The chances of Turkey and Syria going to war are extremely slim. The Syrian shelling of a Turkish town that killed five women and children, followed by stepped up Turkish retaliatory artillery strikes on a Syrian border town which killed several Syrian soldiers, looked like the start of something big. And when in an emergency session, Turkey's parliament authorized a resolution giving the government permission to deploy its soldiers to foreign countries, the war drums suddenly got louder. But Turkey is keen to stress it is not declaring war on Syria. There is no appetite for military conflict, which is noticeable in how conciliatory Syria has been since the news of the shelling broke. Damascus apologized for the shelling and said it would not happen again. A recent poll by the Center for Economic and Foreign Policy Research shows strong opposition to any deeper involvement in the Syrian crisis among Turks. The majority of those polled - 56 percent - do not support military intervention in Syria. In Istanbul, the 5,000 people who took to the city center on Thursday evening in a peaceful anti-war protest expressed the views of millions of Turks. A conflict of any size or nature with Turkey would only dig a deeper hole for Bashar Al-Assad as he clings precariously to power. The border violence adds another new dimension to Syria's civil war that has already killed 30,000 people. In addition, Turkey already has its hands full in hosting more than 93,000 Syrian refugees in camps, raising reasonable fears of a mass influx and bringing back images of the flight of half a million Iraqi Kurds into Turkey after the 1991 Gulf War. Still, there is much tension and the once cozy relationship between the countries is not allaying fears. Turkey has played a key role in calling for a transition of power in Syria. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repeatedly denounced Al-Assad, publicly calling on him to step down after accusing him of massacring his own people. The Syrian government, meanwhile, has accused Turkey of arming and funding Syrian rebels and of allowing Turkey to be used as their base. In March, the two countries shut down their respective embassies. Syria's shooting down four months ago of a Turkish military reconnaissance jet after it crossed into Syrian airspace, killing two Turkish pilots, further strained bilateral relations. Whether the jet was shot down in or out of Syrian airspace remains a contentious issue. When Syria shot down the jet, Turkey's response was relatively restrained. It increased its military presence along its border with Syria and called a meeting of NATO. Now Turkey has hit back after what it called “the last straw” when the mortar hit Akcakale. The gravity of the situation was seen at the UN Security Council which overcame deep divisions over Syria to unanimously approve a statement condemning the Syrian assault. However, the Turkish resolution is not a bill of war but a preventative measure so that the situation does not escalate further. Although it is the first time Turkey has fired into Syria, Syria says that its shelling of Turkey will not happen again.
