Israel’s Defence Minister and alternate Prime Minister, Benny Gantz, accused Turkey and Iran of destabilising the region and working against efforts to achieve peace, reported Reuters.
The criticisms came during a Zoom session yesterday with journalists and communication professionals from the Arab world, in which Gantz described Turkey and Iran as “denying promotion of peace and supporting regional aggression”.
Mohamed Al-Hammadi, the editor of Alroeya, an Arabic newspaper based in the UAE who took part in last month’s online forum with Israeli journalists and government officials regarding the role of the media to achieve peace in the Middle East, also added this conference.
Organised by the Arab Council for Regional Integration, participants were joined by two Saudi journalists.
During the call, Gantz said Israel’s new ties with the UAE and Bahrain enables further means to confront regional rival Iran, which is seen as a major threat to Israel.
He said: “We have the strategic tools to face Iran. We are stronger than them. Our collaborations give us new strategies and options, and the Iranians understand that too. The best strategy for regional stability is peace.”
The agreement has been hailed as a “historic breakthrough” that it said would further peace in the region, but the Palestinian Authority slammed it as “another stab in the back” by an Arab government, while Hamas said it was an “aggression” that dealt “serious prejudice” to the Palestinian cause.
Iran and Turkey condemned the normalisation of relations between Israel and Bahrain, saying it undermined the Palestinian cause.
Gantz added that dealing with Turkey was complicated by the fact that it was a member of NATO.
“We must take all the options that we have in our hands and try to influence it through international pressure to make sure that they are pulling their hands from direct terrorism.”
Source » middleeastmonitor