Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Thursday accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of delivering an “antisemitic and incendiary” U.N. General Assembly speech and warned him against “meddling” in Jerusalem’s affairs.
The Israeli delegation walked out of Erdoğan’s address in New York on Tuesday, in which he called Gaza “the most inhumane and shameful concentration camp of our time.”
In an X post, Katz said that Erdoğan supports the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas while failing to respond to Iranian missiles launched toward Turkish territory or help Saudi Arabia against Houthi attacks despite signing a mutual defense pact, calling him a “paper sultan.”
Katz also accused Erdoğan of abusing Kurds in Turkey.
Israeli U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon separately pointed to comments by Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides during his U.N. speech on Wednesday, saying the Cypriot leader had exposed Erdoğan’s “hypocrisy” over Turkish calls for respect for territorial integrity while Turkish forces remain in northern Cyprus and Syria.
The Israeli officials’ remarks came as Turkish media reported, without official confirmation from Israel or the United Arab Emirates, that Jerusalem had pressed Abu Dhabi not to purchase Turkey’s Russian-made S-400 air-defense systems.
The reported transaction was seen as a potential route for Ankara to address U.S. sanctions linked to its acquisition of the system and reopen a path toward the F-35 program.
