Analysis: Turkey emerges unscathed from the Iran war When US President Donald Trump ordered strikes on Iran in late February, Turkish officials found themselves sidelined. Their repeated attempts to prevent the war proved unsuccessful, and the mood in Ankara was that Trump preferred the counsel of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over that of Turkish leaders. Three months later, however, Trump once again counted Turkey, alongside Pakistan and Qatar , among the countries that had significantly helped secure a memorandum of understanding with Iran.