Turkey-Israel relations at all-time low? | DW News

Turkey-Israel relations at all-time low? | DW News

now Israel’s foreign minister has accused turkey of blocking Israeli imports and exports Israel cat said the action by Turkish president Reb Ty erdogan is breaking trade agreements he posted a statement on the social media Network X saying this is how a dictator behaves disregarding the interests of the Turkish people and businessmen and ignoring international trade agreements Mr Katz also said he’d instructed officials to create alternatives to trade with turkey let’s get more from our correspondent Darian Jones in Istanbul welcome Darian so um has this been has this cessation of trade and imports into turkey has that been confirmed and what else do we know about this well as of year this story has come from uh the Bloomberg News Agency citing Turkish officials who says as of today Thursday all imports and exports to Israel have ended now um there hasn’t been any confirmation from anyone including the Turkish president Reb T erdogan but the Israelis have appeared to confirmed this uh and have strongly condemned uh the action now turkey uh has maintained trade relations with Israel uh in spite of the very fiery rhetoric coming from Turkish president erdan who has routinely condemned Israel but at the same time behind the scenes trade was largely unaffected in in fact in 2023 bilateral trade accounted for around $6.8 billion of which Turkish exports accounted for 5.1 and that was very contentious among the opposition who accus third one of double standards particularly as it’s understood that much of the exports from Turkey were very sensitive including aviation fuel steel which critics of erdan said were being used for the Israeli War Machine now after the big setback in March local elections which erdan saw many of his traditional supporters abandoning him especially the religious voters eran’s government announced that 54 items were banned from being exported to Israel including aviation fuel now we understand that the uh erdan has gone a step further and has now banned all exports to Israel although erdan himself hasn’t said anything of yet and he released the news through an international news agency rather than domestically which is Raising questions possibly erdoan wants to give him some wiggle room of possibly stepping back in the near future this is likely to be a popular move uh Darian well undoubtedly among the his religious voters this will be very much welcomed in fact we’ve seen numerous protest where you’ve seen rarely secular and religious people on the streets condemning trade with Israel this Israel war against Gaza has crossed Turkish political boundaries there is UN unification in support of uh of Gaza against Israel and so erdan stance was under a lot of pressure to tighten up his stance against Israel now it has to be said this move is unprecedented even in 2010 when Israeli Security Forces killed 10 Turkish citizens who were on a boat trying to deliver Aid to Gaza turkey while suspending much of its diplomatic relations trade continued unaffected and in many ways bilateral trade is many ways seen as the glue that holds the two countries relations together at times of high tension if Turkey is going ahead with a cessation of all trade this will lead to Major long-term effects on the relations with Israel and many analyst Israel have already said that this could cause irrep damage a key thing though will be whether oil exports from aaban to Israel will continue to flow because much of that goes through Turkish Port of Jan and Israel is one of the major importers from aaban of oil that will be a key concern of Israel whether that oil will continue flowing and will also be an indication of how serious turkey on applying pressure on Israel okay thanks for that Darian Darian Jones in Istanbul

Turkey suspended all trade with Israel due to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Turkey’s trade ministry stated that “export and import transactions related to Israel have been stopped, covering all products.” It said the measures would stay in place until Israel allowed “an uninterrupted and sufficient flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.” The two countries had a trade volume of $6.8 billion (€6.3 billion) in 2023.
Turkey, one of the few Muslim-majority nations to recognize Israel, has seen large protests in support of Palestinians in Gaza. After years of thawing relations, Turkey has become one of the harshest critics of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan branding Israel a “terrorist state.”
On October 7, Hamas members attacked Israel, which resulted in the deaths of around 1,200 people. The militants also took over 200 people hostage. Israel launched a ground operation in Gaza shortly after to destroy Hamas. The militant group is classified as a terrorist organization by Israel, the US, and the EU, among others. More than 80% of the Gaza Strip’s total population of 2.3 million has been displaced by the fighting, and the death toll in Gaza has reached more than 34,500 people.

#turkey #israel #gaza
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