Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told CNN on Monday “We hope that the situation in Gaza will be improved, that the situation will be back to the diplomatic track and that will create a new atmosphere in Turkish-Israeli relations as well.

“But in the existing situation, of course, we are criticizing this approach, [the] Israeli approach.”

The statement from the senior official is a first signal that Ankara is not overly actions to accept the breakdown in relations that resulted from this week’s decision to oust Israel from the multinational military exercise dubbed Anatolia Eagle. As a result of Turkey’s decision, the United States and Rome pulled out, resulting in the cancelation of the event.

Foreign Ministry officials in Israel on Monday met to discuss the latest political row with Turkey, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak released a statement calling for calm, stressing the importance of the long-standing relations between Israel and Turkey, a relationship that Barak stated should not be hastily discarded based on the incident surrounding Anatolia Eagle.

(Yechiel Spira – YWN Israel)