Some would say that Israel’s relations with Turkey have never been as complex as they are currently. This past Wednesday, the Turkish Foreign Minister announced that his country decided to join South Africa’s lawsuit at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, which accuses Israel of genocide.
Additionally, the current chairman of Hamas’s political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, left Qatar and visited Turkey for the past 12 days. Some believe that the leaders of Hamas are interested in establishing their new home base in the country.
Further, on Tuesday, an attack was carried out in Jerusalem in which a security guard was injured by a Turkish tourist, and later that day, Esra Erdogan, the daughter of the President of Turkey, posted a tweet in which she welcomed the attack.
There is no longer any doubt that Turkey has a hand in the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Dr. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak, born and raised in Turkey, is an expert in politics and foreign relations of Turkey and Turkey-Israel relations and a researcher and activist at the Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University and explained this complicated situation in depth.
He explained that since the beginning of the war, there has been an unprecedented incitement in Turkey against the State of Israel. Yanarocak claimed that it has gone beyond any scale known to date, and it has crossed the boundaries of legitimate criticism against any country. Unfortunately, it has also reached high levels of antisemitism.
Yanarocak draws attention to the fact that the Turkish terrorist who arrived in Jerusalem was not “just a tourist” but came here on a religious mission. He points out that this person served as an imam, a mosque prayer leader in a Turkish periphery settlement. “Thanks to this delegation, he arrived here and obtained an entry visa from the Israeli embassy, probably in Ankara or the Israeli consulate in Istanbul. I saw the photo of his passport. It was an ordinary tourist’s passport,” Yanarocak explained.
Following this incident, should Israel behave differently towards Turkish tourists?
In Yanarocak’s eyes, this means that the terrorist enjoys the patronage of the Turkish Religious Affairs Authority, which sent the delegation to Israel.
Yanarocak explained that “they do it every year, they call it ‘Umrah,’ the visit of the holy places outside of the Hajj season. They first arrive in Jerusalem, and they continue to several other countries, including Mecca.”
Additional information about the terrorist gathered from Turkish media sources revealed him to be an introvert, unlikable, and married with children. According to Yanarocak, the Turkish media reported the incident in a balanced way. He explained, “At first, they wrote that the Israeli police killed a Turkish citizen in Jerusalem. Then, as soon as the security camera footage was revealed, they simply changed the narrative and reported that the Turkish attacker was hit and killed by police officers.”
Yanarocak further explained that there were those on the Turkish streets who handed out sweets after the attack and that the Islamic media tried to make the terrorist a martyr.
However, on social media, the terrorist was criticized for attacking from behind and not trying to challenge the Israeli policeman properly. Therefore, it was claimed that he did not deserve to be considered a martyr. In response, Yanarocak stated that Israel is in the process of deterioration because “for the first time, a Turkish tourist in the State of Israel is stabbed.”
Yanarocak clarified that the group that received an entry visa was a group of clerics and civil servants on behalf of the Turkish state. “Ultimately, they are not considered problematic people. If Israel prevents clerics from entering Jerusalem, a new diplomatic crisis may occur. Turkey is in such a grey area. It’s not the friendliest country in the world to Israel, nor is it openly hostile. The grey area, something in between, causes a headache for Israel.”
