Gaza: Turkish lawmaker collapses moments after saying Israel will ‘suffer Allah’s wrath’
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A Turkish lawmaker collapsed in parliament on Tuesday, suffering a severe heart attack at the end of a livestreamed parliamentary speech in which he berated Israel and said it wouldn’t be able to “escape the wrath of Allah.”
Times of Israel reports that Hasan Bitmez, 53, of the conservative Felicity Party, delivered an address at the General Assembly of the Turkish parliament, ending it by saying that “we can perhaps hide from our conscience but not from history,” and by addressing the Jewish state: “You will not escape the wrath of Allah.”
He then said, “I salute you all,” immediately before collapsing to the ground at the podium, with his head hitting the floor.
Fellow members of the assembly rushed to his side.
According to Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca, Bitmez was hospitalized and his condition was “extremely critical and serious.”
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Recall that Turkey had been in the midst of an effort to warm ties with Israel in the months before Hamas’s October 7 onslaught in southern Israel and the ensuing war, but Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has since sharply backtracked and returned to the same vitriolic attacks that characterized many of the Islamist leader’s previous years in power.
Last week, Erdogan reiterated his belief that Hamas is not a terror group and said it must have a part in rebuilding Gaza after the war, despite the backing Israel has received from the West to eliminate the Palestinian terror group from the coastal enclave, which it has ruled since 2007.
