Turkey and Hamas Grow Close Ties between Turkey, NATO's biggest Muslim member, and Hamas, the Islamic militant group that says Israel should not exist, are blossoming. Last month, the Hamas premier visited the Turkish prime minister at his Istanbul home. Today, Turkish and Palestinian flags fly side by side at a building site in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. It seems like bad news for Israel, whose alliance with Turkey collapsed over a deadly raid by Israeli troops on a Turkish aid ship bound for Gaza in 2010. Yet some pundits believe that Turkey, a rising power that has worked with Washington on Iraq and other regional problems, could seek to nudge Hamas away from the principle of armed struggle or reduce the influence of Iranian sponsors. They acknowledge closer engagement with Hamas could disrupt Turkish diplomacy if there is another Gaza war, or a return to rocket attacks and bombings of Israeli targets. Israel wonders if Turkey will veer closer to the Hamas line, rather than the other way around. Another Hamas sponsor, Syria, is struggling to quell an uprising and has broken with Turkey, a former ally that says President Bashar Assad should resign. Turkey has said there are no plans for Khaled Mashaal, the Hamas political leader based in Damascus, to move to Turkey, though some Turkish analysts think the government phrasing did not close the door on the idea of a Hamas office in Turkey. Turkey would like to have more influence over Hamas as part of its general program of increasing influence in the region. Certainly, the decline of Syria has made that relationship more attractive to Hamas," Howard Eissenstat, a Turkey expert at St. Lawrence University in the United States, wrote in an email. However, he noted: "Hamas would have to be very isolated indeed for Turkey to be able to push it in directions that it doesn't want to go. Given its ability to get aid from private donors in the Gulf and from Iran, that type of desperation seems unlikely in the short term. As a possible patron or model for Hamas, Turkey seemingly has a lot to share, though its ambitions for influence elsewhere in the fast-changing region have sometimes fallen short of expectations. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a pious Muslim at the helm of a secular political system that he has dominated with robust election wins and a strong economic record. He won Palestinian praise in blockaded Gaza with harsh criticism of Israel. While Turkish officials back calls for democratic reform in response to popular uprisings, Iran remains supportive of Syria and is under U.N. sanctions because of its suspected nuclear weapons program. Iran says the program is peaceful, an assertion that Turkey once backed enthusiastically. Now there are strains, partly because Turkey agreed to host a NATO defense shield radar that would warn of any Iranian ballistic missiles. Turkey and Iran are also wary of each other's involvement in Iraq, a stew of sectarian tension. On the diplomatic front, Turkey and Iran enjoy cordial relations. Turkey buys oil and gas from Iran," said Nihat Ali Ozcan, a political analyst at the Economic Policy Research Foundation of Turkey in Ankara. However, there are thorny issues under the table.