TURKISH PRIME MINISTER FUELS ANTI-SEMITISM, SAYS ISRAELI REPORT
Asbarez
Jan 26th, 2010
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan walked off the stage
after an angry exchange with the Israeli president, Shimon Peres,
during a panel discussion on Gaza at the World Economic Forum in 2009.
JERUSALEM (Hurriyet)-The already tense ties between Turkey and Israel
appear to have hit a new low as a new Israeli Foreign Ministry report
accused Turkey’s prime minister of fueling anti-Semitism with his
criticism of Israel.
A government official said Tuesday the seven-page report accuses
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of inflaming Turkish public
opinion against Israel with his repeated allegations that Israel
committed war crimes during its Gaza offensive last winter, reported
the Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity
because the report is confidential.
He said the report also acknowledged Deputy Foreign Minister Danny
Ayalon seriously offended Turkey’s ambassador when he summoned
the diplomat to protest a Turkish TV show that portrayed Israeli
intelligence agents as cruel. Still, it said that the incident
made clear that Turkey "reached the outer limits of the Israeli
government’s patience."
The report came as Turkey stated Tuesday that it would pursue
its determination against anti-Semitism, racism, xenophobia and
discrimination with its belief in mutual understanding, tolerance,
freedom, security and democracy.
On the eve of the 65th anniversary of the Auschwitz death camp’s
liberation, the Foreign Ministry noted that it was a duty of both
humanity and every U.N.-member state to condemn the Holocaust and
to encourage efforts to educate new generations. The ministry also
commemorated Turkish diplomats who risked their lives to save people
from the Holocaust in Europe during World War II.
In Israel, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Ayalon, both of
Yisrael Beiteinu, are the leaders of the government’s aggressive
anti-Turkey faction, while Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Industry
Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, both of Labor, head the conciliatory,
pro-Turkey faction.
The report was written by the Center for Political Research, which
performs the ministry’s in-house intelligence analysis, and has
already been distributed to Israeli embassies and consulates abroad.
It was submitted to the key seven cabinet ministers a few days ago,
Israel’s Haaretz reported.
Regarding Ayalon’s humiliation of Ambassador Oguz Celikkol, the report
said that while this seriously offended the Turks for many years to
come, "at the same time, the manner in which senior Turkish officials,
including Erdogan, ended the crisis may indicate that Turkey recognizes
that it entered the red-line zone and [reached] the outer limits of the
Israeli government’s patience, and that this was liable to lead to it
losing Israel, which would damage Turkey’s international legitimacy."
But most of the report focuses on the Turkish prime minister, who it
considers the main source of the current friction. "In our estimate,
ever since his party took power, Erdogan has conducted an ongoing
process of … fashioning a negative view of Israel in Turkish public
opinion," via endless talk of Palestinian suffering, repeatedly
accusing Israel of war crimes and even "anti-Semitic expressions and
incitement," it said.
Though in international forums Erdogan always stresses that
anti-Semitism is "a crime against humanity," the report continued,
in reality, he "indirectly incites and encourages" anti-Semitism
in Turkey. "For Erdogan and some of those around him," it explained,
"there is no distinction between ‘Israeli’ and ‘Jewish,’ and therefore,
[their] anti-Israel fervor and criticism became anti-Jewish."
One result, according to the report, is articles in the Turkish
press questioning whether Turkish Jews are loyal to their country –
something that could endanger Turkey’s Jewish community.
In some cases, it added, Erdogan simply does not understand the
anti-Semitic nature of his remarks – such as "Jews are good with
money," which "he sees as a compliment."
Erdogan also "grants legitimacy" or "turns a blind eye" to anti-Israeli
television programs "of an inflammatory, anti-Semitic nature," such
as "Valley of the Wolves" – the series that prompted Ayalon’s rebuke
of the ambassador, according to report. The claim that this is just
freedom of the press at work, the report said, is belied not only
by the fact that such programs are approved by the Turkish censor,
but by reports from Turkish journalists who say this freedom has been
sharply curtailed in recent months: They say that "editorial policy
is dictated by government bodies, journalists’ phones and offices that
have been wiretapped, pressure has been applied to owners of mainstream
media outlets, and there is tight supervision of Internet sites."
"For Erdogan, Israel-bashing is a way of bolstering his status with
Islamic and Middle Eastern states, which Turkey would like to lead,
and against the Turkish opposition, as well as with his own party’s
target audience and nationalist elements of the Turkish public,"
the report read.
It also rejected the Turkish position that Erdogan is merely responding
to Turkish public opinion, saying that in reality, Turkey’s government
is leading public opinion, not following it. "Turkey today, under the
leadership of the AKP [the ruling Justice and Development Party],
is different from the Turkey with which Israel forged a strategic
relationship in the early 1990s," it concluded.