In 2018 Ankara removed its ambassador to Israel for lethal attacks against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
After two years of absence, Turkey has named a new ambassador to Israel.
In May 2018, Ankara removed her ambassador in the Gaza Strip, protesting against US President Donald Trump’s decision to transfer the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, for killing Palestinians. In Jerusalem. Ufuk Ulutas, 40, has been named as a new Turkish ambassador in an effort to strengthen ties with the newly elected administration of President Joe Biden, a report by Al-Monitor citing ‘blessed sources’ published last week This article is now being published in French.
Hebrew and Middle East policy studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem were described as very polished, clever, and very pro-Palestinian.’ He is an authority on the regional competitor, Iran, but not a career diplomat, of Israel as well. Turkey’s diplomatic relations with Israel broke out for the first time in 2010 after the Israeli commandos, who had boarded the Turkish-own flotilla, assassinated ten pro-Palestinian Turkish campaigners seeking to provide assistance and crack the Israelis-long maritime blockade.
In 2016 they restored ties, but after the transfer of the American Embassy, relations settled again in 2018. Ulutas’ appointments have come with the agreement to normalize diplomats with Israel in agreements signed with US President Trump by several Arab countries –Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates.
The Palestinian leadership has undermined the agreements as serious trappings from Arab countries which further undermine Palestinian self-determination efforts.
Earlier this year Trump presented a so-called Middle East strategy that strongly supported Israel and that the Palestinians had categorically resisted. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has positioned himself as a staunch advocate for the Palestinian cause in the Muslim world, opposed the Trump plan and the recent normalization agreements.
Despite Ulutas’ new appointment as ambassador, it still remains to be seen if Ankara will develop complete diplomatic relations with Israel. Often angry comments were exchanged between Erdogan and Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu, with a war of words that reached the boiling point about the past two years. In response to Netanyahu’s remarks, Erdogan called Netanyahu a “terrorist” to refuse Ankara’s “moral lessons” on Palestinian protesters’ killing by the Israeli army in Gaza, and to mark Erdogan as “bombs of the Kurdish villagers.”
Erdogan also criticized a controversial law of Israel that described the country as the Jewish nation-state.
