2023-10-25 20:50:00
Turkish President Erdogan says Hamas is not terrorist and cancels trip to Israel
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said today that Hamas It is not a terrorist organization and that he canceled a trip to Israel due to its bombings in the Gaza Strip in response to attacks by the Palestinian Islamist movement.
Israel quickly responded that the world had already seen the horrors caused by Hamas in its recent attacks in Israel and that Erdogan’s statements could not change that.
“Hamas is not a terrorist organization, but a liberation group fighting to protect their lands and their citizens“said Erdogan, who added that a planned trip to Israel in the framework of strengthening bilateral relations “was cancelled.”
“We have no problems with the State of Israel, but we have never approved of the atrocities committed by Israel and the way it acts as an organization, rather than as a state,” Erdogan stressed.
More than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, were killed by Hamas militants in their attacks on Israel on October 7, and some 220 were taken hostage and taken to the Gaza Strip.
Israel responded with a total blockade of the Palestinian enclave and heavy bombing that left more than 6,500 dead.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry rejected Erdogan’s statements. “The Turkish president’s attempt to defend a terrorist organization and his provocative intentions will not change the horrors that the entire world observed,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Photo: AFP.
The Turkish president said that almost half of those killed by Israel’s attacks on the Gaza Strip are childrenreported the Europa Press news agency.
“These data demonstrate that the objective was premeditated brutality to commit crimes against humanity,” he added.
“The attacks on Gaza indicate murder and mental illness among those who carry them out and those who support them,” he said.
“I invite all countries with reason and conscience to put pressure on the Government of the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, so that the State of Israel returns to sanity,” he continued.
Erdogan reiterated a call for a ceasefire and the delivery of humanitarian aid to the population of the Gaza Strip.
Authorities in the Hamas-controlled strip have so far reported the deaths of nearly 5,800 Palestinians due to Israeli bombings.
Furthermore, the Palestinian Authority has denounced more than one Hundreds dead in the West Bank.
Israel, for its part, says the Hamas attacks on October 7 left more than 1,400 dead, most of them civilians.
Hamas, which before its attacks in Israel this month had committed dozens of suicide attacks, says that with its violent actions it is exercising its legitimate right, protected by international law, to resist the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.
For many countries, however, it is a “terrorist” organization that seeks the destruction of Israel.
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