Turkish President Gül and Batia Keinan

 

 

Weizman saw Turkey as balancing country

Tuesday, April 26, 2005

ANKARA - Turkish Daily News

A former spokesperson for the late Israeli President Exer Weizman said yesterday that he perceived Turkey as a country that provided a strategic balance in the turbulent Middle East and appreciated it as the first Muslim state that recognized Jewish Israel.

"He believed that the [Israeli] relationship with Turkey provided a strategic balance," Batia Keinan, now cultural attaché at the Israeli Consulate in Istanbul told the Turkish Daily News. Weizman also saw Turkey's role important for peace in the region, she added. Keinan was the spokesperson for Weizman between 1993 and 2000.