Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued a fierce denunciation of Israel on Tuesday following a unanimous vote by the Israeli Cabinet to formally acknowledge the Ottoman-era Armenian massacres as genocide.
The legislative move and the ensuing diplomatic clash mark the latest breakdown in bilateral ties, which have deteriorated drastically amid the ongoing war in Gaza.
Speaking directly after a cabinet session, Erdogan rejected the historical designation and forcefully turned the focus toward current events in the Middle East.
“We do not give the slightest heed to the slanders about our country from the murder network that has the blood of 73,000 innocent Gazans, most of them children and women, on its hands," Erdogan said, as quoted by Politico.
“In our history there is no genocide, no massacre, no oppression, and no colonialism," he claimed.
The Turkish president has repeatedly accused the Israeli military of executing a genocide within the Gaza Strip.
His remarks echo statements from Turkey’s Vice President, Cevdet Yılmaz, who recently dismissed Israel's historic vote as a “transparent bid to obscure their own contemporary misconduct."
During his Tuesday press conference, Erdogan asserted that Israel's moral authority to pass judgment on Turkey is completely erased by its military campaign in Gaza. He contrasted Israel's recent actions with Turkey's historical legacy of providing a safe haven to Jewish refugees escaping Europe during World War II.
“There is the virtue of protecting those who fled from … Nazi persecution," Erdogan claimed. “Those who slander Turkey and the Turkish nation … know this best, if they look at their own history."
Erdogan’s criticism follows that of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, which reacted with intense fury toward Jerusalem after the Israeli Cabinet vote.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry fired back with a stinging public rebuke, claiming that the vote was orchestrated to distract the international community from Israel's active military operations in the Gaza Strip.
“The Israeli government, which has systematically persecuted the Palestinian people before the eyes of the entire world and is being tried at the International Court of Justice on charges of committing genocide against the people of Gaza, is seeking to cover up its own crimes through the political decision it has adopted regarding the events of 1915," the Ministry said, as quoted by AFP.
“Turkey will continue to work resolutely to bring an end to Israel's expansionist and destabilizing policies in the region," the statement added.
Turkey -- the Ottoman Empire's successor state -- strongly rejects that the massacres, imprisonment and forced deportation of Armenians from 1915 amounted to a genocide.
Last August, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly recognized the Armenian Genocide for the first time. Turkey responded with anger, rejecting his remarks as politically motivated and historically unfounded.
The Cabinet’s Sunday’s decision to recognize the Armenian Genocide came amid ongoing tensions with Turkey. The two countries were close to reconciliation just before the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, but since that time, Turkish officials, and foremost Erdogan, have repeatedly criticized Israel.
In March of last year, Erdogan blasted Israel and described it as a "terror state" after it launched surprise strikes on terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip.
Several months later, the Turkish President claimed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government represents the most significant threat to Middle East security.