FM Çavuşoğlu makes call to ‘stand against Israel’

HATAY

Turkey’s foreign minister appealed on March 4 to Muslim nations to speak out strongly against Israeli policies against Palestinians.   

Those who refrain from raising their voice against Israel cannot defend Jerusalem, said Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu at a local election campaign event in southern province of Hatay.

“We see that those Muslim countries which get afraid of the U.S. and Israel start faltering. There are even some countries pressuring Palestine ‘not to raise their voice too much’. Are these the ones to defend Jerusalem?” said Çavuşoğlu

The minister also said that the same countries acted “cowardly” when voting against the U.S. and Israel at various Islamic summits and U.N. General Assembly meetings in the last two years.

In December 2017, U.S. President Donald Trump sparked international outrage when he unilaterally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and vowed to relocate Washington’s embassy to the city.      

Israel occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. It annexed the entire city in 1980, claiming it as Israel’s “eternal undivided capital” - a move never recognized by the international community.      

International law views the entire West Bank as “occupied territory” and considers all Israeli settlement building there as illegal.