Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday deemed Hamas a “liberation group” and not a terrorist organization, announcing he had canceled plans to visit Israel.
“Hamas is not a terrorist organization, but a liberation group fighting to protect its country and its citizens,” Erdogan said at a ruling party meeting in Ankara’s parliament.
Israel, the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union classify the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas as a terrorist organization.
Erdogan attacked Western powers “who shout for Israel and do nothing else,” accusing them of hypocrisy.
“The fact that those who mobilized the world in favor of Ukraine do not speak out against the massacres in Gaza is the most blatant sign of their hypocrisy,” he said.
Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007, launched an unprecedented attack on Israeli territory on October 7, killing more than 1,400 people, according to Israeli authorities.
The group’s commandos also kidnapped 200 Israelis and foreigners who they held hostage in the Gaza Strip, a small Palestinian territory with 2.3 million inhabitants.
Erdogan says it is not possible to find “another state whose army behaves so inhumanely”
Israel declared war on Hamas after the attack and has been bombing Gaza ever since, with a death toll of more than 6,500, according to the Islamist group’s latest report.
“Almost half of those killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza are children,” Erdogan said.
In a violent speech, the Turkish leader accused Israel of “premeditated cruelty to commit crimes against humanity.”
“The attacks on Gaza reveal the existence of killings and mental illness among those who carry them out and those who support them,” he said, quoted by international bodies.
Erdogan first met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York in September, as part of a rapprochement between the two countries. “I shook hands with this man. We had good intentions, but he abused us. Relations could have been different, but unfortunately that will not happen again,” he said.
The Turkish head of state said he had plans to visit Israel, but canceled them due to the behavior of the Israeli army.
“We’re not going,” he assured.
Erdogan said it is not possible to find “another state whose army behaves in such an inhumane manner,” referring to the Israeli bombing of Gaza after the Hamas attack.
“We have no problems with the State of Israel, but we have never condoned the atrocities that Israel has committed and the way Israel behaves as an organization and not as a state,” he said.
Erdogan also called for the creation of an “independent Palestine” and for a conference to be held between Israel and the Palestinians, proposing that Turkey would be the guarantor of any future agreement.
Shortly after the Hamas attack, Erdogan, a supporter of the Palestinian cause, warned Israel of the risks of an indiscriminate attack on civilians in the Gaza Strip during a telephone conversation with his Israeli counterpart Isaac Herzog.
Source: DN
