On 8 August, the leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a joint declaration in Washington, committing to end more than three decades of conflict with US backing.
While still short of a final peace treaty, the agreement represented a major breakthrough for Baku, which secured one of its long-standing goals: establishing an unimpeded transit link between mainland Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan exclave.
Although the 27-mile transit route will formally remain under Armenian sovereignty, contrary to Baku’s initial demand, it will be leased and administered by US and other international contractors. The passage, running along Armenia’s southern border with Iran, has been dubbed the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity.
Following its military victories in 2020 and 2023, the Washington declaration has been widely hailed as another success in Baku. At the same time, other key regional powers - Russia and Iran - have expressed mixed reactions.
While cautiously welcoming the step toward peace and stability, both have voiced concern over the expanding US footprint in the South Caucasus. Nonetheless, for Baku, the accord offers more than territorial connectivity: it provides an opening to reposition itself in Washington, shifting the conversation beyond the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict towards a wider regional role, particularly in light of its growing engagement in the Middle East.
Azerbaijan’s engagement with the region has long been shaped by its controversial partnership with Israel. Supplying the bulk of Israel’s oil needs - and even substantially increasing exports during the genocide in Gaza - Baku has cultivated a reputation as one of Israel’s reliable friends in the Muslim world.
Notably, in March 2025, its state-owned energy giant SOCAR was granted licenses to explore natural gas fields in the Eastern Mediterranean, further anchoring its presence in the region’s energy market.
Syria as a new theatre
More recently, Azerbaijan has turned towards Syria, where energy interests and diplomatic strategy converge. The ouster of Bashar Al-Assad in December 2024 created new opportunities for Baku to position itself as a proactive regional actor.
As a close ally of Turkey, the main backer of post-Assad Syria, Azerbaijan dispatched humanitarian aid in late 2024 as a gesture of solidarity. Beyond its practical value, this assistance carried symbolic weight, recalling the role of Turkish-backed Syrian opposition mercenaries who fought alongside Azerbaijani forces against Armenia in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war.
In February 2025, President Ilham Aliyev sent a congratulatory letter to Syria’s transitional leader, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, highlighting “great opportunities for elevating relations” and inviting him for a state visit. Shortly thereafter, Baku reopened its embassy in Damascus after a 13-year closure.
In July, al-Sharaa officially visited Azerbaijan in his tenth stop on a diplomatic tour after assuming office. By August, Azerbaijan had already begun delivering natural gas to Aleppo through Turkey with Qatari financing - signalling Baku’s intent to expand its political and economic footprint in the region.
While Turkish and Israeli interests frequently diverge in Syria, Baku judges that - unlike the entrenched hostility of Assad’s regime or Iran’s ideological opposition to Tel Aviv - the tensions between Ankara, post-Assad Syria, and Israel remain more manageable.
Despite harsh rhetoric and deteriorating ties between the two parties since Israel’s devastating war in Gaza and subsequent strikes in Syria - reportedly also hitting Turkish military facilities - Baku views the rift as unlikely to escalate into open confrontation. With neither side willing to sever ties completely, Azerbaijan retains space to walk a fine line and maintain equilibrium between two of its closest partners.
Accordingly, Baku’s growing engagement in Syria is unlikely to jeopardise its strategic partnership with Israel, allowing Baku to balance relations across competing regional fault lines.
Baku has a record of facilitating rapprochement between Turkey and Israel, having played a behind-the-scenes role in normalisation efforts in 2016, 2018, and 2021. The most recent breakthrough came in 2022, following Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s visit to Ankara and subsequent meetings between Erdogan and then-Prime Minister Yair Lapid, which led to the restoration of full diplomatic relations that August.
With ties again fraying since late 2024, Azerbaijan has stepped in once more as mediator. President Aliyev publicly expressed his hope that “grounds for normalisation and areas of mutual interest” can again be found. In April, it was reported that Israeli and Turkish officials met in Baku to establish a permanent direct communication line for deconfliction in Syria.
Days later, reports surfaced that confidential, direct talks between Israeli and Syrian officials had taken place in Azerbaijan, with Turkish observers present.
Baku's strategic tightrope
As Baku works to mediate between Israel, Turkey, and Syria, Israel, in parallel, has sought to mend US-Azerbaijani relations. This dynamic could open the way to trilateral cooperation and potentially Azerbaijan’s accession to the Abraham Accords.
For Baku, such an outcome would not only secure additional benefits from Washington but also anchor Iran as a central focus of US policy, extending beyond the Middle East into the South Caucasus. In this vision, the competing interests of Turkey and Iran in Syria and the Caucasus could provide a new axis for Israeli-Turkish accommodation, with Azerbaijan positioning itself as a facilitator under US patronage.
However, this is far from an easy task. Israel, in pursuit of regional hegemony, shows little interest in stabilising Syria. Viewing Turkey as a peer rival in the Middle East, Israel’s growing ambitions risk deepening crises and could even trigger military confrontation with Ankara.
For Azerbaijan, maintaining a delicate balance between its two close allies may not be sustainable indefinitely. Just as Baku, after years of hedging between the United States and Russia, eventually shifted toward anti-Russian policies, it could one day be forced to choose between Turkey and Israel.
In such a scenario, President Erdogan would likely expect unequivocal support from Baku, given Ankara’s decisive role in Azerbaijan’s victory in Nagorno-Karabakh. Indeed, when tensions flared between Turkey and Greece over Eastern Mediterranean gas fields in 2020, Ilham Aliyev pledged unconditional support for Ankara “under any circumstances, without hesitation,” while Israel drew closer to Athens.
This underscores Turkey’s considerable leverage: nearly all of Azerbaijan’s major energy and transport projects depend on secure access through Turkish territory.
Besides, Baku’s reach to Syria is structurally limited: it lacks the long-standing networks, ideological influence, and military projection that Ankara, Tehran, or Moscow enjoy. Economically, despite robust energy revenues, Azerbaijan’s resources are insufficient to finance large-scale reconstruction or sustained investments in Syria.
Diplomatically, Baku has limited independent access to Syrian political actors. In this light, Baku’s presence is better understood as an attempt to gain visibility and diplomatic credit rather than a genuine capacity to shape outcomes - a cautious strategy of diversification that nonetheless carries the risk of overreach in a volatile theatre.
Rovshan Mammadli is a Baku-based journalist and independent analyst. Holding a BA in Israel and Middle East Studies and an MA in International Policy Studies, he focuses on Azerbaijan’s foreign policy, Middle East politics, and peace and security in the South Caucasus
Follow him on X: @MammadliRovshan