Turkey playing with fire in ramping up anti-Israel rhetoric
http://www.thecommentator.com/article/495/turkey_playing_with_fire_in_ramping_up_anti_israel_rhetoric
It is hard to remain unmoved by acts of blatant cynicism. Not those small, petty gestures of crass stupidity that seek to advance a particular vested interest, but grand acts of faux-statecraft that leave the observer unsure whether to laugh or cry.
The recent antics of Turkey’s “mildly Islamist” Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, offer a textbook example.
After expelling Israel’s ambassador to Ankara, severing military ties and ending its strategic co-operation with Jerusalem, Turkey’s (non-Arab) Prime Minister flew to a meeting of the Arab League in Cairo. There he presented himself, shiny new credentials intact, as the “cheerleader-in-chief” of the Palestinians.
“We must work hand-in-hand with our Palestinian brothers,” Erdogan lectured his fellow Middle East leaders. “It is time to raise the Palestinian flag at the United Nations.” International recognition of a Palestinian state was, he declared, an obligation, not an option.