Israel Apologizes; Turkey Steps Back
Kadri Gursel writes that Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan's acceptance of the Israeli apology, although a positive development, is more important than the actual apology.
For Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to call Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan [on March 22] to declare that his country is apologizing to Turkish people for the mistakes during the 2010 flotilla affair, that Israel has accepted to pay compensation to victims' relatives and even has agreed to soften the Gaza blockade is an important development.
But for the apology in this format to be accepted by Erdogan is even more important and a positive development.
In the incident that became the subject of compensation and apology, the Israeli military launched an operation on the Mavi Marmara while it was in international waters. Mavi Marmara was the flag ship of the flotilla assembled to attract the world’s attention to the naval blockade Israel had imposed on Gaza. Nine Turkish activists, eight of them Turkish citizens, were killed in the Israeli operation.
Secret contacts to discuss apology and compensation preconditions Turkey required to normalize bilateral relations between Turkey and Israel followed. In June 2011, a draft of an agreement reflecting comprehensive accords were formulated but because of the opposition of the former Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman the secret diplomatic contacts remained futile. This is when Turkey upped its preconditions from two to three by adding lifting of the blockade and embargos on Gaza.
