Special to WorldTribune.com

Abraham Rabinovich, Washington Free Beacon

JERUSALEM—Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Wednesday called Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “a neighborhood bully” whose constant criticism of Israel fanned the flames of anti-Semitism in the Middle East and Europe.

Lieberman was reacting to an attack by Erdogan on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for “daring” to attend the march in Paris for the victims of last week’s killings by Islamic gunmen. …

“Most of the public dialogue, particularly in France, was about freedom of expression, radicalism, and Islamophobia but not about anti-Semitism, and that’s been very worrying,” he said. “These same countries remain silent in the face of Erdogan’s repeated verbal attacks on Israel, which he calls a ‘terror state,’ contributing to murderous hatred towards Jews in Europe.”

Lieberman said that this “cultured,” “politically correct” silence that is extended also to “a neighborhood bully like Erdogan and his bunch, brings us back to the reality of the 1930s.” Four Jews were killed in a kosher supermarket in Paris Friday by an Islamic terrorist who was subsequently killed by police. A total of 17 people died in the terror attacks that began with the shootings at the Charlie Hebdo office. …

Erdogan said at a press conference that Western hypocrisy and Islamophobia lay behind the Paris killings. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who had attended the Paris march, was also at the press conference which was held in Erdogan’s new 1,000-room presidential palace, built at a reported cost of $614 million.

Erdogan singled out for condemnation Netanyahu’s participation in the march. “How dare he go there?” he asked. Referring to video clips showing Netanyahu waving to the crowd as he marched near French President Francois Hollande, Erdogan said “How can a man who has killed 2,500 people in Gaza with state terrorism wave his hand in Paris, as if people there were waiting in excitement for him to do so?”

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  Israel’s FM Lieberman charges Turkey’s Erdogan fanned flames of anti-Semitism, LIFE, WorldTribune.com