US representatives criticize PM Erdoğan’s ‘anti-semitic’ statements in letter to President Gül

ANKARA - Hürriyet

The letter requested Abdullah Gül to publically condemn 'the anti-semitic rhetoric' of government officials. AA photo

Forty-six U.S. representatives have written a letter to Turkish President Abdullah Gül criticizing some of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s statements which they described as “anti-semitic,” daily Hürriyet reported. 
 
The letter requested Gül to publically condemn “the anti-semitic rhetoric” of government officials.
 
The signatories noted that another letter had been written a few months ago asking Erdoğan to retract his statements that compared Zionism to a “crime against humanity,” without success.
 
They also argued that Erdoğan’s accusations of an “interest rate lobby” engineering the Gezi protests were implicitly targeting Jews, recalling that Deputy Prime Minister Beşir Atalay had openly stated that a “Jewish diaspora” was behind the recent unrest in Turkey.
 
The letter was prepared on the initiative of Rep. Brad Schneider (D-Illinois), Rep. Randy Weber (R-Texas), Rep. Lois Frankel (D-Florida) and Mark Meadows (R-North Carolina) and signed by congressmen from both the Democrat and Republican parties, the report said.