Tag: Israel

Turkey turns from West

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Israel and Turkey have enjoyed a long and durable friendship — a remarkable achievement in the hornet’s nest that is the modern Middle East. The first Muslim-majority nation to recognize the legitimacy of the state of Israel back in 1950, Turkey has for decades cooperated with Israel in economic, intelligence and military matters. (Ironically enough, Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel, but of course that wasn’t the Iran of the Islamic Republic that we know today.)

The last decade has witnessed a marked decline in Turkey’s treatment of Israel, however. This has occurred in concert with the creeping Islamicization of what had once been a rare Middle Eastern bulwark of secularism. Under its Islamist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has governed in Ankara since 2003, Turkey’s education system has grown more religious, and the government has enforced Islamic prohibitions such as that against drinking alcohol. Erdogan has also weakened the standing of the military, the country’s traditional guardian of the secular state. Not surprisingly, he has also ensured that relations with Israel have deteriorated significantly.

Over the last several years, Erdogan has never missed an opportunity to launch cheap, demagogic attacks on Israel. To wit, when Israeli commandos killed several Turks who were attempting to illegally break the naval blockade on Gaza in 2010, he labeled Israel’s Gaza policy “state terrorism,” a remarkable rhetorical attack on a country that has too often been the victim of terrorism.

Recent developments are even more alarming. David Ignatius of The Washington Post reported earlier this month that Erdogan betrayed the identities of 10 Iranian spies for Israel to the government of Iran. (Israel runs much of its Iran-intelligence operations through Turkey, and Erdogan gave up the spies’ identities after they had met their Israeli contacts in Turkey.) If the report is accurate, that’s a stunning betrayal of Israel by an alleged ally.

It’s a betrayal of the United States, too, as we are Israel’s primary guardian and protector in the international community, and also a putative ally of NATO-member Turkey ourselves. U.S. officials would do well to make their displeasure at Erdogan’s latest machinations abundantly clear to Turkey’s powers that be.

via Turkey turns from West | Providence Journal.

October 31, 2013
Progress for Turkey, Israel and the U.S. – Room for Debate

Mustafa Akyol, a Turkish journalist for Al-Monitor and The Hurriyet Daily News, is the author of “Islam without Extremes: A Muslim Case for Liberty.”

MARCH 27, 2013

It is unclear whether President Obama’s recent visit to Israel helped build the much-hoped peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Yet, in a quite unexpected move, it certainly helped build peace between Israel and Turkey.

The two countries were not at war, of course. But the longtime relationship between Turkey and Israel had fallen to one of its lowest points, after the Gaza flotilla affair of May 2010, in which nine Turks, one of them an American-Turkish citizen, were killed by Israeli commandos. Turkey had immediately asked three things from Israel: apology, compensation and the easing of the blockade on Gaza. By February 2011, Israel had made clear it would not comply, and Turkey expelled the Israeli ambassador to Ankara, reducing the diplomatic relations between two countries.

Obama was wise enough to capture this moment to reconcile his two key allies in the Middle East.

Since then, political commentators had been divided on the future of Turkish-Israeli relations. Some, especially those who are on the Israeli right, argued that the “New Turkey” of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his “Islamist” cadre had proven fanatically anti-Israel, and therefore no reconciliation would ever take place unless a new government came to power in Turkey. Others, including me, noted that while the Erdogan government is strongly pro-Palestinian, it is also pragmatic and is not categorically anti-Israel. We also pointed out that Turkey had lowered relations with Israel back in 1982, to protest the annexation of East Jerusalem, but then restored full relations in 1991, in the light of the Madrid peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians.

The odds for an apology seemed even more distant after Erdogan’s recent condemnation of “Zionism,” which created yet another tension between Ankara and Jerusalem. But soon, Erdogan made clear that his government “recognized Israel’s existence within 1967 borders based on a two-state solution.” This probably gave Obama the grounds for persuading Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to offer an “apology to the Turkish nation,” in a phone call to Erdogan.

Here in Turkey, the apology has been widely welcome, and is interpreted by the media as a diplomatic victory for the Turkish government. It is also noted that two countries now share common concerns about the bloody civil war in Syria and even the Iranian influence in the region. Obama was wise enough to capture this moment to reconcile his two key allies in the Middle East. Netanyahu and Erdogan were pragmatic enough to agree and move on.

via Progress for Turkey, Israel and the U.S. – Room for Debate – NYTimes.com.

March 28, 2013
Israel Apologises For Gaza Flotilla Raid

According to Sky news The Israeli Prime Minister has apologized for a raid on a Gaza flotilla which resulted in the deaths of nine Turkish activists.

Benjamin Netanyahu announced the restoration of normal diplomatic relations with Turkey and expressed regret during a phone call with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

President Barack Obama helped arrange the call shortly before leaving Israel.

In a statement released by the White House said, Mr Obama said: “The United States deeply values our close partnerships with both Turkey and Israel, and we attach great importance to the restoration of positive relations between them in order to advance regional peace and security.

“I am hopeful that today’s exchange between the two leaders will enable them to engage in deeper cooperation on this and a range of other challenges and opportunities,” he added.

The flotilla incident severely harmed ties between the once-close allies. Turkey withdrew its ambassador from Israel, and diplomatic ties and military cooperation were greatly scaled back.

Mr Netanyahu said the “tragic results” were not intentional and Israel “expressed remorse” for the loss of life. He cited “operational mistakes”.

The nine pro-Palestinian activists were killed aboard the Turkish-flagged ship Mavi Marmara on May 31, 2010, after passengers resisted a takeover by Israeli naval commandos.

The flotilla was en route to Gaza in an attempt to bring international attention to Israel’s blockade of the Palestinian territory.

At the time, the former legal adviser to Israel’s foreign ministry, Alan Baker, said it was tragic that lives had been lost, but there was no need for an apology.

March 22, 2013
UEFA President Michel Platini: Remove UEFA 2013 European Under-21 Championship from Israel

It took three months of hunger strike and the near death of a Palestinian footballer, Mahmoud Sarsak, held for three years without charge or trial under the ‘Unlawful Combatants Law’, which is itself illegal under international law, for the Israeli authorities to agree to a release deal in July 2012. We continue to be alarmed that Olympic squad goalkeeper Omar Abu Rois and Ramallah player Mohammed Nimr are also being held by Israel without charge. We maintain that a state which holds sportsmen as political prisoners is unfit to host an international sporting event. We, therefore, call on UEFA to withdraw the honour of hosting the 2013 European Under-21 championship from Israel.

Petition Letter

I’ve just signed the following petition addressed to: UEFA President Michel Platini.

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Remove UEFA Under-21 Championship 2013 from Israel

An earlier letter to you signed by eminent figures including former football legend Éric Cantona, filmmaker Ken Loach, Michael Mansfield, QC, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and writer Alice Walker (1), addressed racist oppression in Israel as exemplified by the treatment of Palestinian footballer, Mahmoud Sarsak, and called for an end to Israel’s impunity. We are grateful for any interventions you made on Sarsak’s behalf, and welcome news of a deal that saw the footballer released on 10 July 2012.

It took huge international pressure and condemnation in response to three months of hunger strike by Mahmoud Sarsak to force the Israeli authorities to agree to this deal. This is a sportsman who has been held for over three years without charge or trial under the ‘Unlawful Combatants Law’, which is illegal under international laws (2). Sarsak felt so strongly about the injustice of his case that he was willing to die to highlight Israel’s ongoing human rights abuses.

As pointed out to you in a June 2012 letter from Palestinian Football Association President Jibril Rajoub, in addition to Sarsak, Olympic squad goalkeeper Omar Abu Rois and Ramallah player Mohammed Nimr are also being held by Israel without charge. Rajoub makes clear in his letter the importance of UEFA not giving Israel the honour of hosting the next UEFA European Under-21 Championship in June 2013, when “For athletes in Palestine, there is no real freedom of movement and the risks of being detained or even killed are always looming before their eyes”.

UEFA’s response to this urgent plea by Palestinians and their supporters is that “football – and sport in general – are building bridges between nations and communities and that political matters should not interfere with the practice of the game.”

UEFA should understand that this argument rings hollow in the ears of Palestinians, footballers and others, who are victims of Israel’s discriminatory regime. Sport cannot build bridges when a government wields state power to imprison and oppress a specific community. The idea that politics can be separated from sport in this situation is clearly untenable. For Israel, sport, and culture generally, are tools to be used to divert attention away from the state’s persecution of the Palestinian population of Israel and the occupied territories – a population equal in numbers and just as passionate about football as their Israeli counterparts but denied access both as participants and spectators.

Have you considered how the besieged 1.2 million Palestinians in Gaza will gain entry to the four Israeli stadia earmarked for the Under-21 games next year? Or how the population of the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem will negotiate their way through checkpoints and across Israel’s apartheid wall to watch the games?

You stated in your response to Rajoub: “We cannot hold the Israel FA responsible for the political situation in the region or for legal procedures in place in its country.”

We cannot accept the contention that a national football association that has tolerated years of discrimination and suffering on the part of Palestinian players and football-lovers can be acquitted of its share of responsibility. Not only are prominent Palestinian players held as political prisoners, but on 20 June, a 12-year-old boy kicking a football around near his family home in Gaza became the latest in a sad catalogue of child victims of the Israeli military (3).

Where are the IFA’s public denunciations of such crimes? There are none.

We join Palestinians and people of conscience all over the world in calling on UEFA to withdraw the European under-21 Championship from Israel next year, and to deny it such privileges until such time as the State of Israel complies with international law and ceases its human rights violations.

1.

2.

3.

Sincerely,

[Your name]

Change.org

November 1, 2012