ANKARA, Turkey — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has stepped up his belligerent rhetoric against Israel, saying Turkish warships will escort future aid boats leaving its territory for Gaza to prevent a repeat of last year’s deadly Israeli raid on an aid flotilla.
Erdogan’s comments to al-Jazeera television Thursday were the first time Turkey has said its navy will use force to protect ships attempting to break Israel’s blockade of the coastal Palestinian territory. Turkey had already announced it would increase navy patrols in the eastern Mediterranean in response to Israel’s refusal to apologize for the raid.
Dan Meridor, the Israeli Cabinet minister in charge of intelligence, called Erdogan’s threat “grave and serious.”
“Turkey, which declares that Israel is not above international law, must understand that it isn’t either,” he said Friday.
Eight Turks and a Turkish-American were killed last year aboard the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara — part of an international flotilla trying to break the blockade, which Israel says it imposed in 2007 to keep militants from bringing weapons into Gaza.
Turkey and Israel have had close relations that gave Israel a defense ally and allowed Turkey to purchase Israeli high-tech military equipment.
But relations declined steadily after 2008 over Israel’s war in Gaza, with Erdogan repeatedly attacking Israel for the deaths of Palestinians. Erdogan, whose party has roots in Turkey’s Islamic movement, has also adopted a more hardline approach toward Israel after a strong election victory in July gave him a third consecutive term in office.
“At the moment, there is no doubt that the Turkish military ships’ primary duty is to protect (Turkish) ships,” Turkey’s state-run Anatolia quoted Erdogan as telling al-Jazeera. “We will be making humanitarian aid. This aid will no longer be subjected to any kind of attack as the Mavi Marmara was.”
Israel said it would not escalate the rhetoric.
“I do not think it would be correct to get into verbal saber rattling with him now,” Meridor told Army Radio.
