President Isaac Herzog hit out on Sunday at Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan’s Friday comments that “Israelis are a burden on the world.”
“A few days ago, I heard a senior official in the Turkish administration make a terrible antisemitic statement, according to him, ‘Israel is a burden on the world.’ And my answer to him is simple: Israel is here to stay, and it is a blessing to the world,” Herzog said.
“Israel stands at the forefront against the terrorism threatening the entire world. Around the world, Israeli innovations and inventions bring blessings to billions of people every day.”
Herzog was reffering to comments that Fidan made on Friday, in which he claimed that Israel was a problem for the entire world.
“Israel is not only Turkey’s problem, and it is not only President [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan’s problem,” the Turkish foreign minister said. “These people have become a burden that humanity can no longer bear. The human conscience cannot bear it, political systems cannot sustain it, and economic systems cannot sustain it either.
Herzog says Israel stands at forefront of war against terrorism
Herzog, speaking at a Sunday event commemorating the anniversary of Theodor Herzl’s death, called for unity before Israeli elections.
“Elections are our ability to change the reality in which we live, through arguments, through debate and disagreement, but beneath them there must be the knowledge that we are building a shared tomorrow here,” he said.
“Our descendants will not remember the arguments we waged. They will live within what we choose to build,” he continued.
Herzog continued his call for unity in his speech, and recalled Herzl’s founding beliefs.
“Herzl’s message is not only that we have a state; the message is that we will know what to do with it, that true freedom also requires true responsibility. That the root lives not because there are no branches that break, but because we renew them. Every generation and every time anew.”
He then went on to praise Israel’s resilience over the past few years.
“Even when the State of Israel is forced to fight for its existence, it does not stop building and being built and contributing to humanity. Precisely in heavy and difficult years in which the State of Israel is struggling against existential dangers, we know that we are fighting the war of enlightenment and humanity,” he said.
“Precisely when the State of Israel stands at the forefront of the campaign against terrorism, at the forefront of the campaign against those who seek to threaten many countries in the region and the entire world, Israel leads not only through its military power, but also leads in the productive and creative world.
“It protects the free world. It is indeed a small nation, but its contribution to humanity is enormous.”
