop, Israel says yes; it tries everything to avoid that. It will continue to try to provoke. So inside Israel, there is a lot of criticism. First, as usual, Israel overestimated its own capacity and underestimated that of its adversary. You had the Northern Commander of the Israeli military saying, “We were surprised by Hezbollah still having this capacity to send rockets to fire on the ground.” But, and the “but” is important. As usual, it’s a ceasefire, Israel style. And it’s a ceasefire that the Americans have accepted, at least in this respect, Israeli stipulations on the ceasefire. Which means Israel is still physically inside Lebanon. So it doesn’t have the larger security buffer, but it has a significant security buffer. In fact, they took additional land inside Lebanon, bordering Syria, in the hours leading up to this declaration. And Israel, according to the document, the text, can act to prevent immediate operations from the other side. But who defines what that is? Who defines what the threat is? As long as Israel defines the threat, it will define it widely. Nonetheless, Israel has been significantly curtailed, which never happens on the Palestinian front, of course.

With Netanyahu government, there are a lot of, maybe conspiracy theories, maybe more normal comments. But people are claiming that Netanyahu is pursuing more and more war around their neighbors and with Iran because he wants to, you know, just keep going in the political scene. If they stop, maybe he’s going to get into a court case, he’s going to get arrested. Do you think that’s the case or do you think that the Israeli government and Israeli state itself wants to pursue these wars?

So I don’t think it has to be one or the other. It can be both. And I think in this case it is both. Netanyahu, who is alive, by the way, in terms of rumors of conspiracy theories… Well, it’s a weekly rumor. Exactly. It has served him politically since October 7th to be a permanent wartime leader, for Israel to be in perpetual war. Every week he’s still supposed to be in court. Every week he still sends his lawyers to the courthouse to say, “I can’t come this week, I’m busy with the war,” which is genuinely what’s happening. It seems like with the election getting closer, he wants these conditions and he has many options: Lebanon, Iran, Gaza, West Bank. So it’s not just a continuation of war, it’s a continuation of war on multiple fronts. There are other elements to this. Economically, part of how Israel has managed its economy is a version of military Keynesianism, which has been to pump money into the economy not only through the military-industrial complex, but also through the compensation that reservists receive. So part of the money in the Israeli economy at the moment is the very generous packages that those who sign up for more and more and more weeks of military service are getting. And Israel went into this war with a low debt-to-GDP ratio, so it has headspace to keep doing that. But then there is the part of this that’s not about Netanyahu, his personal court case and political management. This is about something that goes much deeper. He has support from the opposition. The opposition criticized: “Why didn’t you get the Americans to do more with us in Lebanon? Why didn’t you build more shelters?” They’re actually mad that they stopped. The opposition are just as belligerent in this respect as the Prime Minister. Back when there were discussions over the Israelis being held in Gaza, the opposition would say, “Get the hostages released and then resume the attack. Why don’t you at least get the hostages released?” So this goes much deeper into Israeli conceptual thinking and how the state has gone on a journey to promoting and then manufacturing societal consent for genocide against the Palestinians and war in the region. And so the way one has to understand this is Israel has a vision for regional domination that requires the weakening and collapsing of surrounding states, of any potential power balances or anything that could emerge as a peer competitor. Of course, Israel’s not the only one that has been involved in encouraging the collapse of states. Israel wasn’t the primary actor in Syria for sure. Israel did then go and smash up what was left of what the Syrian successor leadership could have done after Assad fell. And it even includes trying to… there are some states you’re not going to collapse, but you want to co-opt them. You want them to become dependent on Israel, more vulnerable, like the Gulf. Israel’s desired intentional outcome from this war with Iran was that the Gulf would be more weakened. And of course, the Israeli system is very clear in which country next needs to be weakened; it’s a country called Türkiye.

Yeah, I’ll get to that. But firstly, the cost of doing all of that, the road to regional hegemony, if you will. It’s always claimed that it’s Israel’s reputation and Israel’s friendships, all in the West, in Europe, in the United States and everything. But there’s this idea that if this war stops, somehow, not just Iran, all of that stops. Probably Israel has the idea that things will go back to how it was before. There won’t be any sanctions, there won’t be any, quote-unquote, “hard feelings” with the Western countries. Do you think that’s going to be the case? Because when Germany put sanctions on weapons sales to Israel, they waited for a ceasefire in Gaza, and the moment that it took place, there was just no more sanctions or no more ban for weapons sales. So do you think that’s going to happen with European states who right now are showing negative emotions towards Israel’s actions?

So I think this is a project of overreach, of exaggeration, which is typical of a state that goes to a very extreme place, which is the case in Israel today. But the Israeli, Netanyahu and others’ counter-narrative would be: so far it works. So one thing that’s going on here is while we’re in this moment of fluidity and while he still has Trump onside in the White House, and while everyone else is going, “Oh, my God, what do we do with Trump?”—Europeans, Arab allies, even Tier One Asian-American allies—Netanyahu is saying, “Let’s exploit this moment to strengthen our position to the maximum possible, and then things will settle down again, but we’ll be that much stronger.” So the bet he is placing is if Israel is successful enough, then the others won’t have a choice. They’ll be dealing with a much more powerful Israel. You know, as soon as Germany went one way, it went back the other way. And not only went back the other way, Germany has now signed one of its biggest drone manufacturing deals with an Israeli military arms company. So Netanyahu is saying, “Look, if I can pull this thing enough in my direction, if I get more of the Gulf with me, then India will be less reticent about taking sides. It will be more with me. I have the relations with Greece and Cyprus on energy. Maybe I force Lebanese gas to come this way, maybe I force the Syrians into a similar arrangement. Even if we’ve lost image, even if the reputation looks different, power talks and we can lose the campus and we can lose public opinion, but we can retain enough power that people won’t have a choice. And then they’ll basically accept in Europe as well.” Everyone will look at America as unreliable. This is even thinking for a post… kind of how do we function with an America that has reduced power? If we can assert this, others will fall in line. That’s the gamble. That’s the bet that Netanyahu is placing. There is, to my mind, sadly too much evidence that it’s not a crazy bet. Now, I don’t think it’s going to work. I think there will be blowback. I don’t think he can succeed. But that’s what he’s trying to do. And at the moment it’s not clear that he will fail.

Final question. You already mentioned about their will to, you know, have a quarrel with Türkiye. They’re making it evident in the media, they’re making it evident by their politicians and the claims they do. But at the same time yesterday Mr. Tom Barrack was here and he asked the same question if there will be a fight between Israel and Türkiye. And he said that it’s just rhetoric, there’s nothing serious behind it, that they are just being pushed by people around the leaders like Netanyahu and Erdogan. So I would like to ask you, is there a realistic scenario where Türkiye and Israel are going to face each other and what position the United States will take in such case?

So we’re not talking short term, but this is more than rhetoric. Israeli officials go around the world to their friends and they say, “We need to talk to you about Türkiye, why this country is dangerous.” They are beginning to talk about Türkiye in the way they used to talk about Iran. And Iran was not a short-term project. Iran was a decades-long project of creating the conditions for a confrontation. They warn about the Turkish missile program. That’s the language that they use. But it’s not just that. Türkiye would be not a serious actor in statecraft if it wasn’t now testing on the other side, which I’m sure it is, which is to look at… we’re not talking about war in the short term. What we’re looking at is what vulnerabilities can we begin to create or exploit. One should, for instance, see the energy relationship not only with Greece and Cyprus, but with Egypt. And if they can pull, as I said, Lebanon and maybe try and pull Syria just to test… maybe we can’t, but let’s try. Try the first time. If there is a Syria-Israel relationship, they will see where it can go. Now, I’m not saying that will happen; I don’t think it can. But on Lebanon they will try. They may get further. On Syria, they will try. The relationship on the Kurdish front, Israel got a defeat there when the Americans came in and said, “No, we’re not going to,” when the SDF was forced into the climb down that it was forced into with the Syrian state. So they get setbacks as well. Somaliland, the Israeli recognition of… So there are going to be things happening in places that you go, “What was that about?” and then you say, “Oh, okay.” One of the angles to this story, like the Somaliland story, is a Turkish angle. Israel putting a base somewhere next to where Türkiye has an influence. Sudan. Israel’s not a main actor in Sudan, but Israel’s closest friend in the Gulf is a very main actor in Sudan. So let’s see what we can do there. So you will see sometimes under the surface things going on if Israel is able to continue to pursue this. Now, the counterpoint to that is whether you begin to get an alliance in the region which includes containing and deterring Israel as part of its DNA, as part of its mission statement, if you like. And that’s the subtext to a lot of what is going on is whether Israel can pull more people in its direction or whether we get something that begins to look like containment. But if Israel could continue to pick off country after country, one at a time, then it will continue to escalate its future planning in a belligerent way vis-à-vis Türkiye. If it is forced to roll back some of its ambitious domination project, then the Türkiye thing is too much of a stretch.

Thank you so much, sir.

Pleasure.