U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on August 12 and, summarizing from the American State Department’s statement, asked Türkiye to use its influence to get Hamas to return to the negotiation table with Israel on August 15. Fidan, as I summarize from Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Öncü Keçeli’s statement, told him
No official statement has yet been made regarding how Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in Tehran, where he was attending the inauguration ceremony of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. However, several emerging scenarios are gradually taking shape. These scenarios primarily revolve around whether the attack was carried out from external or internal sources. On the
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Turkish government officials issued strong condemnations following the assasination of Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’s Political Bureu, in Tehran, Iran. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan expressed his “outrage” and “denounced the treacherous assassination” on the social media platform X on July 31, calling it “a delibarate attempt to undermine the
First and foremost, we must not leave unaddressed the audacity of Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz, who suggested that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan “is going down the path of Saddam Hussein,” of Irak. The political future of Erdoğan will be decided solely by the Turkish electorate through their votes. Katz, a minister under Benjamin Netanyahu,
According to Turkish security sources, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh said that “the ball is in Israel’s court to achieve a ceasefire” during his meeting with İbrahim Kalın, the head of the Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MIT), in Doha, the capital of Qatar, on May 12. Security sources who wanted not to be named said
February 9 might mark a beginning of a new era in relations with the U.S. and Türkiye, depending on the news about the F-16 sales expected from Congress. It would be prudent to be cautious, but the US State Department’s statement on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s expected visit to Türkiye can be considered one of
The meeting between the head of the Turkish National Intelligence Organization (MİT), İbrahim Kalın, and Hamas leader İsmail Haniyeh in Doha, Qatar, on February 3 has increased the curiosity of Ankara diplomatic circles recently. A few hours after Anadolu Agency’s report, citing security sources, Hamas spokesman Osama bin Hamdan announced overnight that no new ceasefire
Ankara responded harshly to alleged claims of Israeli domestic intelligence service Shin Bet’s chief Ronen Bar, who said in a record published by Israeli state television KAN that “they are determined to kill Hamas leaders all over the world, including Qatar, Türkiye and Lebanon.” Turkish intelligence officials told Turkish state-run Anadolu Agency that the Israeli
Türkiye-Israel relations are increasingly strained on December 2 after Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a statement as a response to Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen’s social media post directly addressing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who reiterated his previous statement that he does not regard Hamas as a terrorist organisation. Spokesperson of Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
A 4-day ceasefire, hostage exchange, and humanitarian aid delivery agreement between Israel and Hamas in Gaza have been announced in the first hours of November 22. Israel and Hamas agreed on a “humanitarian pause” to the crisis that started on October 7 when Hamas attacked Israel and killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and has continued