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It’s a serious thing if Turkey provokes a skirmish with Israel. Is NATO obliged to defend Turkey when it acts as the aggressor?

Furthermore, they can’t have it both ways. Israel, though it has no land forces in Gaza, remains the Occupying Power and has every right to inspect goods in transit to Territory under its control. Turkey should not try to claim independence for Gaza.

The whole thing is turning into farce and President Obama needs to send strong signals to Turkey. Our executive branch may have severe disagreements with Israeli policy but should not allow that to serve as pretext for armed escalation between a NATO ally and our “strong ally”.

NATO is made obsolete by the end of the Cold War in 1991.

During the invasion of Iraq back in '03, the Turks refused to give us permission to use their territory as a staging ground to launch attacks into northern Iraq.

It’s a serious thing if Turkey provokes a skirmish with Israel. Is NATO obliged to defend Turkey when it acts as the aggressor?

No not when Turkey is the attacker, only when they are attacked article 5 comes into play. But the problem is
since a possible confrontaion would be in open waters how
do you prove who has attacked whom first?