Israeli and Turkish foreign ministers held a secret meeting - which turned out to be not so secret - on the sidelines of the recent NATO summit.
The Turkish state has been in a deep alliance with the Israeli state for some time, encompassing both economic and military interests.
Erdogan's recent spat with Peres at the Davos conference, and more importantly, his government's criticism of Israel's war on Gaza can now be seen more as a response to the groundswell of anger at home than as a principled position against the zionist state. The Turkish military has worked with Israel for many years and its opposition to Erdogan's Islamist-leaning government is well known. It signed a military co-operation agreement with Israel in December 2008. Ron Margulies in Istanbul wrote astutely in Socialist Worker (UK) recently that:
In Turkey the political fallout of Israel’s attack on Gaza can been measured in terms of the government’s change in tone. But despite the tough words, the country’s ruling AK Party has yet to make any concrete moves to cut its ties with Israel. moreThe meeting is sure to enrage public opinion in Turkey where anti-Israeli sentiment has been growing. A recent opinion poll in Turkey found that 68% of the population support the Hamas resistance movement in Gaza, a party many of Turkey's western NATO partners regard as a terrorist organisation. According to a joint press release they "agreed that cooperation and political consultations would continue on all levels".
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