Turkey vetoes Israel participation in NATO summit

PanARMENIAN.Net - Turkey has blocked Israel’s participation in NATO’s upcoming Chicago summit in a sign of Turkey’s determination to prevent its new foe from cooperating with the alliance following a deadly ship raid in May 2010, Today’s Zaman reported.

Turkey said it will not allow Israel, a member of the Mediterranean Dialogue, a NATO outreach program with seven non-NATO nations, to take part in the alliance’s new “Partnership Cooperation Menu (PCM),” during a NATO meeting in Brussels last week attended by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu.

Because of Ankara’s veto, Israel will not attend the NATO summit due to take place on May 20 and 21 in Chicago, an important diplomatic summit to be hosted by U.S. President Barack Obama.

According to information obtained from Turkish diplomatic sources, Davutoğlu reacted to the criticism raised by some NATO members in the Brussels meeting who claimed bilateral problems should not be brought to the alliance by underlining that Turkey cannot consider a country which killed Turkish citizens in international waters as a partner.

Davutoğlu reminded the members that Turkey was a country that rescued citizens of other NATO member countries who were detained by Israel during the Mavi Marmara raid. “Go and tell Israel to apologize for the incident and to pay compensation for the Turkish citizens whom it massacred,” Davutoğlu said.

When asked whether Turkey would allow Israel to participate in the NATO process if Israel offers an apology and pays compensation for the lethal Mavi Marmara raid, diplomatic sources replied that a new assessment of the situation would be done in that case. “For Israel the biggest prize will be the normalization of relations with Turkey,” said the same diplomatic source.

In addition, Turkey prevented Israel from taking part in NATO’s long-term operation “Active Endeavor” in the Mediterranean Sea.