Last week, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took time off from the mayhem in his country and his campaign of political payback for the failed coup against him nearly a month ago, by sending his army into neighboring Syria. Thus, simultaneous to rapprochement efforts with Russia and Israel, Erdogan chose to open a new-old front against his enemies in Syria. The military operation was code-named "Euphrates Shield" and is intended, according to Erdogan and his cohort, to hit the Islamic State group, which has recently carried out a string of devastating terrorist attacks on Turkish soil. In the most recent of these attacks, about one week ago in the city of Gaziantep in the country's south, a 13-year-old suicide bomber detonated himself in the middle of a wedding party and killed dozens of people. It is good that Islamic State exists, to provide justification for military intervention in Syria. To be sure, the Russians and Iranians also announced they were sending troops to Syria to fight ISIS, but actually they are fighting the moderate rebel groups posing a threat to the rule of Syrian President Bashar Assad while largely ignoring Islamic State. Islamic State is indeed a growing nuisance for the Turks, but in the Syrian arena, they see the Kurds as the real threat. For their part, the Kurds are slowly establishing, with the help of Washington and with Russia turning a blind eye, true autonomy in northern and eastern Syria. This burgeoning autonomy has also aroused nationalistic feelings among the Kurds, which Ankara fears could spill over to the Kurdish minority in Turkey itself. After all, the Turkish army is mired in an escalating conflict with the Kurdish underground, the PKK, with which the majority of Kurdish forces active in Syria are affiliated. Erdogan, it appears, believes the best way to prevent the creation of a Kurdish state in Syria is by military intervention and perhaps ongoing occupation on Syrian soil. It is the only way the large superpowers will take him into account when they set out to formulate a long-term resolution to the crisis in Syria. And it is the only way to get the Americans -- who support, train and arm the Kurds to fight Islamic State (which the Turks have thus far avoided doing) -- to limit the scope of Kurdish activity inside Syria. Indeed, the Kurds, lacking a better alternative, are being made to swallow this bitter pill. They are dependent on the good graces of Washington, which needs the Turks. The Turkish military operation is targeting the town of Jarablus, from where Islamic State has dispatched suicide bombers to wreak havoc across Turkey. The town is important, however, because it is a meeting point between the Kurdish-held lands in eastern and northern Syria. With the help of his tanks, Erdogan hopes to stop the Kurds from conjoining these two swathes of territory in an effort to establish an autonomous region, and perhaps, down the road, even from declaring an independent state there. From this area, Erdogan can also influence events in Aleppo, where the Russians, Iranians and Hezbollah are engaged in all-out war against the Syrian rebels, who for the time being, against all odds, have managed to withstand the onslaught. Yet, all things considered, the Turkish campaign is limited in scope. It comprises several hundred troops and a few dozen armored vehicles. To be sure, the Turks, and Erdogan in particular, talk a lot -- as was the case with Israel -- but they are aware of their limitations and have exhibited considerable caution at every step. After all, they also want to avoid sinking in the Syrian quagmire. Turkey has joined the game in Syria, but has essentially been aiding the rebels there for quite some time already. However, following Turkey's intervention, a beneficiary has clearly emerged from among all the players, along with clear losers. The big winner is of course Assad, who is still securely in power and enjoying the fact that his adversaries are fighting among themselves. The losers, meanwhile, include Omran Daqneesh, the 5-year-old Syrian boy who was photographed covered in dust, bloodied and in shock after an airstrike, likely Russian, turned his home into rubble and killed his older brother. For one short moment, the image appalled the entire world. He and others like him are paying the price for Assad's continued power, for the prestige of Russia and its leader, Vladimir Putin, and for the failures and utter helplessness of the Obama administration.
