BICOM

Turkish Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu said yesterday that the organisers of the Gaza aid flotilla which plans to set sail later this month should wait and reconsider their mission in light of changes being made in the Gaza Strip. Davutoglu told the organisers to see how the opening of the Egyptian-Gaza Rafah border crossing would affect the situation. Davutoglu noted, however, that the flotilla was organised by a non-government group, the Humanitarian Aid Foundation (IHH), and therefore there was no legal way to stop the departure of the ships.

Israel prefers a diplomatic solution to halt the flotilla from entering the naval blockade around Gaza, but the IDF says it will be prepared to take the necessary actions and deal with the situation if the ships proceed to attempt to break the blockade. The previous incident in May 2010, when navy commandos boarded a ship heading for Gaza, led to nine Turks being killed. Since then, Israel has eased restriction of goods and services flowing in and out of Gaza and the border crossing with Egypt was recently reopened.