Turkish councilman praises Hitler for killing Jews

A local politician from Türkiye’s Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has publicly praised Adolf Hitler’s genocide of the Jews, adding that he was “praying” for the Nazi leader.

Suleyman Sezen, who represents President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s party in the Atakum district council in the province of Samsun, made the comments at a meeting on Wednesday.

“Hitler had this remark, ‘You will curse me for every Jew that I did not kill.’ Such true words, as Zionist Jewish Israel today is behind every single attempt at creating chaos in the world,” the politician declared in a rant shared online. He added that he prayed for “God’s mercy and grace on [Hitler] for his words.”

Sezen expressed hope that Israel “will soon cease to exist and there will be peace in the world once it is cleansed of Jews.” A fellow council member pushed back after Sezen’s remarks, suggesting they were an emotional outburst.

The speech came after the bombing of a Gaza hospital on Tuesday further inflamed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel has denied responsibility for the strike, claiming it was caused by a misfired Palestinian rocket. Türkiye is among the Muslim nations to have blamed the Jewish state.

Just before the hospital strike, the Israeli National Security Council urged its citizens to leave Türkiye. The bombing triggered rioting in Türkiye’s largest city, Istanbul, during which protesters attempted to breach the security fence around the Israeli consulate and set the compound on fire. Israel subsequently pulled its diplomats out of the country, according to reports.

The purported Hitler quote was mentioned in a 2018 report by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), a Washington-based think tank co-founded by a former Israeli intelligence officer. The report stated that it was popular on Turkish Twitter (now renamed as X) among accounts expressing anti-Semitic views.

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