FM: Turkey chose wrong diplomacy

Lieberman says Israel doesn't need to apologize for flotilla raid.

Lieberman talks to cameras 311 (photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski )
Lieberman talks to cameras 311
(photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski )
Israel will not be delivering an apology to Turkey over the flotilla events, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said in an Army Radio interview from Helsinki Tuesday morning.
Lieberman was reiterating comments he made the previous day, in response to the Turkish foreign minister's threatening to cut ties with Israel.
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"Every nation chooses its own diplomacy and to my sorrow Turkey has chosen the wrong direction," Lieberman said during the interview.
Lieberman explained that Israel does not need to apologize or change its diplomacy as a result of Turkey choosing the wrong course of diplomacy. Israel's handling with Turkey has been "very reasonable" said the foreign minister.
"It is as if we place ourselves in the Ayatollah Revolution of Iran in the 1970s," explained Lieberman regarding the changes in Turkey's diplomacy. "We need to understand that we are not the problem, but only the excuse."
The anger that was displayed after learning about Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer's secret meeting with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, did not damage his relationship with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, added Lieberman. There was no need for him and the prime minister to "open a new page," he said.
"We meet on a regular basis every Friday," he said, noting the last week's meeting was not out of the ordinary.
"It was not an emergency meeting. There is nothing personal here... regarding the decision to meet with the Turkish foreign minister.  Barak also said that he was against the meeting and announced that timing was not fitting."