Erdogan meets Hamas leader amid reports terror group wants to relocate
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has met Hamas’s leader for talks amid reports the terror group is seeking to move its political headquarters from Qatar.
Turkish TV showed Erdogan and Ismail Haniyeh warmly embracing at the meeting in Istanbul yesterday, during which they discussed humanitarian assistance to Gaza, and sanctions that Ankara recently announced against Israel.
The meeting comes amid reports that Hamas is on the lookout for a new base for its operations abroad after Qatar signalled that it no longer wants to host the group.
Doha is reportedly frustrated at the lack of movement in ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel since the terror group launched a brutal attack on October 7 last year, killing around 1200 Israelis and taking 250 hostages.
“Qatar is in the process of a complete re-evaluation of its role,” Qatari ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani said earlier this week. “There are limits to this role and limits to the ability to which we can contribute to these negotiations in a constructive way.”
Hamas’s political hierarchy has been based in Qatar since 2012, where the Gulf kingdom has put them up in luxury hotels as it has taken on a role as a mediator.
But Hamas has reached out to Oman and at least one other country in the region in recent days to ask if it could relocate there, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). Hamas yesterday denied the report, accusing the WSJ of being “part of the Israeli media propaganda”.
The meeting between Haniyeh and Erdogan has raised suspicions that Turkey may be looking to fill the gap left by Qatar.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan visited Doha last week in a sign that Ankara is seeking to deepen ties with Hamas.
The terror group has had a second, smaller office in Istanbul since 2011, and Turkey has long supported the Islamist ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is an offshoot.
Erdogan has long refused to call Hamas a terror group, instead branding it a liberation army, and since the October 7
attack he has been one of its most vocal supporters.
Haniyeh was in Istanbul on October 7, but was reportedly asked to leave after photos emerged showing Palestinian gunmen celebrating after killing hundreds of civilians. Shortly afterwards, Ankara recalled its ambassador to Israel, and Israel extracted its diplomatic team from Turkey.
In January, Erdogan announced that he was helping to provide documentation for South Africa’s case against Israel in the International Court of Justice accusing the Jewish state of genocide. Erdogan has also compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler over the tactics employed by the Israeli army in Gaza.