Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu condemned what it called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “irresponsible” promise to annex settlements in the West Bank if re-elected, insisting that it would not change their territorial status.
Cavusoglu suggested in a tweet on Sunday that Netanyahu was seeking to lure votes with such a promise.
“West Bank is Palestinian territory occupied by Israel in violation of int’l law,” Cavusoglu wrote on Twitter. “Prime Minister Netanyahu’s irresponsible statement to seek votes just before the Israeli general elections cannot and will not change this fact.”
Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin criticized Netanyahu’s political ambitions, noting that they are undermining the attempts to have a mutual solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
“Yet another example of how Netanyahu uses electoral politics to justify occupation and undermine the two-state solution. If he is re-elected, will this be a triumph of ‘democracy’ or occupation?” he tweeted.
Omer Celik, a spokesman for Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party, also noted that Netanyahu’s promise violates United Nations Security Council resolutions, stating that it “not only transgresses the law, but it also attempts to completely destroy it,” cited by PressTV.