The US administration has lost its role as a mediator in the Middle East with its decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday.
Erdogan’s comments came in his address at the Chatham House – a London-based think tank – on the day the US administration said it would move its embassy to Jerusalem.
" We once again reject this decision, which is violating international law and conflicting with the UN decisions
he said.
Monday also coincides with the 70th anniversary of Israel’s establishment in 1948 – an event Palestinians refer to as the “Nakba” or the “The Catastrophe”.
“We cannot stop feeling like being in dark days of pre-World War II,” Erdogan said on the US Embassy move.
US President Donald Trump sparked international outcry last December when he unilaterally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and vowed to relocate Washington’s embassy to the city.
He also spoke about several regional and international conflicts.
‘Good terrorist, bad terrorist’
“The international community must act fast to end Israel’s rising aggression by fulfilling its responsibilities.
“If Shakespeare was alive and rewrote his Hamlet today, I believe he would have made Prince Hamlet say the same thing: ‘The time is out of joint’,” Erdogan said, quoting the famous English bard.
“It is not possible to say anything else after seeing more than 50 people getting killed by snipers after being specifically targeted in Palestine — just in the last few weeks — and about 1,000 wounded people, who wanted nothing else but to go back to their homes,” he said.
Ask a father who works for under $1 per day and tries to look after his family! Can he say anything else? Words fail to describe the miserable conditions of millions of people in Somalia, Yemen and Afghanistan.
He added the international community had been unable to reach a consensus in the fight against terrorism due to the stance: “Your terrorist is bad, my terrorist is good”.
Erdogan underlined that Turkey had neutralized 3,000 Daesh terrorists during Operation Euphrates Shield between 2016 and 2017 in Syria.
Anti-terror efforts
“We have denied entry to our country to more than 63,000 people suspected of having links to Daesh, deported nearly 6,200 individuals who are suspected of having links with terrorist organizations and had entered our country illegally, and detained more than 12,000 others, arresting 3,563 of them.”
On Turkey’s fight against PKK/PYD/YPG terrorist organization, Erdogan said: “We have cleared and are still clearing Afrin region of those terrorists.”
Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch in January 2018 to clear YPG/PKK and Daesh terrorist groups from Afrin, northwestern Syria, amid growing threats from the region.
On March 18, Turkish-backed troops liberated the Afrin town center, which had been a major hideout for the YPG/PKK terrorists since 2012.
He said the only way to ensure the repatriation of more than 3.5 million Syrian refugees, currently living in Turkey, is to make Syria safe again.
Pointing out that Turkey had spent $31 billion on refugees, so far, without any significant support from any other country and especially from the EU, Erdogan said refugees do not return to areas controlled by terror organizations supported by allies.
He said the PKK/YPG terrorist organization was camouflaging itself with Kurdism or Kurds to con the world and they control the region called Ayn al-Arab/Kobani.
Erdogan said Turkey will continue to fight against terrorist organizations in a principled way.
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