GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 297

Diplomacy Hopes

Totally Nuts

Those are the words of a world leader in response to Turkish leader Erdogan saying they will invade Israel in light of the talk of a harsh military response to Hezbollah as we see in an article from The Jerusalem Post:

Following what could seem like a threat by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, where he implied Turkey would enter Israel like the country had done with others in the past, politicians began expressing their condemnations on the matter over social media.

The Israeli Foreign Minister took to X to respond to the threat:

Foreign Minister Israel Katz slammed Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a post on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday night.

"Erdogan is following Sadam Hussein's path and threatens to attack Israel. He needs to remember what happened there and how it ended," wrote the Israeli minister in his post.

Another Israeli minister was less diplomatic:

Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli posted on his X account in Turkish. He wrote that he “hears the threats [from] the pro-Hamas [Erdogan],” and slammed him, adding he is a “clown, and the Turkish people know it.”

Even a political leader who if on the left let loose on Erdogan:

Opposition leader and Chairman of Yesh Atid party Yair Lapid wrote on X, “President Erdogan is ranting and raving again. He is a danger to the Middle East."

Lapid even called for him to not help Hamas:

He further wrote that NATO must condemn the threats and "force him to end his support for Hamas."

A Dutch politician wants strong actions taken:

After reading The Jerusalem Post's article, Dutch Parliament Member Geert Wilders posted on X, stating that President Erdogan “is totally nuts,” and suggesting the country be removed from NATO.

He described Erdogan as an "Islamofascist."

Turkey Responds

In another article from the Post we hear responses from Turkey:

The Turkish Foreign Ministry on Monday compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the World War II German Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler in a post on X.

“Just as genocidal Hitler ended, so will genocidal Netanyahu,” the post stated.

“Just as the genocidal Nazis were held accountable, those who tried to destroy the Palestinians will also be held accountable,” it added. “Humanity will stand with the Palestinians.”

Another government leader from Turkey gave his view:

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan wrote on X that Erdogan had “become the voice of humanity’s conscience.”“International Zionist circles, especially Israel, who want to suppress this righteous voice are in great alarm.“History ended the same way for all genociders and their supporters,” Fidan said.

Erdogan’s words make it very clear what he thinks of Israel:

Erdogan, who has been a fierce critic of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas, began discussing the war during a speech praising his country’s defense industry.

“We must be very strong so that Israel can’t do these ridiculous things to Palestine. Just like we entered Karabakh, just like we entered Libya, we might do similar to them,” Erdogan told a meeting of his ruling AK Party in his hometown of Rize.

“There is no reason why we cannot do this ... We must be strong so that we can take these steps,” Erdogan added in the televised address.

The article does give us more context for Erdogan’s comments:

Erdogan’s threats come amid a dramatic flare-up in the nine-month cross-border war between the IDF and Hezbollah. A Hezbollah-launched Iranian rocket landed in the Druze village of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights on Saturday, killing 12 children.

The Turkish leader spoke as the international community is scrambling to avert a larger Israeli-Lebanese war or a regional one.

Can Turkey just unilaterally invade Israel? Here is what the article says about that:

Turkey, however, is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and as such, it is unlikely that it could intervene militarily in the IDF-Hezbollah conflict.

The report concludes with the obvious and actually could be the start of why Turkey will be part of the War of Gog and Magog:

Relations between Israel and Turkey, which had been on the mend prior to the Gaza war, have frayed, with Ankara stopping all trade with Israel in May.

What Kind Of Response?

Of course all the world wants to know how Israel will respond to the attack from Hezbollah that killed 12 young children. We read about possible answers to that in an article from The Times Of Israel:

With the region on edge ahead of an expected Israeli retaliation against Hezbollah for a deadly rocket strike on Saturday, Western diplomats urged de-escalation, while Israeli officials suggested that the response would be serious but not lead to an all-out conflagration.

Israel doesn’t want a war:

Israeli officials speaking to Reuters said Israel wants to hurt Hezbollah, but not drag the Middle East into regional war, while other Israeli officials told the wire service that the IDF is preparing for the possibility of a few days of fighting with the Iran-backed Lebanese terror group.

The PM said that they have to do something strong:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Majdal Shams on Monday, saying that “these children are our children; they are all the children of all of us.”

Netanyahu said that “Israel will not and cannot let this simply pass on by. Our response will come, and it will be harsh.”

A diplomatic Israeli source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that “the estimation is that the response will not lead to an all-out war… That would not be in our interest at this point.”

The United States wants to calm things down:

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with President Isaac Herzog on Monday to urge Israel and Hezbollah step back from any escalation.

A statement from the State Department said that in his call with Herzog, Blinken “emphasized the importance of preventing escalation of the conflict and discussed efforts to reach a diplomatic solution to allow citizens on both sides of the border between Israel and Lebanon to return home.”

America is working on the Lebanon side as well:

Lebanese officials have held a flurry of calls with Amos Hochstein, a senior adviser to US President Joe Biden who frequently handles delicate negotiations in Lebanon, also seeking to tamp down on escalation, according to an unnamed Lebanese diplomat.

The White House later reiterated its stance that Israel has every right to respond to Hezbollah following Saturday’s attack, but that it was “confident” that a wider conflagration could be avoided.

Another US spokesperson says that talk of a war is overblown:

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that US and Israeli officials had conversations at “multiple levels” over the weekend, and that the risk of a full-blown conflict is “exaggerated.”

“Nobody wants a broader war, and I’m confident that we’ll be able to avoid such an outcome,” Kirby said in a call with reporters. “We all heard about this ‘all-out war’ at multiple points over the last 10 months, those predictions were exaggerated then, quite frankly, we think they’re exaggerated now.”

One diplomat says that the response will only be for show:

“It’s clear that [Israel] wants to take a stance, but without leading to a generalized conflict,” the anonymous diplomat said. “It’s sure that there will be a retaliation. It will be symbolic. It may be spectacular, but it will not be a reason for both parties to engage in a general escalation.”

Iran is warning Israel to think twice:

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, meanwhile, threatened that an Israeli attack on Lebanon will have serious consequences for the Jewish state.

Speaking to French President Emanuel Macron, Pezeshkian said that “any possible Israeli attack on Lebanon will have serious consequences for Israel,” according to Iranian state media.

Hezbollah simply can’t just take the lives of 12 innocent children and think that diplomacy will spare them of a counter attack. I can easily see that Israel will try and target the leader of Hezbollah and leave it at that. However Iran can quickly act if that happens and then no diplomat can stop a regional war.