Israeli FM says NATO should expel Turkey after Erdogan threatens Israel

This isn’t the first time NATO has been called on to expel or at least discipline Turkey.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz called on NATO to expel Turkey as a member after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to invade Israel.

Katz said, “The US and the Western world must denounce Erdogan and curb his destructive actions” and said Turkey had joined Iran’s “Axis of evil.”

In an unprecedented statement on Sunday, Erdogan threatened to invade Israel to stop the war in Gaza.

“We must be very strong so that Israel can’t do these…things to Palestine,” Erdogan said at a meeting of his AK party held in Rize, Turkey.

“Just like we entered Karabakh [Azerbaijan], just like we entered Libya, we might do similar to them,” Erdogan said in the televised discussion.

Following Erdogan’s statement on Sunday, Katz compared him to the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein who also threatened to invade Israel.

“Erdogan is following in the footsteps of [Iraqi despot] Saddam Hussein by threatening to attack Israel,” wrote Katz on social media platform X.

“He should remember how that turned out and how it ended.”

The war of words escalated as Erdogan compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler.

“Just as the genocidal Hitler met his end, so will the genocidal Netanyahu,” read an official media release from Erdogan’s office.

“Those who tried to eliminate the Palestinians will be held accountable, just like the genocidal Nazis. Humanity will stand with the Palestinians. You will not be able to eliminate the Palestinians.”

Erdogan has long made incendiary remarks against Israel and Netanyahu, as evidenced by his statement in May 2024 that “Israel is not just a threat to Gaza but the whole world.”

This isn’t the first NATO has been called on to expel or at least discipline Turkey.

In 2019, NATO member states such as Germany, France, the UK and the United States were concerned about Turkey’s military actions in Syria and urged Erdogan to cease.

At that time, US Senator Lindsey Graham proposed “Bipartisan sanctions against Turkey if they invade Syria” and to “call for their suspension from NATO if they attack Kurdish forces who assisted the U.S. in the destruction of the ISIS Caliphate.”

Israel-Turkey relationsNATORecep Tayyip Erdogan