Ankara asks for beefed-up security at its TA embassy

Turks reduce security at Israel’s Ankara embassy.

By BEN HARTMAN
Injaz 311 (photo credit: Associated Press)
Injaz 311
(photo credit: Associated Press)
Ankara has called on Israeli officials to beef up security at its embassy in Tel Aviv, Turkish media reported on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, a Palestinian man made his way into the building and forced a standoff with embassy security.
Turkish diplomats said that the incident showed there is weak security at the building and that the quick response of Embassy security personnel, who shot Nadim Injaz in the leg, prevented a greater tragedy, the Istanbul-based paper Hurriyet reported.
The newspaper reported that on the same day the Turkish Embassy was raided in Tel Aviv, security guidelines for the Israeli Embassy in Ankara were downgraded and a set of barriers in front of the building was removed. The decision was reportedly made following a court ruling in favor of a petition submitted by a Turk in 2006 who contended that the security measures caused serious gridlock for commuters.
Israeli and Turkish officials have presented different versions of what happened on Tuesday night and how Injaz entered the building. The Israel Police said he was let into the building and Turkish officials contend that he broke in through a second-floor window.
Reporters from a Turkish television station filmed a video at the embassy on Tuesday night showing a correspondent easily climbing to a second-floor window by way of a low concrete wall, an area reportedly not covered by security cameras. One of the reporters said that some embassy officials were in hot water with superiors in Turkey for allowing reporters into the building to shoot a video that exposed security flaws.
With the diplomatic relationship between Israel and Turkey at one of its worst points ever, the incident seems to have taken on a life of its own online, with talkbackers in Turkish Web forums and news sites saying that the incident was staged by Israeli authorities, possibly as a means of repairing Israel-Turkey ties by showing a Palestinian attacking a Turkish state installation.
Under said conspiracy theory, Israelis hoped that the image of Turkish guards shooting a Palestinian man would cause Turks to abandon support for the Palestinians.