Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan will be traveling to the Egyptian capital Cairo on Wednesday to attend a meeting of the D-8 Organization for Economic Cooperation, diplomatic sources said Tuesday.
The war in Gaza and other regional issues, as well as the D-8 organization’s progress report, the adoption of the next secretary-general’s candidacy, the D-8 secretariat’s budget and other organizational matters will be on the agenda.
Fidan is expected to call for an end to Israel’s genocidal attacks on Palestine, as well as attempts to spread the war into a regional conflict.
The minister is expected to point out the importance of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
Fidan will also stress international pressure on Israel and its allies must be increasingly maintained on all levels.
Türkiye is a fierce critic of Israel’s now yearlong war on blockaded Gaza and its deadly push into Lebanon and Syria, accusing the United Nations of failing to sanction Israel over the conflicts and its Western allies of supporting its violent methods.
Israel has continued its devastating offensive on Gaza since an attack last year by Hamas, despite a U.N. Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire.
More than 45,000 people have since been killed, mostly women and children, and over 102,000 others injured, according to local health authorities.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has branded Netanyahu the “butcher of Gaza” and compared him to Nazi Germany’s Adolf Hitler. He also called on the U.N. to impose an arms embargo on Israel, which he said would be an “effective solution” to end the Gaza war.
The Turkish government suspended trade relations with Israel last May and applied to join a genocide case at the ICJ against Tel Aviv.
The foreign ministers of D-8 countries, which include Türkiye, Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Nigeria and Pakistan, came together in Istanbul in June to discuss the Palestine-Israel conflict.
Fidan will argue the meeting made significant contributions to regional efforts and underscore the need for international support for the reconstruction of Gaza and Lebanon.
The D-8 was primarily founded as an economic body, and its extraordinary meetings on Gaza have been the first of their kind solely focused on a political issue.
The Turkish diplomat will also underline the importance of fully implementing the Preferential Trade Agreement, which all members have signed. He will argue for supporting small and medium-sized enterprises, vital for creating jobs for youths in D-8 nations.
The D-8 organization was established in Istanbul in 1997 through the efforts of the late Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, a political mentor of Erdoğan.