BRUSSELS: Turkiye wants no confrontation with Israel in Syria after repeated Israeli attacks on military sites there undermined the new government’s ability to deter threats, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told Reuters on Friday.
In an interview on the sidelines of a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels, Fidan said Israel’s actions in Syria — where the administration of President Ahmed Al-Sharaa is a close Turkish ally — were paving the way for future regional instability.
If the new administration in Damascus wants to have “certain understandings” with Israel, which like Turkiye is a neighbor of Syria, then that is their own business, he added.
NATO member Turkiye has fiercely criticized Israel over its attacks on Gaza since 2023, saying they amount to a genocide against the Palestinians, and has applied to join a case at the World Court against Israel while also halting all trade.
Israel denies the genocide accusations.
The animosity between the regional powers has spilled over into Syria, with Israeli forces striking Syria for weeks since a new administration took control in Damascus. Turkiye has called the Israeli strikes an encroachment on Syrian territories, while Israel has said it would not allow any hostile forces in Syria.
Asked about US President Donald Trump’s threats of military strikes against Iran, Fidan said diplomacy was needed to resolve the dispute and that Ankara did not want to see any attack taking place against its neighbor Iran.
Turkiye wants no confrontation with Israel in Syria, foreign minister says
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Turkiye wants no confrontation with Israel in Syria, foreign minister says
- Fidan said Israel’s actions in Syria were paving the way for future regional instability
- If the new administration in Damascus wants to have “certain understandings” with Israel, then that is their own business, he added
Over 10,000 people displaced in 3 days in Sudan: UN agency
- The conflict has created the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises
PORT SUDAN: Violence in western and southern Sudan displaced more than 10,000 people within three days this week, according to figures released by the UN’S migration agency on Sunday.
Since April 2023, Sudan’s regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces have waged what the UN has called a “war of atrocities,” killing tens of thousands of people and uprooting more than 11 million.
Between Dec. 25 and 26, attacks on the villages of Um Baru and Kernoi near Sudan’s western border with Chad displaced more than 7,000 people, according to the International Organization for Migration.
After its takeover of the North Darfur capital of El-Fasher in October, the RSF has pushed westward in recent days, through enclaves inhabited by the Zaghawa ethnic group and controlled by a militia.
Between Christmas Eve and Friday, a further 3,100 people were displaced from the famine-stricken city of Kadugli in South Kordofan, which has been under siege by paramilitary forces for over a year and a half.
Resource-rich Kordofan is currently experiencing the fiercest fighting, as the RSF and its allies seek to recapture Sudan’s central corridor, which runs from Darfur back toward the capital, Khartoum.
The conflict has created the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises.
It has also effectively split Sudan in two, with the army controlling the north, east, and center while the RSF dominates all five state capitals in Darfur and, with its allies, parts of the south.
