2024-09-10 03:46:45
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said today that Islamic countries must form an alliance against what he called the “growing threat of expansionism” from Israel, Reuters reported.
He made this comment on the occasion of the murder of a woman with Turkish and American citizenship, carried out, according to Palestinian and Turkish representatives, by Israeli soldiers, during a protest against the expansion of Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, BTA reported.
“The only step that will stop Israeli arrogance, Israeli banditry, and Israeli state terrorism is a union of Islamic countries,” Erdogan said at an event of an association of Islamic schools outside Istanbul.
He said the latest steps Turkey has taken to improve ties with Egypt and Syria are aimed at “forming a line of solidarity against the growing threat of expansionism,” which he said also threatens Lebanon and Syria.
Erdogan hosted Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Ankara this week. They discussed the war in Gaza and ways to continue to warm their long-frozen relationship. It was the first visit of an Egyptian president to Turkey in 12 years.
Relations between the two countries began to thaw in 2020 as Turkey began diplomatic efforts to reduce tensions with regional rivals including the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.
Erdogan said in July that Turkey would extend an invitation to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad “at any time” for possible talks to restore relations between the two neighbors, which severed ties in 2011 after the Syrian civil war broke out.
Israel did not comment on Erdogan’s statements today.
The Israeli army said after yesterday’s incident that it was investigating reports that a foreign national had been killed as a result of gunfire in the area. The details of the incident and the circumstances in which she was shot are being investigated.
There is still no comment on the incident from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, notes Reuters.