Yesh Atid party chairman Yair Lapid urged Israel’s governing coalition in a Tel Aviv news briefing Thursday to recognize Kurdistan, and to stop worrying about offending the Turkish government.
“The time has come to stop groveling before the Turks, said Lapid, “who each time kick us harder and harder.
Lapid also suggested that Israel acknowledge the Armenian genocide carried out by the Ottoman Empire 100 years ago, something that most Western nations have avoided doing in order not to exacerbate friction with their NATO ally.
“We need to do those things we avoided doing when things were good, when we had good relations with Turkey, because now we don’t have those relations and we’re not going to have them.|
Lapid spoke following a week of Islamist incitement by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan against Israel over the Temple Mount crisis.
It is not in Israel’s best interest to cut diplomatic ties with Ankara, Lapid added, or to recall our ambassador either. “But the Turks need to know they can’t kick us, only to see us ask for more.”
“Now we have to take matters into our own hands. From now on we support the establishment of an independent Kurdish state. We need to recognize the Armenian genocide. We need to do all those things that we didn’t do when we had good relations with Turkey, because we don’t [have them anymore] and we’re not likely to have them in the future.”
Lapid also said Israel must let go of what he called a “misguided dream” that it will build a natural gas pipeline to export the energy resource to Europe through Turkey.
“Israel cannot allow itself to be dependent on a customer who has become either an enemy state or a semi-enemy state,” he said.