Tel Aviv/Ankara: Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan is an antisemitic dictator who supports Hamas, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said after the former told his parliament that Israeli strikes on Lebanon and Syria had reached a point where they threatened Turkey directly.
Taking direct aim at Netanyahu, Erdogan said on Wednesday that Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Syria had escalated to the point where they now posed a threat to Turkey as well. Ankara’s security was directly tied to the security of those two neighbouring countries, he said while speaking to lawmakers from his ruling AK Party in parliament.
He went a step further, accusing Israel of leading what he called a sneaky effort to destabilise African countries and the Mediterranean, including by stirring up tensions on the ethnically divided island of Cyprus. He warned that any violation of Turkey’s rights or those of Turkish Cypriots in the Eastern Mediterranean would be met with a strong and clear response, as reported by timesnow.in.
Urging world powers to take a firmer stance against Israel, the Turkish president argued that the international community’s silence had emboldened the country.
“Pulling Israel back to within the bounds of the rule of law has become a shared duty not just for certain countries, but for all of humanity,” he said.
Turkey, a NATO member, has been among the most vocal critics of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran. Ankara has halted all trade with Israel and has pushed for action against it at international courts. Turkey has also blamed Israeli provocations for triggering the US-Iran war.
In a blistering response on X, Netanyahu called Erdogan an antisemitic dictator and accused him of committing genocide against the Kurds, supporting the Hamas terrorist organisation, oppressing his own people and jailing political rivals.
Erdogan was the last person in a position to lecture Israel on morality, Netanyahu said.
Israel and the IDF would continue taking forceful action against Iran and its proxies, Netanyahu said, describing them as a threat to the Middle East and the wider world.
