(Istanbul) The head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken, on his way to the Middle East, stopped off in Turkey to discuss the war in the Gaza Strip on Saturday with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and try to remove the last obstacles to Sweden’s entry into NATO.
Mr. Blinken, who arrived in Istanbul on Friday evening, begins a new regional tour which will take him notably to Israel, the occupied West Bank and Qatar, to plead in favor of increased aid to Gaza and talk about ways to avoid a regional conflagration , three months after the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.
President Erdogan, who was absent from Ankara at the time of Mr. Blinken’s previous visit to Turkey in early November, criticizes Washington for its support for Israel, whose military operations in the Gaza Strip have left 22,600 dead, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
Mr. Erdogan is one of the most vocal critics of Israel, which has vowed to “destroy” the Palestinian Islamist movement in retaliation for its unprecedented attack on Israeli soil on October 7, killing some 1,140 people. dead, mainly civilians.
In addition, 132 people are still hostages of Hamas.
For the strong man from Ankara, who has failed to play a mediating role between the Israelis and this Islamist movement, Israel is a “terrorist state” and Hamas, a “group of liberators”.
In the wake of the bloody attack of October 7, the Turkish president discreetly asked political executives of this Islamist movement living in Turkey to leave the country.
On Friday, the US State Department promised up to ten million dollars in exchange for information concerning five Hamas “financial facilitators”, three of whom reside in Turkey, according to Washington.
” As soon as possible ”
The thorny issue of Sweden’s membership in NATO is the other reason for Antony Blinken’s visit to Turkey.
The Foreign Affairs Committee of the Turkish Parliament half-opened the doors of the Atlantic Alliance to Sweden at the end of December, but the accession protocol must still be approved by the majority of deputies to put an end to the suspense which has lasted for almost 20 years. month.
Turkey is the last NATO member with Hungary to block the path of this Scandinavian country.
Ankara criticizes Sweden for its alleged leniency towards Kurdish militants who have taken refuge on its soil and uses its blocking power to obtain the delivery of 40 American F-16 combat planes and modernization kits for those it already has.
According to a diplomatic source in Ankara, the F-16 file was at the heart of a telephone conversation last week between Mr. Blinken and his Turkish counterpart, Hakan Fidan.
The Turkish parliament is officially on vacation until January 15. However, President Erdogan has the possibility of calling an extraordinary session.
The American government is not hostile to the sale of F-16s but Congress has so far opposed it due to historical tensions between Turkey and Greece – also a NATO member – although relations between these two countries have warmed up in recent months.
“We don’t think we should link the sale of F-16 upgrade kits to Turkey and Sweden’s membership in NATO – but some members of Congress take a different view and have linked the two,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller commented on Wednesday.
“I think the best thing that can happen to lead to progress […] is for Turkey to act as soon as possible to ratify Sweden’s membership,” he added.
Mr. Blinken, who is also due to meet in Istanbul with the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs, will make a brief stopover at the end of the day Saturday in Greece, which is worried about such a sale of combat planes to Ankara.