On 22 June, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) made a short, yet critically important, visit to Ankara for one-on-one meetings with Turkish president Erdoğan. The visit, the last leg of MBS’ travels to Jordan and Egypt, symbolized the repairing of Türkiye-Saudi relations, a bond that has been under immense strain for the past five years. Immediately following the meeting, which only lasted four hours from MBS’ touchdown to takeoff, a statement by both governments stressed the importance of trade, tourism, and economic development between the two nations.

However, the meeting, a follow-up to Erdoğan’s April visit to Riyadh, has been increasingly seen by analysts as an emphatic attempt by Erdoğan to repair Türkiye’s relationship with Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern states.

The worsening of relations between Saudi Arabia and the Turkish state began in 2017 with the blockade of Qatar. At the time, Erdoğan’s vision for a transnational religious-nationalist ideology that spanned many Middle Eastern and European states aligned with the values of Qatar’s leadership, and Turkish mutual aid to the small Gulf state angered Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Egypt, the core proponents of the blockade.

However, the main catalyst of the sour relationship came from the 2 October 2018 murder of Saudi-American Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul’s Levent district. The brutal murder, in which a hit squad team of those closest to MBS flew to Istanbul to capture, kill, and ultimately dismember Khashoggi, sparked international outrage against Riyadh and MBS’s supposedly liberal plans for the Kingdom. Erdoğan used the Khashoggi murder to bolster his antipathy towards Saudi Arabia, all the while taking an international stance on human rights by leading the investigation into Khashoggi’s murder. In retaliation, the Kingdom imposed a travel ban on citizens going to Türkiye – justified by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as a de facto embargo on Turkish products in 2020.

The worsening relationship with Saudi Arabia fit Erdoğan’s ultimately isolationist foreign policy, one characterized by hostility towards many European and Middle Eastern states, including France and Egypt. Since ascending to power over a decade ago, further catalyzed by the July 2016 coup attempt, Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP – Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi) have focused on strengthening a, at times neo-Ottoman, domestic image of Türkiye that would see it rise to the power of a regional hegemon. Such tactics included massive-scale development projects within Türkiye – including the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the new Istanbul airport, and many other infrastructure projects – and an exporting of religious ideology by the Diyanet Foundation, including supplying imams in France. Combined with regional interventions, such as military action in Syria and Iraq, state-building in Somalia, and military and aid support in Libya and Afghanistan, Erdoğan’s vision for Türkiye, saw the state isolating itself from many regional partners in lieu of a strong, independent nation driven by a specific ideology.

Yet, Erdoğan’s vision for Türkiye has proved unsustainable. More states in the Middle East are making coalitions and connections previously unseen – such as trade talks between Greece and Saudi Arabia, as well as the wave of controversial Arab-Israeli normalizations spearheaded by the Trump administration – and Türkiye has been left out. Türkiye’s domestic situation isn’t much better, either: the 2019 election of opposition member Ekrem Imamoğlu as Istanbul Mayor, the upcoming 2023 general elections, and most importantly, Türkiye’s failing economy has cornered Erdoğan. The AKP’s unorthodox economic policies, compounded with rising debts and the COVID-19 pandemic, have seen inflation rise to over 70%, although unofficial numbers put the figure much higher. Surviving in major cities such as Istanbul is becoming more challenging, and affording basic provisions is a serious concern for millions of Turks.

Erdoğan’s position domestically and regionally has caused him to rapidly re-evaluate his relations with former regional partners, primarily those in the Gulf. In January, Erdoğan made a deal with the UAE for a $5bn currency swap between the two states in order to bolster reserves in Ankara’s central bank, in addition to creating a $10bn fund for Emirati investment in Türkiye. Erdoğan’s efforts with Saudi Arabia have been even more active – he dropped the absentia trial of the 26 members of Khashoggi’s hit squad, much to the criticism of opposition parties, and instead transferred jurisdiction to Riyadh. Right after the case was handed over in April, Erdoğan made his first visit to the Kingdom since 2017, where the process of mending relationships began. MBS’ most recent visit to Ankara came with the dissolution of the travel ban and de facto embargo, steps that have been seen as a slow start to a healthy relationship between the two states. The joint press release following the short visit made no real, concrete steps between the two states, although it stressed increased tourism and trade improvements.

Is this new effort by Erdoğan to appeal to Saudi Arabia a signifier of a new slate of Türkiye-Gulf relations? Not really. Erdoğan’s turn to Gulf elites is understandable: Türkiye’s economic devastation has only worsened with domestic efforts, and he is trying to establish regional lifelines. The de facto Saudi boycott cost Türkiye $3 billion annually, and since being lifted, imports to the Kingdom have increased by 25%. With Türkiye’s summer tourism scene starting, domestic tourism agencies hope to bolster the number of Saudis visiting the country. With 750,000 Saudi nationals visiting Türkiye in 2018, before the pandemic and travel ban, Türkiye’s tourism department has begun promoting lesser-known areas, such as the Bursa region’s rafting and nature attractions, hoping that Gulf tourists will be spurred to visit.

While a Turkish official called the recent MBS-Erdoğan meeting the beginning of a “new era”, the recent trajectory of Türkiye’s relations with Saudi Arabia and other regional powers indicates that these meetings might simply be a final attempt for Erdoğan to find a way of getting Türkiye out of its economic peril and regional isolation. Erdoğan hasn’t completely given up his old tactics, either. He has claimed upcoming incursions into Syria and combined with his seemingly ardent opposition to Sweden and Finland joining NATO and continuing hostility with Greece. Erdoğan’s nationalist rhetoric stands in seeming contradiction to his attempts at economic resuscitation. While these sporadic policies might be effective in the short term, if Erdoğan is to be victorious in the 2023 elections, he will have to implement and concretize a more stable approach to regional relationships.