ANKARA-The Turkish and Israeli regimes yesterday announced they would normalize ties after a six-year “rupture” caused by a deadly Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship that killed ten Turkish activists. The move was a source of condemnation by the Turkish opposition.
The Turkish Presidency said that Ankara and Tel Aviv will begin the procedure of exchanging ambassadors later this week after the two sides reached a deal to normalize relations.
“This week we will start the process of ambassador appointment” between Turkey and Israel, The Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin told reporters in the capital, Ankara, on Tuesday, according to press TV.
Kalin further noted that new steps will be taken to resume ties with Israel in the fields of “economy, trade and energy.”
The remarks came one day after Turkey and the Israeli regime concluded the reconciliation agreement.
Ankara and Tel Aviv’s once close relations soured after Israeli commandos attacked the Freedom Flotilla in international waters in the Mediterranean Sea on May 31, 2010, killing nine Turkish citizens and injuring about 50 other people. A tenth Turkish national later succumbed to his injuries. The vessel was attempting to break the Israeli occupation naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Slamming the normalization agreement, Kemal Kılıcdaroglu, the head of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), asked, “How can you sign such a deal?… Are you with your country, with justice or with those Israeli soldiers who killed [Turkish citizens?”]
“Turkey faced an action [by Israel, which was] suitable for a pirate state,” he added, expressing further wonder at the rapprochement.
Figen Yuksekdag, the co-chair of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), also said the most crucial item of the deal with Israel was selling Palestinian natural gas to Europe.
“They are making a deal to market what belongs to orphan children in Palestine,” she said. “They are selling the words that they call ‘sacred’ at another bargaining table.”
Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) head Devlet Bahceli, meanwhile, said the deal sharply contrasted Erdogan’s stiff criticism of Israeli aggression in the past.
“The president had repeatedly accused Israel of being a terror state. Israel was killing Gazan children on beaches. Erdogan was rightfully criticizing this heavily. He said Israel even surpassed Hitler in barbarism,” he said. “This means that the government has been meeting with Israel for years secretly and we were not aware of this.”
H.M