Turkey PM storms off stage over Peres remarks on Gaza

[Emit]

By The Associated Press


Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stormed off the stage at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday, red-faced from verbally sparring with President Shimon Peres over the recent fighting in Gaza.

Erdogan was angry after being cut off by a panel moderator after listening to an impassioned monologue by Peres defending Israel's recent 22-day offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Erdogan told Peres: "You are killing people."

Please note that no translation is provided for Erdogan's comments in the clip below.

A finger-pointing Peres told Erdogan at Thursday's panel that he would have done the same if rockets had been hitting Istanbul.

The Turkish prime minister asked the moderator, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, to let him speak once more.

"Only a minute," Ignatius replied.

Erdogan said in Turkish that, "I remember two former prime ministers in your country who said they felt very happy when they were able to enter Palestine on tanks."

"I find it very sad that people applaud what you said. There have been many people killed. And I think that it is very wrong and it is not humanitarian," he said.

Ignatius said, "We can't start the debate again. We just don't have time."

Erdogan said, "Please let me finish." Ignatius responded: "We really do need to get people to dinner."

The Turkish premier then said, "Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I don't think I will come back to Davos after this."

The confrontation saw Peres and Erdogan raise their voice shouting - highly unusual at the elite gathering of corporate and world leaders, which is usually marked by learned consensus seeking and polite dialogue. It showed how emotions remain frayed over Israel's offensive against Hamas that ended less than two weeks ago.

The packed audience at the Erdogan and Peres session, which included President Obama's close adviser Valerie Jarrett, appeared stunned.

~snip~

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1060036.html

Erdogan to Peres: "You Are Killing People"
January 29, 2009, 9:48PM


An amazing scene took place earlier today at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Ergogan responds forcefully to a long harangue from Shimon Peres, and walks off after Wapo's David Ignatius tries to shut him up. Many others in the audience then walk out following Edogan. ~snip~

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/dan_k/2009/01/erdogan-to-peres-you-are-killi.php

[ensho]

1. Ergogan the truth teller - glad others walked out with him

nt

[LeftishBrit]

4. Erdogan the politician.

Israel's actions deserve criticism; but when the criticism comes from someone whose own country is engaged in a long-term illegal occupation; has a somewhat unstable democracy with several military coups in modern times; and prohibits any acknowledgement of the Armenian genocide - then it seems a bit simplistic to call him a 'truth-teller'.

His actions are based on politics, not some moral devotion to the truth - and that's not shocking or unexpected. He *is* a politician, and virtually all politicians are to some degree hypocrites, especially with regard to foreign policy, (Yes, the Israeli politicians are too!)

[Emit]

5. Yes, point well put, honest brokers are few and far between

And politician Shimon Peres' denial of the Israeli occupation of Gaza is simply grotesque.

Now let me… I want you to listen because you watch all of your television, I can understand your feelings.

“Israel left Gaza completely, no occupation. We took out all of our soldiers from Gaza, all of our civilians. People are talking about settlements, we took out from Gaza all the settlements and all the settlers, fifteen thousand of them. Nobody forced us, it was our own choice. We had to mobilize forty-five thousand policemen to bring them back home, at the cost of 2.5 billion dollars.

I want to understand why did they fight rockets against us? What for? There was not any siege against Gaza. All the passages were open. Not only that, we participated in investing money in Gaza, to develop a, an agriculture. We at Peres Center, we ourselves put in twenty thousand dollars, twenty million dollars, sorry, to build green houses, to develop strawberries, the export of strawberries, excellent strawberries, flowers.

Jimmy Wolfensohn who was representative of the Quartet, took from his own pocket 5 million dollars to participate in it. They destroyed it. Why? They bombed all the passages. Why? Why did they fire at us, what did they want?" We didn't occupy, there was never a day of starvation in Gaza! By the way, Israel is the supplier of water daily to Gaza, Israel is the supplier of fuel to Gaza, the only thing we didn't permit to bring in was rockets from Iran!

However, I guess it is a matter of how one defines it:
Is Gaza 'occupied' territory?
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/01/06/israel.gaza.occupation.question/

[msongs]

2. thank koresh hamas and palestinians never kill people eh? turkish hypocrite indeed nt

[Emit]

3. Did Erdogan make that claim?