Free Republic

WASHINGTON (CBS DC/AP) – Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan ridiculed Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, accusing the Israeli government of “barbarism that surpasses Hitler.” Speaking at a political re-election rally in the Turkish city of Ordu, Turkey’s prime minister said that Israel has “surpassed what Hitler did to them” and declared the country a “terrorist state.” “[Israelis] have no conscience, no honor, no pride. Those who condemn Hitler day and night have surpassed Hitler in barbarism,” said Erdoğan. He accused Israel of rejecting ceasefires that Hamas has proposed and “spitting death, spitting blood.” Erdogan reiterated his opposition to Israel’s...

SNIP “The normalization of history,” proclaims the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, whose government has tried to reintegrate the region by lifting visa requirements and promoting a Middle Eastern trade zone, as it deploys its businessmen along the old routes and exports Turkey’s pop culture to an eager audience. “None of the borders of Turkey are natural,” he went on. “Almost all of them are artificial. Of course we have to respect them as nation-states, but at the same time we have to understand that there are natural continuities. That’s the way it’s been for centuries.” SNIP “A RECREATION OF...

WASHINGTON—Turkey moved closer to severing its relations with Israel, demanding that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly apologize for his government's high-seas military action against a pro-Palestinian flotilla this week in order to avert a formal diplomatic rupture. Senior Israeli officials responded Friday that their government would never apologize for an act of "self defense" and acknowledged that Israel could be on the verge of losing its closest military and economic ally in the Middle East. Such a development, these officials said, would raise new strategic and diplomatic challenges for Israel if Ankara reorients itself away from its historically pro-Israel and...