ISTANBUL, July 28. /TASS/. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned that Turkey may enter Israel like it entered Nagorno-Karabakh and Libya.
"Like we entered Karabakh and Libya, we will do the same to them [Israel]. Nothing is impossible. We need to be strong to take such steps," he told the Halk TV channel.
According to the television channel, this way the Turkish leader reiterated his readiness to support Palestine by any means.
The local media recalled that in November 2023 the Turkish parliament had sanctioned a one-year extension of the mission of the country’s armed forces in Azerbaijan within the joint Russian-Turkish monitoring center that had been set up in January 2021 to control the cessation of hostilities in zone of the Karabakh conflict. Also in November 2023, the Turkish parliament extended the mandate of the country’s military contingent in Libya for 24 months. The Turkish forces have been staying in Libya in accordance with a military cooperation agreement with the Libyan Government of National Accord.
Erdogan also said that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had not responded to Turkey’s proposal to speak at its parliament when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was addressing the US Congress on July 24. Earlier, the Turkish leader called on Abbas to apologize for his not replying to Ankara’s invitation.
Addressing the joint session of the US House of Representatives and Senate on July 24, Netanyahu said that the military operation in the Gaza Strip would be finished after Hamas surrendered arms and released the hostages. He called for setting up a security alliance in the Middle East like NATO to counter the growing Iranian threat.
Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 240 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Clashes are also reported in the West Bank.