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Turkey Launches 'Mediterranean Storm' Maneuvers

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg (L) speaks next to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a press conference after their meeting in Athens on 10 October 2019. [ARIS MESSINIS/AFP via Getty Images]
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg (L) speaks next to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a press conference after their meeting in Athens on 10 October 2019. [ARIS MESSINIS/AFP via Getty Images]
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Turkey Launches 'Mediterranean Storm' Maneuvers

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg (L) speaks next to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a press conference after their meeting in Athens on 10 October 2019. [ARIS MESSINIS/AFP via Getty Images]
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg (L) speaks next to Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a press conference after their meeting in Athens on 10 October 2019. [ARIS MESSINIS/AFP via Getty Images]

The Turkish Ministry of Defense announced launching the “Mediterranean Storm” maneuvers from September 6th to 10th.

The statement continued that “Turkish air, land, and sea forces are participating in the exercises,” and that “the exercises include joint and actual exercises on airstrikes and combat search and rescue operations.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said: They will understand that Turkey has political, economic, military might needed to cast off immoral maps and documents imposed by others.”

“Turkey is prepared for any type of sharing, so long as it’s honest”, he added.

Turkey supports an initiative on talks between military officials of Turkey and Greece, which was launched by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Hulusi Akar said at a graduation ceremony at the National Defense University in Ankara.

France’s statements on the Eastern Mediterranean and Iraq “do not contribute to the spirit of the alliance, nor to peace or dialogue,” Akar said.

In the same context, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu discussed last Friday with Stoltenberg the latest developments during a phone call.

Earlier, Foreign Affairs Minister Nikos Dendias briefed UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Turkey’s provocations against peace and regional stability in the Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean, at their meeting in New York on Friday.

In the meantime, the Turkish opposition renewed its criticism to the president and the government as well as for ruining ties with Egypt. Faik Oztrak, the spokesman of the Republican People's Party, said that Greece managed to isolate Turkey diplomatically while Erdogan was busy accomplishing his ‘empty dreams’ which he has been committed to for years.

Oztrak criticized Turkey declaring its readiness to sit and talk with everyone.

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Arab World

UN Investigator Says Israel Still Conducting ‘Starvation Campaign’ in Gaza

Palestinian children queue to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 16, 2024. (Reuters)
Palestinian children queue to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 16, 2024. (Reuters)
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UN Investigator Says Israel Still Conducting ‘Starvation Campaign’ in Gaza

Palestinian children queue to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 16, 2024. (Reuters)
Palestinian children queue to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, October 16, 2024. (Reuters)

The UN independent investigator on the right to food insisted Israel is still conducting “a starvation campaign” in Gaza, despite its delivery of over 1 million tons of aid, including 700,000 tons of food to the territory since it launched its military operation a year ago.

Michael Fakhri told reporters Friday that food is not calories and Palestinians have not gotten adequate food or calories.

The United States, Israel’s closest ally, recently warned Israel that it must increase the amount of humanitarian aid it is allowing into Gaza within 30 days or it could risk losing access to US weapons funding.

Fakhri said: “Based on a year-long starvation campaign and a 24-year blockade and siege, allowing a few more trucks to enter in now does not actually address the humanitarian needs.”

“But most importantly, what Israel is saying contradicts everything every humanitarian organization is saying now, and has been saying,” he said.

Fakhri said humanitarian officials call Israel’s rules on what is allowed into Gaza “opaque and absurd.”

Convoys that make it through are often shot at and targeted by Israeli forces despite coordination with Israeli authorities, he said. “And then even if those convoys get past that, civilians seeking aid have been shot at and killed several times.”

Israel’s UN Mission did not respond to a request for comment on Fakhri’s press conference.