Amid strained relations with Israel, Turkey detained 33 suspects accused of planning abductions and spying for Mossad.
Turkey announced on Tuesday that it had detained 33 people suspected of planning abductions and spying on behalf of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service. Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya stated that the suspects were rounded up in raids across Istanbul and seven other provinces.
It was not immediately clear whether they were Israeli nationals or locals allegedly working with Mossad. Yerlikaya’s office released video footage showing armed security service agents breaking down doors and handcuffing suspects in their homes.
The Istanbul public prosecutor’s office mentioned that 13 additional suspects remained at large. The raids occurred weeks after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned of “serious consequences” should Israel attempt to target figures from the Palestinian militant group Hamas living or working in Turkey.
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“There is an insidious operation and sabotage attempts being made against Turkey and its interests,” Erdogan said after the raids were announced. “We will definitely destroy this game,” he added in televised remarks.
Relations between Turkey and Israel deteriorated following the outbreak of the war in Gaza nearly three months ago. Erdogan has become one of the world’s harshest critics of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Last week, the Turkish leader compared Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler and demanded that Israel’s Western allies drop their support for the “terrorism” conducted by Israeli troops in Gaza.
Erdogan has also recalled Ankara’s envoy to Tel Aviv and pushed for the trial of Israeli commanders and political leaders at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The president’s ruling Islamic conservative AKP party also led tens of thousands of protesters out on the streets of Istanbul on Monday for one of Turkey’s biggest anti-Israel rallies of the entire war.
Miroslava Salazar, with AFP
