2023-10-29 13:24:32
Israel announced on Saturday the repatriation of its diplomats to Turkey after a diatribe by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who accused the West of being “the main culprit of the massacres in Gaza” and Israel of committing “war crimes”. “The main culprits of the massacres in Gaza are the West.
With the exception of a few consciences who raised their voices, (these) massacres are totally the work of the West,” launched the Turkish head of state, during a “meeting in support of Palestine” which brought together several hundred thousand people at the former Atatürk airport in Istanbul. In a virulent speech against them, the Turkish head of state called out the Western powers by suspecting them of “creating an atmosphere of crusades” against Muslims.
“I ask the West: are you going to create a new atmosphere of crusades against the Crescent?”, emblem of the Muslim religion, he insisted. “Everyone knows that Israel cannot take a step without them,” he continued, criticizing the great Western powers for not having called for a ceasefire.
“You mourned the children killed in Ukraine, why this silence in the face of the children killed in Gaza?” he said. Assuring that 1.5 million people attended the meeting, he accused Israel of “war crimes”. “Israel, we will declare you before the whole world war criminals,” he said: “Israel, you are the occupiers, the invaders.”
“Of course, every country has the right to defend itself, but where is justice? What is happening in Gaza is not self-defense but a massacre,” continued the Turkish president. The Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a statement accusing Israel of “committing a crime against humanity in front of the entire world without even tolerating criticism and condemnation.”
These statements led Israel to recall its diplomats from Türkiye. “Given the serious statements coming from Turkey, I have ordered the recall of diplomatic representatives in order to reassess relations between Israel and Turkey,” Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen announced Saturday evening on X (formerly Twitter) .
Israel had already asked its diplomats stationed in Turkey on October 19 to temporarily leave the country as a “security measure”. According to a Turkish diplomatic source, all Israeli diplomats left the country on October 19. “It’s difficult to understand who Cohen asked to come back,” the source said.
President Erdogan also called on Israelis for “dialogue”: “Listen to our calls for dialogue, take a step in the right direction for you and your children. We believe that there will be no losers in a just peace” , he said. In recent days, Mr. Erdogan has toughened his tone regarding the bombings carried out by Israel in Gaza.
He announced on Wednesday that he was abandoning all his plans to travel to Israel and stigmatized the Westerners’ inability to stop the war in Gaza, where more than 8,000 Palestinians have been killed. “Hamas is not a terrorist group, it is a group of liberators who protect their land,” he said, attracting the wrath of Israel.
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