How can UN protect others when it cannot defend its own staff?: Turkish president

By Muhammed Enes Calli

ISTANBUL (AA) - Türkiye's president on Tuesday asked how the UN can defend the rights of others amid Israel's attacks on UN peacekeepers in Lebanon, when it is unable to protect the rights of its own personnel.

"We have followed with embarrassment as the UN Security Council and international organizations have been completely powerless in the face of Israel's impudence," Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at the Global Diplomacy and Future of Palestine conference in Ankara.

"How much longer will the UN Security Council stand by and watch our region turn into a sea of blood, with civilians in Gaza being burned alive?" he said.

"We witnessed how the human rights organizations and global media outlets play the role of three monkeys when it comes to the rights of innocent children killed in Gaza," he added.

Erdogan also said that Palestinians have been enduring this oppression for decades while Israel has perpetuated its policies of occupation, destruction and execution uninterrupted for 76 years.

"We can predict where this expansionism will lead if Israel, which is becoming increasingly arrogant and aggressive, is not stopped," he added.

Israel has mounted massive airstrikes across Lebanon against what it claims are Hezbollah targets since Sept. 23, killing at least 1,542 people, injuring over 4,555 others, and displacing more than 1.34 million people. It also began a ground invasion earlier this month.

The campaign is an escalation from a year of cross-border warfare between Israel and Hezbollah since the start of its offensive on the Gaza Strip, in which Israel has killed more than 42,000 people, most of them women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.