Israel’s genocidal actions against Palestinians in Gaza made it into President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s speech at the COP31 summit in Türkiye’s Antalya on Wednesday.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry was quick to respond, claiming Erdoğan pushed an anti-Israeli campaign of lies.
In return, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Israel was trying to cover up their violations and evade accountability.
“The Israeli Foreign Ministry’s despicable and outrageous slanders against our president represent yet another example of Israeli officials’ futile efforts to conceal the truth,” the ministry said Wednesday.
Ömer Çelik, deputy chair and spokesperson of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), echoed the statement on Thursday. Çelik said in a social media post that “members of the genocide network” had no right to target President Erdoğan and they would “fail anyway to hide their crimes against humanity.”
He stated that Erdoğan said what should be said again, in the name of humanity’s conscience, justice and laws, against Israel’s oppression. “We will never take a step back from standing with people of Palestine and for truth,” Çelik said.
Burhanettin Duran, head of the Directorate of Communications of the Turkish Presidency, also said in a social media post on Thursday that Israel resorted to insults and propaganda instead of paying the price for genocide and the ecological disaster it inflicted on Gaza and this was “just another display of the political and moral quagmire it is in.”
On Wednesday, Erdoğan slammed Israel, something he frequently does in his speeches at international events, accusing it of “genocide and ecocide.”
“Centuries-old olive trees were destroyed, soil was polluted, water was polluted, cities were turned into giant masses of rubble,” he said in his speech at the leaders’ summit of COP31 as he was speaking about the toll armed conflicts inflicted on both humanity and nature.
Erdoğan has also lamented that Israel has not allowed delivery of prefabricated housing units to Gaza, noting that, “Our Palestinian brothers and sisters in Gaza are condemned to live in tents unfortunately, amid mud everywhere.”
“Aren’t they human beings? Don’t they deserve to have at least a tent? We have been hearing heart-wrenching news from Gaza for the past few days. Heavy rainfall and floods, combined with the lack of infrastructure destroyed (by Israel) in Gaza, left tens of thousands of tents and shelters inundated. Hundreds of thousands of Gazan brothers and sisters with no roof above them, especially innocent children trembling with cold, most of them without parents, fight for their lives with water everywhere and in wintry conditions,” Erdoğan stated. Erdoğan added that no one can escape from taking responsibility in the face of such a shame for humanity.
The president said Israel sought “a show of force” over the drama the Gazan children faced and called for immediate admission of humanitarian aid.
In recent days, heavy rainfall and subsequent flooding destroyed many of the tents and makeshift shelters that Palestinian residents now live in. At least four people were killed earlier this week when a sand embankment collapsed on their shelter. The rain also left many displaced people without food, drinking water or a dry place to sleep.
Humanitarian aid enters the territory, but imports remain far below levels before the start of the new round of conflict in 2023, and many items remain blocked by Israel.
A 2025 report by the U.N. Environment Programme also outlined the devastating reality of Gaza’s environment since the war began. Remote sensing assessments showed that by May 2025, more than 97% of the tree crops, 82% of annual crops, 95% of shrubland and 89% of grass and fallow land had been damaged, according to the UNEP report.
“As of now, our families only have 3% of cropland to use, and that is assuming it’s distributed across 2 million Palestinians” in the Gaza Strip, said Mohammed Usrof, co-founder and executive director of the Palestinian Institute for Climate Strategy. “Not talking about these losses undermines Palestinians’ food supply, livelihoods and ability to remain on their land,” Usrof said.
The territory’s ability to dispose of garbage, treat sewage and deliver clean water has been virtually decimated by three years of war. This has made grim living conditions worse and raised health risks for hundreds of thousands of people deprived of adequate shelter, food and medicine, aid groups say.
The conflict has “all but eliminated” Gazan fishing livelihoods, the report said, highlighting how marine ecosystems have been contaminated with munitions, sewage and solid waste.
“For people in Gaza, this translates into severely limited access to safe drinking water, greater exposure to waterborne diseases and toxic substances, deepening food insecurity and the loss of livelihoods dependent on agriculture and fishing,” Ghiwa Nakat, executive director at Greenpeace MENA, told The Associated Press.
Nakat also warned that Gaza’s environment could take years to recover.
“The environmental damage will not end when the war ends,” Nakat said. “Contaminated soil and groundwater, destroyed ecosystems and the collapse of essential environmental infrastructure could undermine public health, food security and livelihoods for generations, threatening communities’ resilience and their ability to recover.”
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