Turkish president slams world's 'silence' on 'Israel's tyranny'

pulse

May 16, 2018 8:45 PM

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday lashed out at the international "silence" over the killing by Israeli fire of dozens of Palestinians on the Gaza border.

"If the silence on Israel's tyranny continues, the world will rapidly be dragged into a chaos where banditry prevails," Erdogan said at a dinner in Ankara.

The fresh violence in Gaza on Monday, when Israel's army killed 60 Palestinians during protests, came as the United States formally moved its embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv.

A fervent advocate of Palestinian cause, Erdogan on Tuesday accused Israel of "state terror" and "genocide" over the killings.

The Turkish leader will on Friday host a summit of the world's main pan-Islamic body the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Istanbul.

On Wednesday, Erdogan also said the Gaza bloodshed showed "the United Nations has collapsed".

Turkey has withdrawn its ambassador in Tel Aviv for consultations and told Israel's ambassador to Ankara to leave, also for an unspecified period of time.

That drew retaliation from Israel, which ordered the Turkish consul in Jerusalem to leave for an unspecified period of time.

pulse