ANKARA, July 12 -- Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan spoke by telephone on Saturday with Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, pressing both governments to back renewed efforts to implement the US-Iran memorandum of understanding and prevent the region's escalating tensions from turning into a broader confrontation.

The calls came one day after Cairo and Amman jointly condemned what both governments described as Iran's "aggressive attacks" against Arab states - a harder posture from two of Turkey's closest partners in the quadrilateral diplomatic mechanism, comprising Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, that has sought to mediate the crisis since March.

In the Fidan-Abdelatty con...