Turkey stopped all imports and exports to and from Israel, the Turkish Ministry of Trade announced, citing the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza as reported by Al Jazeera.
As of Thursday, the government announced that all export and import transactions pertaining to Israel have been discontinued. They continued, “Turkey will strictly and decisively implement these new measures until the Israeli Government allows an uninterrupted and sufficient flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.”
The Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was allegedly breaking agreements by impeding Israeli imports and exports from ports, according to Israel’s foreign minister, who made this decision. Israel Katz said, “This is how a dictator behaves, disregarding the interests of the Turkish people and businessmen, and ignoring international trade agreements,” according to a post on X. Katz further disclosed that he has given the Ministry of Foreign Affairs instructions to look into alternate trade alternatives with Turkey, with a focus on imports from other nations and home manufacturing.
In 2023, the two countries’ combined trade volume was USD 6.8 billion. Due to Israel’s interference with Ankara’s participation in humanitarian airdrops to Gaza and its military operations in the area, Turkey placed trade sanctions on Israel last month.
Erdogan has said that Turkey no longer has “intense trade” with Israel, saying, “That is done,” in spite of Turkey’s harsh language. Al Jazeera reports that he did not, however, specifically state that Ankara has stopped all trade with Israel.