Turkey says Netanyahu remarks on Armenia Genocide bid to distract from Gaza

The Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a sharp rebuke to ‘Israeli’ Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today, accusing him of using his recent remarks on the Armenian Genocide as a "bid to distract from Gaza."

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The statement marks a new escalation in the ongoing diplomatic conflict between Ankara and Jerusalem, which has been severely strained by the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza sparked by the ‘Israeli’ aggression.

The public feud was ignited by an interview in which Netanyahu, for the first time as a sitting ‘Israeli’ Prime Minister, publicly stated that he recognizes the Armenian Genocide.

When asked why ‘Israel’ had never officially recognized the mass killings of Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks by the Ottoman Empire, Netanyahu responded, "I just did. Here you go".

For decades, ‘Israel’ had deliberately avoided official recognition to preserve strategic and trade relations with Turkey. However, his words do not constitute official government policy, as no such legislation has been passed in the ‘Israeli’ Knesset.

Turkey's official position is that the deaths of Armenians in eastern Anatolia during World War I were a tragedy in which both sides suffered casualties amid wartime conditions, and it adamantly rejects the term "genocide".

The Turkish Foreign Ministry has condemned Netanyahu’s remarks, calling them a political ploy to deflect attention from the ongoing war in Gaza.

The ministry stated that Netanyahu's comments were an attempt to "exploit the tragedies of the past for political reasons" and to "cover up the crimes he and his government have committed" in the Gaza Strip.

The ministry's statement highlighted that the ‘Israeli’ parliament, the Knesset, actually canceled a vote on a resolution to recognize the Armenian genocide in 2018 following opposition from Netanyahu's government. However, a parliamentary committee had previously voted in 2016 to recognize the massacres of Armenians in 1915 as "genocide."