Two of Turkey’s key conditions for normalisation of ties with Israel – an apology for the deadly 2010 raid on the Mavi Marmara aid ship and compensation for those killed in the raid – were largely met, as the two countries reached some kind of compromise according to Turkish prime minister.
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Erdogan said he had been in touch with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas about the deal. The incident led to deterioration of the diplomatic relations between the two countries.
“For the peace of the region, I believe in the importance of an effort to improve strategic relations that we have built with this close neighbour”, Erdogan said about Russian Federation.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may face a tougher battle than he expected to win cabinet approval for Israel’s new reconciliation with Turkey, but is still expected to secure the necessary backing when the cabinet meets on Wednesday.
But it said it welcomed “any Arab or Muslim attempt to alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian people”.
Relations took a sharp turn downward during Israel’s three-week war against Hamas in Gaza in 2008 and 2009, when Erdoğan criticized Israel over the high Palestinian death toll.
Yildirim said that Israel and Turkey would exchange ambassadors as soon as possible.
The Kremlin said on Monday the Turkish president had apologized for the downing of a Russian military jet at the Syrian border, which triggered a slew of Russian sanctions that have dealt a severe blow to the Turkish economy.
The relations reached their nadir in 2010 when Israeli commandos stormed a Turkish ship aiming to breech the blockade of Gaza.
The attack on the six civilian vessels, which had been trying to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza, resulted in the death of nine Turkish citizens and left another 30 people injured, one of whom later died.
Reacting to Netanyahu’s announcement of the deal, Goldin’s family said in a statement that it “abandons Lt. Hadar Goldin and Sgt. Oron Shaul and doesn’t include the return of their bodies from Hamas captivity”.
Netanyahu said that with both the world and the region going through enormous changes, it is important to create islands of stability, and this accord does that with Turkey. Relations were never broken completely.
Yaakov Amidror, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s former national security adviser, said the agreement will have little immediate impact on security ties and that it will likely take time for relations to warm up to anywhere close to what they were in the pre-Erdogan years.
A third demand, that Israel lifts its blockade on the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, was partially met.
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Calling Hamas a terrorist organization with “genocidal aims”, Netanyahu said the group “is cruelly and illegally holding the remains of our soldiers and holding our citizens”.
