The war in Gaza was at the top of the agenda when Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Iran’s Ebrahim Raisi met in Ankara.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said during Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s visit to Ankara that he had reached an agreement with the Iranian president to avoid measures that could threaten stability in the Middle East.
At a press conference after Wednesday’s meeting, Erdogan said the two men discussed ending Israel’s “inhumane” attacks on Gaza and the imperative of a just and lasting peace in the region.
“We agreed on the importance of refraining from measures that further undermine regional security and stability,” he said, adding that they also agreed to continue cooperating against cross-border threats.
Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu, reporting from Ankara, said the main topic of the meeting was Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza.
“No one expects the two leaders to stop what is happening in Gaza, but at least they are aiming to intensify and escalate the crisis in the region, especially in Yemen and the Red Sea region,” Koceoglu said. It’s about suppressing that.”
“President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi have said they are fully committed to the fight against terrorism,” she added.
Turkey, which has vocally condemned Israel’s attacks on Gaza, called for an immediate ceasefire and supported legal measures to try Israel for genocide.
However, Ankara maintains commercial ties with Israel, drawing criticism at home and abroad.
Palestinians wait at a hospital to collect the bodies of relatives killed in Israeli shelling in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip. Israel has killed more than 25,700 Palestinians since October 7th. [File: AFP]Iran leads what it calls the “Axis of Resistance,” which includes Hamas, Yemen’s Houthi rebels and other Shiite Islamic groups in the region that have confronted Israel and its Western allies.
In a sign that the war in Gaza could spread to the wider region, the United States and Britain struck targets in Yemen in response to Houthi attacks on ships in the Red Sea.
The Houthis said the attacks in the busy waterway targeted ships with ties to Israel and would continue as long as the war in Gaza continues.
Erdogan condemned the US and UK attacks on Yemen, describing them as an unjustified use of force.
Raisi accused the United States of supporting what he called Israeli crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and repeatedly called on Islamic countries to sever ties with the “Zionist regime.”
“What is happening in Palestine and Gaza is a crime against humanity, and the United States and Western countries support these crimes,” he said on Wednesday.
“Severing economic and political ties with this regime could certainly have an impact on ending the crimes of the Zionist regime.”
Türkiye and Iran have a complicated relationship due to multiple issues including the Syrian civil war.
Iranian-backed rebels are trying to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but Tehran supports him.
Recently, Turkey has taken steps to improve relations with Damascus.
